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A review of The Color of Magic/The Light Fantastic

by Terry Pratchett

An improbable and extremely humorous odyssey through fantasy and fairy tale.

Reviewed by: Kit Thomas
About Kit Thomas

The Color of Magic/The Light Fantastic The first and second of the now infamous Discworld series, if you haven't read any of the series as yet you may well be the only person left on the planet who hasn't. If you are that person, I suggest you immediately remedy the situation by starting with this outing to the nascent Discworld.

Set on a flat Earth supported by four elephants which are in turn supported by a colossal spacefaring turtle, the story starts with the arrival of the Discworld's first tourist, Twoflower, his Luggage, the only specimen of its kind which never ends up in Novosibirsk without you, and Rincewind, his slightly blackmailed guide who is to wizardly heroes what Homer Simpson is to rocket scientists.

Our two unwitting protagonists, and of course the unwilling one, start with a tour of the Discworld's biggest city, Ankh Morpork, which if you've not had the pleasure, has always struck me as being based on Bangkok, which if you've not been there either is big, corrupt, dirty, polluted, smells like the nether end of hell after a bean and cabbage dinner and still manages to be one of the most fascinating and beguiling places on Earth. Having seen the sights and a few brawls and managing not to get mugged, raped or murdered our proto-tourist, Twoflower commits one of those simple cross-cultural faux pas which results in the city being burnt to the ground.

From that point onwards the plot is in the lap of the Gods, literally, as Fate and the Lady contend from on high to get our heroes killed, or not, as the case may be and the wagers may lie. To outline too much more of the plot would spoil the jokes (many) and possibly give the impression that there isn't one (a plot that is) as it swoops and winds in and out of fairy tale, fantasy novels we have known and loved, history and myth (real or imagined).

Pratchett is an arch-satirist and this medium, this imaginary world, is rich with the foibles of humankind and what we choose to call civilisation. Dipping into fable and fantasy in this adventure, (the two books in the anthology are two parts of the same episode effectively), he exposes those facets of human nature that naively walk through the most dangerous parts of places they don't know, with an expensive camera over one shoulder, a pocket full of high denomination dollar bills and no thought for the consequences. If you've ever travelled, you can't help but secretly cringe at Twoflower being you (not that I've ever been there and done this you understand!) and if you haven't travelled much...TAKE NOTES!

Rincewind, on the other hand is the ultimate anti-hero. Not the dark side of heroism as portrayed by Clint Eastwood etc., but what you get if you distil all the heroism out, leaving only a streetwise but inept example of thaumaturgical detritus. ...And then there's the Luggage.

It has often been pondered, by those of us who have arrived home and upon opening their rucksack have discovered that the large bottle of Duty Free vodka and all of their clothes have been exchanged at Customs for clothes of a different size and no vodka at all, if there is a kind of inverse square law relating to hasslefreeness of journey and likelihood of receiving own luggage off carousel on return. Pratchett has solved this by inventing sapient luggage which not only transports but launders your clothes and has the integral extra feature of being entirely lethal to anyone around it that isn't you. Now whilst this last is a feature of all badly controlled luggage, most of it doesn't have hundreds of little legs and its own bad attitude. The Luggage is a law unto itself and clearly deserves a book/spin off series of its own (and it's not even stood here making me say that, honest!). In the inexorable spiral of disaster the Luggage plays a key part in rescuing the doomsome twosome, or would have if they hadn't already run away.

All that's left to say is don't read this while anyone's watching or you may be the victim of an unexpected Heimlich Manoeuvre as Pratchett's acid and penetrating wit makes you choke on your gum/tongue/lunchtime sandwich, and the Discworld only gets better from here...you have been warned!

Click here to buy this book, or read more about it at Amazon.com: The Color of Magic/The Light Fantastic

Copyright © by Kit Thomas, 2002

Reviewed by Kit Thomas:
-- The Color of Magic/The Light Fantastic - by Terry Pratchett
-- Katherine - by Anya Seton
-- The Cat in the Hat - by Dr Seuss
-- Excession - by Iain M. Banks









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