Download or read book The Magic of Terry Pratchett written by Marc Burrows and published by White Owl. This book was released on 2020-07-30 with total page 375 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An in-depth look into the life and writings of the bestselling author of the Discworld novels, Good Omens, and Nation. The Magic of Terry Pratchett is the first full biography of Sir Terry Pratchett ever written. Sir Terry was Britain’s bestselling living author*, and before his death in 2015 had sold more than 85 million copies of his books worldwide. Best known for the Discworld series, his work has been translated into thirty-seven languages, and performed as plays on every continent in the world, including Antarctica. Journalist, comedian and Pratchett fan Marc Burrows delves into the back story of one of UK’s most enduring and beloved authors, from his childhood in the Chiltern Hills, to his time as a journalist, and the journey that would take him—via more than sixty best-selling books—to an OBE, a knighthood and national treasure status. The Magic Of Terry Pratchett is the result of painstaking archival research alongside interviews with friends and contemporaries who knew the real man under the famous black hat, helping to piece together the full story of one of British literature’s most remarkable and beloved figures for the very first time. * Now disqualified on both counts. Praise for The Magic of Terry Pratchett "In this encompassing biography of the prolific fantasy and science-fiction author, writer and comedian Burrows details both the writing accomplishments and the personal life of Sir Terry Pratchett. . . . Burrows spoke to friends and family, and this biography has moments of sadness, especially when discussing Pratchett’s fight with Alzheimer’s. But the book is also funny and conversational in tone, and an excellent tribute to a beloved author.” —Booklist “Affable and consistently engaging . . . Burrow’s buoyant, pun-peppered, and aptly footnote-flecked style . . . helpfully marries his subject matter, propelling us through decade after decade of a heavily writing-centric life while illuminating Pratchett’s complexities and contradictions without any drag in the tempo.” —Locus Magazine “An impressively comprehensive, engagingly written biography. ****”—SFX

Download or read book The Magic of Terry Pratchett written by Marc Burrows and published by White Owl. This book was released on 2021-10-30 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the first full biography of Sir Terry Pratchett ever written. Sir Terry was Britain's best-selling living author, and before his death in 2015 had sold more than 85 million copies of his books worldwide.

Download or read book The Colour Of Magic written by Terry Pratchett and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2022-09-27 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NAMED AS ONE OF THE BBC'S 100 MOST INSPIRING NOVELS 'It was octarine, the colour of magic. It was alive and glowing and vibrant and it was the undisputed pigment of the imagination . . .' Somewhere between thought and reality exists the Discworld, a magical world not totally unlike our own. Except for the fact that it travels through space on the shoulders of four giant elephants who in turn stand on the shell of an astronomically huge star turtle, of course. Rincewind is the world's worst wizard who has just been handed a very important job: to look after the world's first tourist, upon whose survival rests the peace and prosperity of the land. Unfortunately, their journey across the Disc includes facing robbers, monsters, mercenaries, and Death himself. And the whole thing's just a game of the gods that might send them over the edge . . . 'If you've never read a Discworld novel, what's the matter with you?' Guardian 'Pratchett uses his other world to hold up a distorting mirror to our own' The Times The Colour of Magic is the first book in the Wizards series, but you can read the Discworld novels in any order.

Download or read book Turtle Recall written by Stephen Briggs and published by Gollancz. This book was released on 2012-11-08 with total page 674 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Discworld, as everyone knows, is a flat world balanced on the backs of four elephants which, in turn, stand on the shell of the giant star turtle, the Great A'Tuin, as it slowly swims through space. It is also a global publishing phenomenon with sales of over 70 million books worldwide (but who's counting?). The publication of Snuff brought the Discworld canon to 39 books - not including the various guides, mapps, diaries and other side-projects. That's a lot of Discworld to keep track of - more than most people can manage with just the one head - but fear not: help is at hand! If you're looking for the ultimate authority on probably the most heavily populated - certainly the most hilarious - setting in fantasy literature... If you need a handy guide to Discworld locales from Ankh-Morpork to Zemphis... If you want help telling Achmed the Mad from Jack Zweiblumen... If your life depends on being able to distinguish the Agatean Empire from the Zoons... ...look no further than Turtle Recall - the latest Discworld Companion, fully updated and completely up to Snuff!

