Pyramids

Rating:
Summary: Prince Pteppic of Djel: One of the best Discworld Characters
Review: I mean it, Pteppic is one of the best (and that is saying a lot). For Discworld readers, it gives a new inside view to the Assassassassin's guild (never could figure out how to stop spelling that), along with an introduction to the land of Djel. Death is in here, for all the fans, and a new cast of characters comes into the scene. The only bad part about this book is the fact that, so far, Prattchet hasn't re-used any of these characters in other books. For newbies to the land of Discworld, it isn't the best starter book; it has a lot of jokes that you wouldn't understand and references to other books. Still, it is my favorite book in the Discworld series.

Rating:
Summary: Pyramids
Review: Like all Terry Pratchet this book is fun & mind boggling. I have an entirely new perspective on Camels.

Rating:
Summary: phun phor pharoahs?
Review: One of his better parodies. I guess I find the math humor phunny too, what with the sons of the pyramid builder having to develop calculus so that he could pay the wages in more than three dimensions.... And I will never look at a camel in the same way again. My boys and husband just split a gut laughing over the plot of this one.

Rating:
Summary: Best of a mediocre bunch
Review: Probably the best of the Discworld series. Enjoyable, funny in places, and enough story to make the book an easy one to finish.

I've wondered on occasion why Pratchett (at his best) is never nearly as funny as Douglas Adams (at his best); now I think I know. "The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" is genuine science fiction. The story drives itself. The Infinite Improbability Drive, is exactly the sort of thing a science fiction writer would invent, and the explanation for its existence exactly that which a science fiction writer would give. Someone with no sense of humour at all might not like Adams's book, but would at least understand it.

None of this is true of Pratchett. His books, as a rule, aren't fantasy: he usually gives the impression of wanting to write about something else. (This is most apparent in, say, "Moving Pictures", a book about Hollywood that would lose most of its humour if it was actually set *in* Hollywood.) Usually there's nothing to Pratchett except one liners and turns of phrase. He presents us with a plot he doesn't appear to care about, and then goes through the tedious motions of writing a novel to it, all the time keeping a sharp look-out for amusing comments to make. The amusing comments are what makes the otherwise tedious excercise worthwhile. They don't always succeed.

(This explains why Pratchett is seldom REALLY funny. Someone who has no particular axe to grind and is just looking for jokes, any jokes, is in the unenviable position of a a clown at the circus, or a court jester, whom everyone expects to be funny but no-one expects to be anything else. Such people produce dutiful chuckles. Humour needs passion.)

This is a generalisation. There are exceptions, and this book is one of them. Ankh-Morpork is about the only thing left in Discworld which is interesting in itself (and not just interesting as a result of the funny things that might be said about it); so, hurrah, we begin the novel in Ankh-Morpork. We get a story which has some merit as a fantasy story all by itself. The magic is for once genuine magic, and not a kind of ersatz technology. This book approaches the kind of thing Discworld as a whole ought to have been.

Another book worth reading for similar reasons is "Mort". Read it after or before "Pyramids". It won't hurt to read the other Discworld books, but there is really no need.

Rating:
Summary: Ancient Egypt gets the Pratchett treatment
Review: Pyramids is yet another Discworld novel from Terry Pratchett, though it doesn't take place in the same setting as the other novels in the series. Instead, it takes place in "The Old Kingdom," and is take-off on ancient Egypt. How does it fare?

Let's call it a triple. It's wonderfully funny, and definitely a 5-star book. It only suffers in comparison to the other Discworld books that I've read, in that it takes awhile before it's laugh out loud funny. The whole book is definitely worth reading though, and your patience will be rewarded in spades once things actually start happening.

The book is about Teppic, the son of the king, who has gone to Ankh-Morpork to learn to be an assassin. The first section of the book consists of scenes of his final examination intercut with scenes of his joining the assassins' school. This section has its amusing moments, but it didn't make me guffaw like the City Watch trilogy of books did. The section gives information on Teppic's character, which does inform the rest of the book, and is thus valuable. It was just missing something.

There are also scenes back in the Kingdom, where Teppic's father is going a bit insane. He ends up falling off of a balcony while identifying with the local seagulls. Thus, Teppic is drawn back home to take his place. When Teppic gets back, he finds most of the rituals and values that dominate the kingdom grate with the values that he learned while he was in Ankh-Morpork. Meanwhile, Teppic's dad is dead, and he's not liking it.

Things steamroll from there, and I won't give away any of the rest of the stuff. Once Teppic gets back home, things get a lot better in this book. The laughs come very frequently, and nothing is spared from Pratchett's wit. The take-off on the Trojan Horse story has to be seen to be believed, as well as the Philospher's Cafe. And next time you see a camel, you'll be wondering what's going through his head.

