Even with nougat, you can have a perfect moment.
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(Terry Pratchett, Thief of TIme, 2001)

12, WG12, M10, E11, / NG0, F2, MF0, D1, Frz0, B1, NA0, C0

Terry Pratchett, Hogfather

Dieser Discworld, einer meiner ersten Discworldbände überhaupt, rangiert auch ziemlich weit oben bei meinen Favoriten, und trotzdem entdeckte ich bei diesem Wiederlesen immer noch neues, oder fand Stellen, die ich vergessen hatte. Z.B. wie wirklich gruselig die Heimstätte der Tooth Fairy ist. Irgendwann schaffe ich es auch mal, das Buch zur Weihnachtszeit zu lesen, wie es sich gehört.
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'He's right, though,' said Susan. 'Gods don't die. Never completely die...'
There's always somewhere, she told herself. Inside some stone, perhaps, or the words of a song, or riding the mind of some animal, or maybe in a whisper on the wind. They never entirely go, they hang on to the world by the tip of a fingernail, always fighting to find a way back. Once a god, always a god. Dead, perhaps, but only like the world in winter-
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It really was a crummy room, the sort rented by someone who probably took it never intending to stay long, the sort where walking across the floor in the middle of the night would be accompanied by the crack of cockroaches in a death flamenco. It was amazing how many people spent their whole lives in places where they never intended to stay.
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When you were grown up, you only feared, well, logical things. Poverty. Illness. Being found out. At least you weren't mad with terror because of something under the stairs. The world wasn't full of arbitrary light and shade. The wonderful world of childhood? Well, it wasn't a cutdown version of the adult one, that was certain. It was more like the adult one written in big heavy letters. Everything was ... more. More everything.
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(Terry Pratchett, Hogfather, 1996)

11, WG11, M9, E10, B1, / NG0, F2, MF0, D1, Frz0, NA0, C0

Terry Pratchett, The Last Hero

Der Band um das spektakuläre Ende von Cohen the Barbarian und seiner Silver Horde schließt beinahe zwingend an 'Interesting Times' an und war zudem als (einmalig schön) illustrierter Bildband wunderbar als Wochenendlektüre geeignet. Auf dem Paperwhite hätte ich ihn eh nicht laden wollen. Neben der Konfrontation von Cohen mit den Discworldgöttern ist die Reise von Leonardo da Quirm, Rincewind, Captain Carrot und dem Librarian als blinden Passagier um die Disc herum einfach immer wieder unglaublich schön zu lesen.

10, WG10, M8, E9, / NG0, F2, MF0, D1, Frz0, NA0, C0, B0

Terry Pratchett, Interesting Times

Ich bin mir nicht sicher, aber es könnte sein, dass ich diesen Discworldband nur einmal gelesen habe und das vor langer Zeit. Zumindest konnte ich mich nur ganz vage daran erinnern, dass er mit Rincewind und Cohen the Barbarian war und es viele Gags mit den unterschiedlichen Bedeutungen von Lauten, vornehmlich 'Aaargh' gab. Und natürlich, wie alle Discworldbände, mit diesem beißendem Witz, der soviel effektiver zum Nachdenken verleitet. Und so war es dann auch.

9, WG9, M7, E8, / NG0, F2, MF0, D1, Frz0, NA0, C0, B0

Terry Pratchett, Going Postal / Making Money

Anscheinend ist es für mich unmöglich geworden einige Discworldbücher zu lesen ohne wieder bei meinem Lieblingsband um den genialen Lebenskünstler Moist von Lipwig zu landen. Und ich kann mir immer noch nicht erklären, warum mich gerade dieser Band immer noch so fasziniert, dass er auch beim xten Wiederlesen nicht langweilig wird. Allerdings beschränkte ich mich diesmal aufs Querlesen der schönsten Stellen, auch bei dem Nachfolgeband Making Money und übersprang einige Handlungsstränge, dafür werte ich die beiden Bücher diesmal als eines.

8, WG8, M6, E7, / NG0, F2, MF0, D1, Frz0, NA0, C0, B0

Terry Pratchett, Soul Music

Der dritte Death-Band der Discworldreihe und zugleich der erste Band um Susan Sto-Helit rangiert auch irgendwo in den Top Ten bei mir - nicht nur, aber auch weil Pratchett hier permanent aus Blues Brothers zitiert. Und das Wesen, oder eben die Seele der Rockmusik aka Music with Rocks in so genial auf den Punkt bringt. Das letzte Wiederlesen war wirklich zu lange her.
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This was music that had not only escaped but had robbed a bank on the way out. It was music with its sleeves rolled up and its top button undone, raising its hat and grinning and stealing the silver.
It was music that went down to the feet by way of the pelvis without paying a call on Mr Brain.
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Some religions say that the universe was started with a word, a song, a dance, a piece of music. The Listening Monks of the Ramtops have trained their hearing until they can tell the value of a playing card by listening to it, and have made it their task to listen intently to the subtle sounds of the universe to piece together, from the fossil echoes, the very first sounds.
There was certainly, they say, a very strange noise at the beginning of everything.
But the keenest ears (the ones who win most at poker), who listen to the frozen echoes in ammonites and amber, sewar they can detect some tiny sounds before that.
It sounded, they say, like someone counting: One, Two, Three, Four.
The very best one, who listened to basalt, said he thought he could make out, very faintly, some numbers that came even earlier.
When they asked him what it was, he said: 'It sounds like One, Two.'
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'Hah! Well, he'll be sorry later on,' said Glod. 'Later on, people'll talk to him and he'll say: I left, you know, before they became famous.'
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There are millions of chords. There are millions of numbers. And everyone forgets the one that is a zero. But without the zero, numbers are just arithmetic. Without the empty chord, music is just noise.
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(Terry Pratchett, Soul Music, 1994)

7, WG7, M5, E6, / NG0, F2, MF0, D1, Frz0, NA0, C0, B0

Terry Pratchett, Reaper Man

Weiter geht's mit der Death-Serie der Discworldbücher. Bei diesem Band ist es noch länger her, dass ich ihn das letzte Mal las, und seltsamerweise hatte ich die ganze Sache mit den Schneekugeln und Einkaufswagen in einem anderen Band verortet, aber abgesehen davon konnte ich mich ziemlich gut an das Buch erinnern. Vor allem die Teile mit Death aka Bill Door und Miss Flitworth sind immer wieder schön.
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Belief is one of the most powerful organic forces in the multiverse. It may not be able to move mountains, exactly. But it can create someone who can.
People get exactly the wrong idea about belief. They think it works back to front. They think the sequence is, first object, then belief. In fact, it works the other way.
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His business was to the separation of the wheatgerm of the soul from the chaff of the mortal body, and that was usually concluded long before any of the rites associated with, when you got right down to it, a reverential form of garbage disposal.
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It was, indeed, on a skeletal horse. Blue flame crackled over the creature's bones as it trotted forward; Miss Flitworth found herself wondering whether it was a real skeleton, animated in some way, something that had once been the inside of a horse, or a skeletal creature in its own right. It was a ridiculous chain of thought to follow, but it was better than dwelling on the ghastly reality that was approaching.
Did it get rubbed down, or just given a good polish?
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Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong. No matter how fast light travels it finds the darkness has always got there first, and is waiting for it.
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(Terry Pratchett, Reaper Man, 1991)