Tag Archives: Terry Pratchett

100K Blog – Signed Books by Pratchett, Gaiman, and More (and Moore)

This is a Worldbuilders blog.

Okay. I’ve had my holiday break. I’m relatively rested and recharged.  You’ll be seeing more blogs than normal in these next couple weeks. Not just fundraiser stuff, but some other blogs that I’ve been meaning to post for some time.

We hit our 100K target a week or so back. So, as promised, here’s a bonus blog full of books I’m personally adding to the lottery. A lot of these I’ve collected over the last year while attending conventions. Most of them are first editions and signed by the authors.

I’ll be doing another bonus blog when we hit 150K. Which, judging by the look of that thermometer over there, is probably going to happen pretty soon….

Recently someone wrote me an e-mail asking, “What do you do when your life sucks and you don’t want to write any more?”

I replied, “I read Terry Pratchett.”

It amazes me that there are some fantasy readers out there that still haven’t read Pratchett. I can’t fix that for everyone, but one person in the lottery is going to win the chance to read all the Pratchett their geeky little heart desires….

I got to meet Terry Pratchett this year, though only very briefly. In this blog I told the story of how I was lucky enough to get him to sign one book for me.

This was that book. I could probably auction it off for a pretty penny. But I’d rather put it in the lottery where anyone can get it.

Honestly, I don’t have any idea where I got these ARCs. But I figured I’d throw them into the mix, too. Thud! is one of my very favorite Discworld novels.

  • One first edition hardcover copy of The Emerald Atlas by John Stephens. Signed by the author.

“This fast-paced, fully imagined fantasy is by turns frightening and funny, and the siblings are well-crafted and empathetic heroes. Highly enjoyable, it should find many readers.” – Publishers Weekly

“This book has it all: a creepy setting, a deadly curse, reincarnation, spells, witchcraft and voodoo, plus characters that simply will not let the reader put the book down until finished…Who could ask for more?” – VOYA

  • One first edition hardcover copy of Akata Witch by Nnedi Okorafor. Signed by the author.

I’ve already gushed about Nnedi a couple times here on the blog in this last month. So I won’t bother repeating myself. Besides, why would you bother listening to me when Ursula K Le Guin is vouching for her…?

“There’s more vivid imagination in a page of Nnedi Okorafor’s work than in whole volumes of ordinary fantasy epics.” – Ursula K. Le Guin

“Romantic and blood-streaked, and infused with magic so real you can feel it on your fingertips – Deathless is beautiful.” – Cory Doctorow

  • One first edition hardcover copy of A Dance with Dragons by George R. R. Martin. Signed by the author.

“Martin’s love for sophisticated, deeply strange fantasy permeates “Dance” like a phantasmagorical fever dream.” – L.A. Times

“A grand adventure and an inspiration that is not to be missed.” – Kirkus Review

  • One first edition hardcover copy of Ghost Story by Jim Butcher. Signed by the author.

Pat’s Note: I make no bones about my love for Jim Butcher. The Dresden Files is possibly my favorite current series that I’m reading.

“Think Buffy the Vampire Slayer starring Philip Marlowe.” – Entertainment Weekly

  • One first edition hardcover copy of The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. Signed by the author.

How much do I like this book?

Well… last year at House on the Rock, me and my crew dressed up as the ghosts in the book. Because that’s how we roll.

(As you can see, Oot was Bod.)

We almost won the costume contest too….

…but that, as they say, is another story.

The Graveyard Book manages the remarkable feat of playing delightful jazz riffs on Kipling’s classic Jungle Books. One might call this book a small jewel, but in fact it’s much bigger within than it looks from the outside.” – Peter S. Beagle

  • One hardcover copy of The Boy at the End of the World by Greg van Eekhout. Signed by the author.

The Boy at the End of the World is both moving and full of adventure. This remarkable survival story will change the way readers think about themselves and the world they live in.” – Sarah Prineas, author of The Magic Thief

From outrageously funny New York Times bestselling author Christopher Moore and award-winning screenwriter and director Ian Corson, THE GRIFF: A Graphic Novel is about an alien invasion of Earth and the motley crew of humans who save the world—sort of . . .