Download or read book Sourcery written by Terry Pratchett and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2009-10-13 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Delightful. . . logically illogical as only Terry Pratchett can write.”—Anne McCaffrey Will the most unlikely hero in all of Discworld save the universe once again . . . or has his luck finally run out in this wildly funny installment in Sir Terry Pratchett’s internationally bestselling series, a hilarious mix of magic, mayhem, and Luggage. Once upon a time, there was an eighth son of an eighth son who was, of course, a wizard. As if that wasn’t complicated enough, said wizard then had seven sons. And then he had an eighth son—a wizard squared (that’s all the math, really)—who, of course, was a source of magic, a sourcerer. Unseen University, the most magical establishment on the Discworld, has finally got its wish: the emergence of a wizard more powerful than they’ve ever seen. But be careful what you wish for . . . As the drastic consequences of sourcery begin to unfold, it’s up to one unlikely wizard to save them. Rincewind has survived a string of misadventures, including falling off the edge of the world—which is no mean feat when it’s flying through space on the back of a turtle and held up by four elephants. Now, he must take the University’s most precious artifact, the very embodiment of magic itself, and deliver it halfway across the Disc to prevent a mathematically blessed sourcerer from leading the wizards to dominate all of Discworld. Can Rincewind and his tiny band, including the carnivorous Luggage, stave off the Apocalypse? The Discworld novels can be read in any order, but Sourcery is the 3rd installment in the Wizards series and the 5th Discworld book. The other books in the Wizards collection include: The Color of Magic The Light Fantastic Eric Interesting Times The Last Continent Unseen Academicals

Download or read book The First Discworld Novels written by Terry Pratchett and published by Colin Smythe. This book was released on 1999 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is how the Discworld began. Here is the sapient pearwood Luggage, a mobile trunk which launders any clothes put in it and incidentally homicidally defends its owner. Here is Twoflower, an innocent tourist in a world of nightmares and fairy tales gon

Download or read book A Slip of the Keyboard written by Terry Pratchett and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2014-09-23 with total page 295 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of essays and other non fiction from Terry Pratchett, spanning the whole of his writing career from his early years to the present day. Terry Pratchett has earned a place in the hearts of readers the world over with his bestselling Discworld series -- but in recent years he has become equally well-known and respected as an outspoken campaigner for causes including Alzheimer's research and animal rights. A Slip of the Keyboard brings together for the first time the finest examples of Pratchett's non fiction writing, both serious and surreal: from musings on mushrooms to what it means to be a writer (and why banana daiquiris are so important); from memories of Granny Pratchett to speculation about Gandalf's love life, and passionate defences of the causes dear to him. With all the humour and humanity that have made his novels so enduringly popular, this collection brings Pratchett out from behind the scenes of the Discworld to speak for himself -- man and boy, bibliophile and computer geek, champion of hats, orangutans and Dignity in Dying. Snuff was the bestselling adult hardcover novel of 2011. A Blink of the Screen, Terry's short fiction collection, was also one of the bestselling hardcovers of 2012.

Download or read book Rincewind the Wizzard written by Terry Pratchett and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page 649 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Includes "The Colour of Magic", "The Light Fantastic", "Sourcery" and "Eric".

Download or read book Seriously Funny written by Terry Pratchett and published by Random House. This book was released on 2016-04-21 with total page 130 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ‘I’ll be more enthusiastic about encouraging thinking outside the box when there’s evidence of any thinking going on inside it.’ The most quotable writer of our time, Terry Pratchett’s unique brand of wit made him both a bestseller and an enduring, endearing source of modern wisdom. This collection is filled with his funniest and most memorable words about life, the universe and snoring.

Download or read book Tiffany Aching Complete 5 Book Collection written by Terry Pratchett and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2015-09-01 with total page 834 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection includes all five Tiffany Aching novels in Terry Pratchett's beloved and bestselling Discworld series, including the final Discworld novel, The Shepherd's Crown. The Wee Free Men: Armed with only a frying pan and her common sense, young witch-to-be Tiffany Aching must defend her home against the monsters of Fairyland. Luckily she has some very unusual help: the local Nac Mac Feegle—aka the Wee Free Men. A Hat Full of Sky: Tiffany Aching is ready to begin her apprenticeship in magic. She expects spells and magic—not chores and ill-tempered nanny goats! Surely there must be more to witchcraft than this! Indeed, there is. . . . Wintersmith: When the Spirit of Winter takes a fancy to Tiffany Aching, he wants her to stay in his gleaming, frozen world. Forever. It will take the young witch's skill and cunning, as well as help from the legendary Granny Weatherwax and the irrepressible Wee Free Men, to survive until Spring. I Shall Wear Midnight: As the witch of the Chalk, Tiffany Aching performs the distinctly unglamorous work of caring for the needy. But someone—or something—is inciting fear, generating dark thoughts and angry murmurs against witches. Tiffany must find the source of unrest and defeat the evil at its root, for if she falls, the whole Chalk falls with her. . . . The Shepherd's Crown: Deep in the Chalk, something is stirring. The owls and the foxes can sense it, and Tiffany Aching feels it in her boots. An old enemy is gathering strength. This is a time of endings and beginnings, old friends and new, a blurring of edges and a shifting of power. Now Tiffany stands between the light and the dark, the good and the bad. There will be a reckoning. . . .

