Carpe Jugulum

Locations
Call Number: Fantasy / Pratchett, Terry
On Shelf At: Downtown Library

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	Fantasy / Pratchett, Terry	4-week checkout	On Shelf

REVIEWS & SUMMARIES

School Library Journal Review
Publishers Weekly Review
Summary / Annotation
Fiction Profile
Author Notes

COMMUNITY REVIEWS

my beloved diskworld submitted by ferdoble on August 11, 2011, 3:52pm To describe Terry Pratchett’s books is a difficult thing to do. The disc world series is in a word fantastic. Terry Pratchett, would seem to use the disk world, to take any theme, or know story and then twist it in his own very humorous way. These are not always laugh out loud funny (sometimes they are), bur rather the sort of funny that just sort of lifts your spirits a little bit.

I will say that in some cases there isn’t always a really strong story, sometimes its just his characters moving through one of those twisted themes. I like them all, you may want to start with the Most Von Lipwig story line (“Going Postal” and then “making money”) as at least the first one has a really great story line.

I love to pepper my reading queue with these books to keep all those books that take themselves seriously fresh and interesting.

I recommend reading them ALL.

OR listening to them. The two main narrators of Terry Pratchett’s books are Stephen Briggs & Nigel Planer and they take Terry Pratchett’s phenomenal writing to a whole new level.

Pratchett tackles religion. submitted by eknapp on November 9, 2011, 3:02pm Witches vs vampires in the Discworld kingdom of Lancre (which seems to be a Switzerland analog).

Perfectly serviceable Pratchett. As always, the plot was adequate; as with Douglas Adams, Pratchett's genius lies in his writing itself. Fun fun stuff. This time around, he takes a few more shots at Christianity--I mean, Omnianism--and organized religion.

While I was able to follow along, it was pretty clear that there were several previous books that this one continued. I would have enjoyed it more had I read those first, I think.

Vampires submitted by Jen Chapin-Smith on August 16, 2012, 3:03pm As you probably guessed from the title, "Carpe Jugulum" is about dangerous vampires. These are not the friendly vampires of the "Twilight" series nor the sexy ones of "True Blood." These vampires are scary and manipulative. Only the witches, and not even all of them, can resist their power.
One of the things I most like about this novel is that (SPOILER ALERT) an older woman saves the day, rather than the young queen or the youngest witch who seems to be the focus of a love triangle. I also love that this youngest witch who is the object of two men's devotion is a bit heavy, rather than the toothpick-thin heroine we usually find on TV.
"Carpe" is the sixth novel about the witches, so read Sir Terry Pratchett's other ones about the Lancer coven first, especially to learn Magrat's plot line. The book contains many hilarious lines that I continue to quote years after I read it.

discworld submitted by unknown on August 10, 2013, 11:18pm Those of us who grew up watching Hammer films know better than to invite a vampire into our castle. But suppose you are the new jester-turned-king of a small principality on Discworld, and you want to be friends with all of your neighbors, even if they happen to be undead. (Hint: always check to see if a country has a disproportionate number of 24-hour Walgreens before issuing your invitations).

Not only does King Verence invite a family of vampires to his daughter's christening, his invitation to the powerful witch, Granny Weatherwax goes mysteriously astray.

Foopahs abound. Granny Weatherwax closes up her cottage as though she never means to return. Her friend and fellow-witch, Nanny Ogg is upset by King Verence's choice of a priest of Om as the official baptizer--a priest who relies on bits of strategically placed paper to jog his uncertain memory--which is how the little princess ends up with the name 'Esmerelda Margaret Note Spelling of Lancre.'

Of course, Lancre did once have a king named, 'My God He's Heavy the First.'

This is obviously going to shape up as one of the most disastrous christenings since Sleeping Beauty got the shaft (or more correctly, the spindle) from the thirteenth fairy godmother. Then events take a turn for the worse when the vampires happily chow through Nanny Ogg's special garlic dip without a single rumble of indigestion.

I love all of the Granny Weatherwax/Nanny Ogg Discworld novels, and even though "Carpe Jugulum" tackles some unusually serious themes (its vampires are truly evil, unlike the loveable, teetotalling Otto in "The Truth"), it is still vintage Pratchett and vintage Granny.

It is amazing how an author of such absurd fantasies can still convey such a bone-chilling description of evil. Pratchett is much more than a 'simple' comic novelist.