  • One leather-bound, gold-leaf paged copy of Lamb by Christopher Moore. Signed by the author.

This year when I was at San Diego Comic Con I got to meet Christopher Moore. While I was there, I got lucky and bought two copies of the special gold-leaf edition of Lamb. The first one was for me, of course, but the second one I’ve been holding on to so I could put it in the fundraiser.

It’s a pretty book, gold leaf around the pages. This edition also has the faux leather cover, so it’s extra valuable, as faux are now endangered species and can’t be hunted for their skins any more.

It also has a little bookmark, so you know it’s posh.

All joking aside, this is a great book.Laugh-out-loud funny in places, sweet and touching in others. If you haven’t read any Moore before, this is a good place to start.

*     *     *

Remember, for every 10 dollars you donate on the Worldbuilders Team Page, you get a chance to win these books and hundreds of others.

What’s more, Worldbuilders will match 50% of your donations. So if you chip in before January 31st of 2012, you get a bigger bang for your buck.

To see the other books folks have donated, as well as our auctions, and the items we’re selling in the store, you can head over to our main page HERE.

Posted in Worldbuilders 2011 | By Pat45 Responses

My First Discworld Convention

So this weekend I went to NADWcon: The North American Discworld convention.

I know what you’re thinking. Technically there shouldn’t be a “W” in that acronym. But without it, they’d have to call the convention NADcon, and that would attract the entirely wrong sort of attendee.

Truth is, the last thing I needed in my schedule right now was another convention. It’s not that I don’t enjoy cons, I do. I love hanging out with other geeks, being on panels, doing readings and signing books. It’s a good time.

But conventions tend to be expensive, exhausting, and time-consuming. Any two of those are hard to deal with, but all three together can be a crushing combination. Especially now that little Oot is in the picture. He’s sentient enough to miss me, and I feel guilty leaving him for days at a time.

Luckily, this con was in Madison, which is pretty much my backyard. I can drive there in less than two hours, and Sarah and Oot can come along with relatively little hassle.

But the real reason I was willing to go to this convention was the fact that Terry Pratchett was attending.

I’ve talked about Pratchett’s books on the blog before. Most specifically, his book Nation, and the Tiffany Aching series.

I haven’t bothered mentioning him much more than that for the simple reason that I assume you’ve already read his stuff. If you read my books, you read fantasy. And if you read fantasy, you know about Terry Pratchett. Q.E.D.

Anyway. Suffice to say that I’m a Pratchett fan. I’ve been reading him for more than 20 years, and the thought of getting to see him in person was too much to pass up.

The convention was a different experience for me. I’m used to cons where all different types of geeks get together and revel in their nerdery. You’ll see someone dressed up as Harry Dresden chatting with a hot vulcan girl. You’ll see a catgirl playing Catan with a kid wearing a Dalek outfit.

But at this con, the focus was all Pratchett, and 98% of that focus was Discworld.

That means no catgirls. Many feegles.

I did a tiny signing and a tiny reading. I wasn’t really an official part of the convention because I don’t have anything to do with Pratchett (other than liking him a bunch.) But that itself was nice in a way, as it meant I could spend time with my family.

Cool things:

  • There was a guy there who did crazy-cool balloon animals. I’m not talking about a hat or a poodle or shit like that. I’m talking about Death Riding A Motorcycle.

Or Granny Weatherwax:

He also did a cool dragon for Oot:

This picture doesn’t do the dragon justice. You’ll have to take my word for the fact that it’s awesome, and it looks like it’s breathing fire.

  • I got to hear Terry talk about writing and tell stories.

A lot of the biggest panels were ones featuring Terry himself. Including one about his work on The Long Earth with Steven Baxter.

  • Swag.

I bought a copy of Thud! and some coins and stamps from Discworld. It’s cool to see things like stamps from a fictional world. They’re an odd combination of souvenir and artifact. I’d love to make some coins set in the Four Corners world….