The main problem with the book is that it seems a bit detached from the situation. In the City Watch books, most of the humour comes directly out of what is happening, making the events that Pratchett is describing feel important, at least to the characters. Pyramids, though, seems different than that. The jokes are funny, but the events that they are coming out of seem very inconsequential when you think about it. And when the event in question is as big as it is in this book (can't say more without spoilers), inconsequential is the last thing it should feel like.

Still, that doesn't detract from the enjoyment of the book. Some people don't like the zany, madcap type of humour that Pratchett delivers, and they should stay away from it. But it's certainly worth a pick up for anybody with a funny bone.

Rating:
Summary: Pyramid power--it's not just for razors any more
Review: Pyramids represents something of a detour in Pratchett's Discworld series. The principal action takes place in the heretofore unfamiliar land of Djelibeybi, located in northern Klatch across the Circle Sea from Anhk-Morpork. This is a unique realm of the Discworld, two miles wide and 150 miles long. It is often referred to as the Old Kingdom for a very good reason-it is quite old, over 7000 years old in fact. It is a desert land whose pharaohs are obsessed with pyramid-building; besides bankrupting the country, this obsession has also had the unforeseen consequence of keeping the country firmly entrenched in the past. Pyramids, you see, slow down time, and there are so many pyramids in Djelibeybi now that new time is continually sucked in by them and released nightly in flares. In a land where the same time is reused daily, it comes as something of a surprise when the pharaoh Teppicymon XXVII decides to send his son Teppic outside of the kingdom to get his education. Just after becoming a certified, guild-approved assassin, young Teppic is called upon to return home after his father suffers the unfortunate consequences attendant upon thinking he can fly. Three months into his reign, he basically loses his kingdom-literally. The Great Pyramid being built for his father's mummy is much too big, and eventually it causes the temporal dislocation of Djelibeybi from the face of the Discworld. Accompanied by the handmaiden Ptraci, whom he rescued from certain death, and a camel whose name would be edited were I to state it here, Teppic must find a way to restore his kingdom back to its proper place and time above the ground. The ordeal is only complicated further by the fact that all of the land's dead and thousands of gods suddenly have appeared in person, acting as if they own the place.

While its unusual setting and the fact that it features characters seen here and nowhere else makes this novel seem a little different from its fellow Discworld chronicles, I must admit it is quite an enjoyable read. Pratchett ingeniously incorporates ideas and practices from ancient Egypt and ancient Greece: pyramids, mummification, Greek philosophers, the Trojan War and its Horse in particular, etc. Teppic is an enjoyable enough character, but we never seem to delve deeply enough to understand him properly. I loved the brash handmaiden Ptraci and her fearless contempt for tradition. All of the dead pharaohs are quite funny, particularly in terms of their opinions on an afterlife spent shut inside a tomb inside an escape-proof pyramid. The subplot featuring the history of warfare between two neighboring kingdoms really helps make this novel a true winner. Perhaps the most interesting thing to be found in these pages, though, is the actual identity and thought processes of Discworld's greatest mathematician. There is also much to amuse and delight fans of temporal dislocation theories-the pyramid builders make many incredible discoveries in the process of building the Great Pyramid, not the least of which is a means of utilizing the structure's innate time loop to call forth several different selves to help make sure the job is finished in the allotted time.

Even though this book is funny and satisfying enough to stand on its own, I would not start my Discworld reading with it. Aside from Teppic's time spent in Anhk-Morpork learning to be an assassin, the action takes place outside the much more familiar lands we encounter time and again in the other novels. Of course, Pratchett devotees will want to read it for the very reason that it acquaints us with a strange, otherwise unfamiliar section of the Discworld.

Rating:
Summary: Pyramid power--it's not just for razors any more
Review: Pyramids represents something of a detour in Pratchett's Discworld series. The principal action takes place in the heretofore unfamiliar land of Djelibeybi, located in northern Klatch across the Circle Sea from Anhk-Morpork. This is a unique realm of the Discworld, two miles wide and 150 miles long. It is often referred to as the Old Kingdom for a very good reason-it is quite old, over 7000 years old in fact. It is a desert land whose pharaohs are obsessed with pyramid-building; besides bankrupting the country, this obsession has also had the unforeseen consequence of keeping the country firmly entrenched in the past. Pyramids, you see, slow down time, and there are so many pyramids in Djelibeybi now that new time is continually sucked in by them and released nightly in flares. In a land where the same time is reused daily, it comes as something of a surprise when the pharaoh Teppicymon XXVII decides to send his son Teppic outside of the kingdom to get his education. Just after becoming a certified, guild-approved assassin, young Teppic is called upon to return home after his father suffers the unfortunate consequences attendant upon thinking he can fly. Three months into his reign, he basically loses his kingdom-literally. The Great Pyramid being built for his father's mummy is much too big, and eventually it causes the temporal dislocation of Djelibeybi from the face of the Discworld. Accompanied by the handmaiden Ptraci, whom he rescued from certain death, and a camel whose name would be edited were I to state it here, Teppic must find a way to restore his kingdom back to its proper place and time above the ground. The ordeal is only complicated further by the fact that all of the land's dead and thousands of gods suddenly have appeared in person, acting as if they own the place.