Download or read book Equal Rites written by Terry Pratchett and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2009-10-13 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Unadulterated fun. . . witty, frequently hilarious.”—San Francisco Chronicle Chaos and hilarity ensue when a young woman becomes the first female wizard, upending the Discworld in this bitingly funny tale from internationally bestselling author Sir Terry Pratchett. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it’s not half so bad as a lot of ignorance. Everyone knows there’s no such thing as a female wizard. So when a dying wizard accidentally passes on his staff of power to an eighth daughter of an eighth son, the exclusively masculine world of wizarding is thrown into a tailspin. Eskarina isn’t afraid of male critics and she isn’t going to relinquish this unexpected gift. With a little hocus pocus from Granny Weatherwax, the Discworld’s most infamous witch (an old crone who has plenty of experience ignoring the status quo), Esk infiltrates the magical Unseen University and befriends another apprentice, a wizard named Simon. But power is unpredictable, and these bright young students soon find themselves in a whole new dimension of trouble. . . . The Discworld novels can be read in any order but Equal Rites is the first book in the Witches collection. The Witches collection, in order, include: Equal Rites Wyrd Sisters Witches Abroad Lords and Ladies Maskerade Carpe Jugulum

Download or read book Moving Pictures written by Terry Pratchett and published by Random House. This book was released on 2009-05-27 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'HOLY WOOD IS A DIFFERENT SORT OF PLACE . . . HERE, THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IS TO BE IMPORTANT.' A new phenomenon is taking over the Discworld: moving pictures. Created by the alchemists of Ankh-Morpork, the growing 'clicks' industry moves to the sandy land of Holy Wood, attracted by the light of the sun and some strange calling no one can quite put their finger on... Also drawn to Holy Wood are aspiring young stars Victor Tugelbend, a wizarding student dropout, and Theda 'Ginger' Withel, a small-town girl with big dreams. But behind the glitz and glamour of the clicks, a sinister presence lurks. Because belief is powerful in the Discworld, and sometimes downright dangerous... The magic of movies might just unravel reality itself. 'Funny, delightfully inventive, and refuses to lie down in its genre' - Observer The Discworld novels can be read in any order but Moving Pictures is a standalone.

Download or read book Guest House for Young Widows written by Azadeh Moaveni and published by Random House. This book was released on 2019-09-10 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A gripping account of thirteen women who joined, endured, and, in some cases, escaped life in the Islamic State—based on years of immersive reporting by a Pulitzer Prize finalist. FINALIST FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE • NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY PUBLISHERS WEEKLY AND ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Book Review • NPR • Toronto Star • The Guardian Among the many books trying to understand the terrifying rise of ISIS, none has given voice to the women in the organization; but women were essential to the establishment of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s caliphate. Responding to promises of female empowerment and social justice, and calls to aid the plight of fellow Muslims in Syria, thousands of women emigrated from the United States and Europe, Russia and Central Asia, from across North Africa and the rest of the Middle East to join the Islamic State. These were the educated daughters of diplomats, trainee doctors, teenagers with straight-A averages, as well as working-class drifters and desolate housewives, and they joined forces to set up makeshift clinics and schools for the Islamic homeland they’d envisioned. Guest House for Young Widows charts the different ways women were recruited, inspired, or compelled to join the militants. Emma from Hamburg, Sharmeena and three high school friends from London, and Nour, a religious dropout from Tunis: All found rebellion or community in political Islam and fell prey to sophisticated propaganda that promised them a cosmopolitan adventure and a chance to forge an ideal Islamic community in which they could live devoutly without fear of stigma or repression. It wasn’t long before the militants exposed themselves as little more than violent criminals,more obsessed with power than the tenets of Islam, and the women of ISIS were stripped of any agency, perpetually widowed and remarried, and ultimately trapped in a brutal, lawless society. The fall of the caliphate only brought new challenges to women no state wanted to reclaim. Azadeh Moaveni’s exquisite sensitivity and rigorous reporting make these forgotten women indelible and illuminate the turbulent politics that set them on their paths.