  • Neil Gaiman.

Neil made a surprise appearance at the con where he and Terry spent a couple of hours talking about Good Omens on a panel. It was cool watching them tell embarrassing stories about each other. They knew each other back in the day, back before they strode the earth like titans.

Oot slept through the panel, which was nice, as that meant Sarah and I both got to listen to it, as opposed to having to tag-team and take turns watching him.

He woke up at the very end, just as Gaiman was presenting Pratchett with an award. After looking around bleerily for a moment, he correctly sensed the mood of the room and burst out with a preemptive “Yay!”

It was a sentiment pretty much everyone shared.

It was a good time overall. Oot made some kid-aged friends and got to climb stairs, so he was happy. Sarah got to go to a con and bum around State Street a bit, so she had a good time, too.

But for me, the high point of the weekend was on the last day of the con, when I got Terry Pratchett’s autograph.

More about that tomorrow,

pat

Posted in conventions, Oot, Sarah, Tales from the Con | By Pat33 Responses

Fanmail Q&A: YA Recomendations

Hello, Pat!

Today, my 10-year-old daughter, Becca, came home from school with a book pressed to her nose. This is nothing unexpected; she’s been addicted to books for nearly as long as she’s been able to speak!

But today, I had a little smile when I noted the title that she’d selected from her school’s library: “A Wrinkle In Time.”

I recently read your blog post about your early experience with the book, and it gave me pause to think. I had one of those thoroughly “mom” moments, suddenly picturing my redheaded, freckle-faced, bespectacled, skinny 10 year old as a grown-up with a career!

I hope I don’t sound dreadfully stage-momish when I say that I’ve long guessed she would end up being a writer. She thinks differently from other kids. She’s never been afraid of spiders or robbers, instead, her real-life fears include the concept of infinity and people one day traveling at the speed of light. Many nightmares over the size of the universe. She’s bizarre, but pretty darned cute, so it balances. ;)

(Editor’s note: She is pretty cute.)

Writing all that down probably seals her fate as a future tax accountant!

So, here begins my question to you… She’s read all of the usual suspects for children at her age, including Harry Potter and the Narnia series. She also spent a whole month reading every BabySitter’s Club book she could scrounge up! (She is a little girl, after all!!)

But finding books that really challenge and appeal to her as a voracious reader has been a years-long sprint to stay ahead of her curiosity! She adores fantasy, but a LOT of fantasy novels are just too sexual, or too violent for her, at this age.

I’ve loved your recommendations of books over the years, and I wonder if you could think of a list of books that little budding geeks would adore? …a geekery primer, as it were.

Thank you so much for sharing your time and talent with the world.

-Carrie

Well Carrie, I won’t lie to you. You do sound slightly stage-mom. But at least you’re aware of it. Knowing is half the battle, after all.

I have a lot of control-freak tendencies myself. (I think some of it comes from being an author.) But so far I’ve managed to reign in those elements of my personality when it comes to planning Oot’s future.

Sarah constantly wants to speculate about what he’ll be like when he grows up. What job will he have? Will he be right handed? Will his hair be curly or wavy? Will he be gay or straight? What will his secondary mutation be?

I decided early on that I don’t care about any of that stuff. I only want two things from him when he grows up.

He must:

1. Make the world a better place.

2. Be happy.

That’s all I require of him. He can even do them in whatever order he likes. Concurrently or consecutively. Everything else is meaningless detail as far as I’m concerned. (Though it would be nice if he was a bit of a reader, too.)

But yeah, back to the point of your letter. Let me see if I can think of some good YA reads for you….

The first thing that leaps to mind is:

  • Terry Pratchett’s Tiffany Aching books.

I don’t really feel the need to sell these books to you. If you know anything about fantasy, you know who Terry Pratchett is. You know he’s great.

On the off chance that you don’t, I’ll simply say what I’ve said before: There may be authors as good as Terry Pratchett, but there are no authors better. And the Tiffany Aching books are as good as anything he’s ever written. I just pulled one down off the shelf and right now I’m having to actively fight my desire start reading it again.

In order, they are: Wee Free Men, Hat Full of Sky, and Wintersmith.

The fourth book in the series, I Shall Wear Midnight, is coming out in less than a month. I plan on reading it the day it’s released.

Side note: I’d probably recommend *any* of Pratchett’s books as a safe YA read. They’re all really good, and by opening that single door, you instantly add more than thirty exceptionally high-quality books to your reading list.

  • Neil Gaiman’s Coraline

Again, I don’t feel like I need to push you very hard about this book. It’s Neil Gaiman. You know how good he is.

Side note: The audiobook version of this is really excellent. I just listened to it for the third time about two weeks ago. Gaiman reads it himself, and does an absolutely brilliant job.

  • Peter S. Beagle’s The Last Unicorn.

Again. I rave about this book all the time, so I won’t go on and on. I didn’t read it when I was a kid, but I can’t help but feel that it would be a great YA read.

Secondary Recommendation: There’s a movie too.

  • The BFG by Roald Dahl.

I remember reading this one as a kid and loving it. Dahl has the rare gift that I’ve come to think of as The Divine Ridiculous.

You see, anybody can be goofy. Anybody can just make up some silly bullshit. But true inspired ridiculousness can’t be forced. You cannot strive for it, for in striving you fail. It’s like Nirvana. It’s like the eternal Tao.

Some authors manage to touch this odd piece of our Jungian collective consciousness, and when they do, they write things that are genuinely delightful and bizarre. Douglass Adams brushed up against it occasionally, as do the guys over at Penny Arcade.  Dahl kinda lived there. I remember reading his books as a kid and thinking the kid version of, “WTF?”

That’s a good thing for a kid to think, in my opinion.

Secondary recommendation: Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is pretty good, too.

  • The Fledgling by Jane Langton.

Honestly. I can’t remember much about this book except that I read it when I was a kid and I loved it. When you asked this question it was one of the first books that sprung to mind, that says a lot, considering it’s probably been 25 years since I’ve read it, and usually I can barely remember to put on pants before I leave the house every day.

  • Zarah the Windseeker by Nnedi Okorafor.

I’ve interviewed Nnedi Okorafor on the website before, and talked about some of her newer books. But this was her first book, which I read years and years ago. I really enjoyed it, and have given away many copies as gifts. Not only does it have some cool non-western worldbuiding in it, but the protagonist is a clever, capable young girl.

I could go on and on. (The Hobbit, The Princess Bride, Podkayne of Mars or other Heinlein juveniles, Peter Pan, The Little Prince…) but I think I’ll stop there.

Feel free to post some of your childhood favorites in the comments below. Discuss and disagree. That’s one of the joys of threaded comments.

However, I do expect things to remain civilized. If you you don’t think a book is appropriate for kids, feel free to say so. Feel free to explain why. But don’t be a dick about it. Typical internet asshattery will result in suspension of posting privileges, the scorn of your peers, and my terrible, terrible wrath.

pat

Posted in Neil Gaiman, Oot, recommendations, Sarah, Young Adult | By Pat486 Responses

What should I do #12: Nation

I would like to take a moment of your time to talk to you about a book.

(The US cover for the book. It looks cooler in other places.)

I’ve been a fan of Terry Pratchett’s for years. He’s a truly magnificent writer. One of the best. This cannot be argued.

Still, I have to admit that I picked up this book with more than a little hesitation.

The problem was that I knew this book wasn’t going to be set in Discworld, so I was nervous. Also, I was a little disappointed, because I love Discworld. It’s like a place that I get to visit on vacation once or twice a year. I look forward to those visits, and because of that, I was ready to be let down by this non-Discworld story.

I shouldn’t have worried. This is quite possibly Pratchett’s best book yet. Reading it, I laughed aloud in public. Finishing it, I cried.

This is probably the best book that I’ve read in years. Maybe the best book I’ve read in forever. I’ve already ordered a half-dozen copies so I can give them away as gifts.