Download or read book Good Omens written by Neil Gaiman and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2011-06-28 with total page 434 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The classic collaboration from the internationally bestselling authors Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, soon to be an original series starring Michael Sheen and David Tennant. ?Season 2 of Good Omens coming soon! “Good Omens . . . is something like what would have happened if Thomas Pynchon, Tom Robbins and Don DeLillo had collaborated. Lots of literary inventiveness in the plotting and chunks of very good writing and characterization. It’s a wow. It would make one hell of a movie. Or a heavenly one. Take your pick.” —Washington Post According to The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch (the world's only completely accurate book of prophecies, written in 1655, before she exploded), the world will end on a Saturday. Next Saturday, in fact. Just before dinner. So the armies of Good and Evil are amassing, Atlantis is rising, frogs are falling, tempers are flaring. Everything appears to be going according to Divine Plan. Except a somewhat fussy angel and a fast-living demon—both of whom have lived amongst Earth's mortals since The Beginning and have grown rather fond of the lifestyle—are not actually looking forward to the coming Rapture. And someone seems to have misplaced the Antichrist . . .

Download or read book The Light Fantastic written by Terry Pratchett and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2009-10-13 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Humorously entertaining. . . subtly thought-provoking. . . . Pratchett’s Discworld books are filled with humor and with magic, but they're rooted in—of all things—real life and cold, hard reason.”—Chicago Tribune Bumbling wizard Rincewind and hapless tourist Twoflower have survived a host of misadventures . . . only to face annihilation as a red star hurtles towards the Discworld in this gloriously funny second installment in Sir Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series (also the second book in the Wizards collection) It’s just one of those days when nothing seems to go right—and a most inopportune time for the first tourist ever to set foot in Discworld—accompanied by the carnivorous Luggage—to extend his already eventful vacation, even if it’s not quite by choice. A monstrous red star is on a direct collision course with the Discworld and the future appears uncertain at best. Discworld needs a hero to save it from total destruction. Unfortunately, it’s got the bumbling Rincewind, still recovering from the trauma of falling off the edge of the world. The alternative couldn’t be much worse. . . . The Discworld novels can be read in any order, but The Light Fantastic is the second book in the Wizards collection. The other books in the collection include: The Color of Magic Sourcery Eric Interesting Times The Last Continent Unseen Academicals

Download or read book The City of Zirdai written by Maria V. Snyder and published by Maria V. Snyder. This book was released on 2021-06-02 with total page 383 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It's suicide, Shyla. You're the prize they want. Through her courage and tenacity, Shyla Sun-Kissed has awoken the power of The Eyes of Tamburah. But this feat only marks the beginning of the challenges that the magical order, the Invisible Sword, faces to free the underground city of Zirdai. Though they have allies among the monks and splinter cells inside the city, Shyla knows the Invisible Sword doesn't have the strength to win. With the group fracturing due to the strain of losses from their latest ordeal, thinly veiled suspicions and endless disagreements, it's up to Shyla to forge a new united order. When both the draconian Water Prince and brutal Heliacal Priestess learn of Shyla's new powers, life becomes even more complicated as they will stop at nothing to capture Shyla and take the magic of The Eyes for themselves. Hunted at every turn and unable to hide, Shyla and the Invisible Sword must use every resource at their command - and unearth new ones - in their race to save the city from destruction. But their enemies always seem to be one step ahead. And the cost to win the battle may be more than Shyla would ever be willing to pay...

Download or read book The Coldest War written by Ian Tregillis and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For decades, Britain's warlocks have been all that stands between the British Empire and the Soviet Union - a vast domain stretching from the Pacific Ocean to the shores of the English Channel. Now each wizard's death is another blow to Britain's national security. Meanwhile, a brother and sister - the subjects of a twisted Nazi experiment to imbue ordinary people with superhuman abilities - escape from a top-secret facility deep behind the Iron Curtain. They head for England, because that's where former spy Raybould Marsh lives. And Gretel, the mad seer, has plans for him. As Marsh is once again drawn into the world of Milkweed, he discovers that Britain's darkest acts didn't end with the war. And while he strives to protect queen and country, he is forced to confront his own willingness to accept victory at any cost.