Buy it. Read it. Love it. This book is like a kiss from god.

pat

Posted in recommendations | By Pat34 Responses

What should I do #9: Precipice

Odds are if you like computer games, you either know about Penny Arcade, or you live under a heavy, heavy rock.

What some folks don’t realize is that Penny Arcade recently put out their own video game titled On the Rain-Swept Precipice of Darkness. * I played it a while back and enjoyed it to a surprising degree. The interface is solid, the steampunk-ish world is appealing, and the game itself is pleasantly challenging in places, though by no means Nintendo hard.

As you can tell by the title, it’s rather tongue-in-cheek. The tone isn’t like anything else I’ve run into before. It’s like H. P. Lovecraft and Terry Pratchett had some sort of oddly charismatic love child with Tourette’s.

For me, the main selling point was the wit, the good use of language, and the irreverent humor. I’m a big fan of that sort of thing, if you hadn’t already guessed.

Best of all, if you’re like me and fear leaving the house during the summer for fear that the sun might touch you. You can download the whole game directly via the intertubes.

If you’re curious, there’s a demo available. If you like that, then I strongly urge you to buy the game and support them in their future endeavors.

That’s all for now folks,

pat

*** Edit: An attentive reader has pointed out that the title is actually “On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness.” I stand corrected. My bad.

Posted in recommendations, video games | By Pat19 Responses

What should I do #1 – Cat and Girl

Welcome to the first instalment of something I’m going to call “What-Should-I-do Tuesdays.”

Over the last several months I’ve received many e-mails where at some point the person says something very similar to this:

[…] I can’t wait for the sequel. Write faster! I don’t know what I’m going to do with myself until your next book comes out. […]

I usually thought of this as just a rhetorical comment until I got this e-mail:

Hi, Pat!

I was catching up on your blog and realized that one thing that would make it even better would be a list of your favorite authors, movies, games, etc… Clearly, you are a Joss Weedon fan, adore Orson Scott Card, and so on. It’s likely you could turn us, your humble audience, on to some other great stuff you like. I’d love to read your recommendations.

Kelly,

So I thought, why kill two birds with one stone. I turn you on to some good authors AND keep you from wasting away while you wait for book two.

Since this is the first week, let’s start at the top.

If you like good fantasy, you have to read Neil Gaiman.

If you’re into novels, I suggest starting with Neverwhere or Stardust. If you like comics, I suggest reading his Sandman series. Read it in the proper order too, or the continuity gods will strike you down.

Another of the best and brightest in the fantasy Genre is Terry Pratchett. He has written a metric ton of novels over the years. A few of them are merely great, but most of them are hands-down excellent. It isn’t that vital that you read them all in order, but I still recommend trying to start with some of the earlier books first, as there are continuing characters and plot lines.

And finally, a webcomic that I’m guessing many of you have never heard of. It’s not fantasy, but it is one of my favorites. It’s funny, clever, and has healthy doses of social satire. Other comics out there might be funnier, or have more stylish art. But Cat and Girl is possibly the smartest comic I’ve ever read. And it does it without getting snobby or preachy, and it makes me laugh too. It may not be for all of you, but I’m guessing that some of you will really dig it. Browse the archives and find out.

In other news, I’m going to be down at a new convention in Madison this weekend – Geek Kon.

Details are on the tour schedule page, but here are some of the panels I’ll be doing….

SATURDAY,
4pm – Lord of the Rings
6pm – Defining the Genres

SUNDAY
12 noon – SF/F Roundtable
1pm – The 36-Hour Day in Flatland

On Sunday I’m also have a reading/booksigning at Room of One’s Own just off State Street. It’s at 3:00.

Note: Those of you sending books out to me to get them signed, please remember to pack them carefully. One showed up today that had just been dropped in a box with no padding at all. It was banged up pretty badly and the dustjacket was in shreds. If you want specific advice about packaging, check out the details at the end of the blog I wrote on the subject.

Later all,

pat

Posted in appearances, conventions, Fanmail Q + A, Neil Gaiman, recommendations | By Pat30 Responses
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