While its unusual setting and the fact that it features characters seen here and nowhere else makes this novel seem a little different from its fellow Discworld chronicles, I must admit it is quite an enjoyable read. Pratchett ingeniously incorporates ideas and practices from ancient Egypt and ancient Greece: pyramids, mummification, Greek philosophers, the Trojan War and its Horse in particular, etc. Teppic is an enjoyable enough character, but we never seem to delve deeply enough to understand him properly. I loved the brash handmaiden Ptraci and her fearless contempt for tradition. All of the dead pharaohs are quite funny, particularly in terms of their opinions on an afterlife spent shut inside a tomb inside an escape-proof pyramid. The subplot featuring the history of warfare between two neighboring kingdoms really helps make this novel a true winner. Perhaps the most interesting thing to be found in these pages, though, is the actual identity and thought processes of Discworld's greatest mathematician. There is also much to amuse and delight fans of temporal dislocation theories-the pyramid builders make many incredible discoveries in the process of building the Great Pyramid, not the least of which is a means of utilizing the structure's innate time loop to call forth several different selves to help make sure the job is finished in the allotted time.

Even though this book is funny and satisfying enough to stand on its own, I would not start my Discworld reading with it. Aside from Teppic's time spent in Anhk-Morpork learning to be an assassin, the action takes place outside the much more familiar lands we encounter time and again in the other novels. Of course, Pratchett devotees will want to read it for the very reason that it acquaints us with a strange, otherwise unfamiliar section of the Discworld.

Rating:
Summary: My Favorite Discworld Book Yet
Review: Recently I became a fan of Terry Pratchett, after having read The Color of Magic. I continued to read the series in order, and I just finished reading Pyramids. Immediately I liked this book, because I found the Assassins Guild fascinating, and I thought Teppic was an interesting and cool main character.

The plot goes something like this: Teppic was born in Djelibeybi (a sort of ancient Egypt-like country) and was sent to Ankh-Morpork when he was 12 to become an assassin. Just after Teppic passes the final test, his father dies and he has to return to Djelibeybi to be king. When he arrives, he realizes a pyramid has to be built for his father, and he orders that it be the biggest pyramid in the valley, with labyrinths and statues and so forth. But the pyramid is -so- big and powerful that it somehow alters the fabric of time and space, and puts Djelibeybi into its own little dimension, separate from the outside world. It's now Teppic's job as king (and a god) to make things right, even if the High Priest likes to twist everything he says.

Thrown into the mix is the mysteriously old High Priest named Dios; the best mathemetician in the world (a camel); a handmaiden named Ptraci; the gods coming to life and freaking everyone out; and thousands of dead 'ancestors' lurching around and complaining about their pyramids. The story is humorous, as are all of Pratchett's books, and the characters are very likeable. And for those of you who like romance, there is definitely some of that (which I was glad of).

Some reviewers complain that the plot is thin and the characters are under-developed, but I must disagree. So far this is my favorite Discworld book, and I'm pretty sure it will stay that way. This is well worth buying, even if you're not a huge Discworld fan!

Rating:
Summary: A humorous account of a king
Review: Teppic, only legitimate son of the king of an impoverished kingdom, is sent to an assassins' school for his training. Students who fail disappear. When called back to take the throne, he finds himself contending with the chief priest. Mysterious pyramids, a runaway handmaiden, an educated camel, and a friend from school all add to the complications leading to an interesting climax. There are some digressions in the story, easy to skim over, and it skips from character to character and is written with some flashbacks necessary to explain the plot. Overall, it is an interesting story.

Rating:
Summary: What can I say? It's Pratchett, man!
Review: Teppic, who has just finished his training at the Assasins' Guild in Ankh-Morpork is called back to his home kingdom, because he is the only heir to the throne of his late father. Waiting for him back at home are numerous problems -- building a pyramid bigger than any other for his father, dealing with a high priest that just doesn't seem to listen to him, etc. The cast is very, very interesting, and is what pretty much makes the book. There's your 1000-year old high priest, a camel that's also the greatest mathematician on Earth, a sea trader whose business is about 30% legal, a handmaiden (what does that mean, anyway?), a whole lot of architects, and of course the new pharaoh, Teppic. This is the book's first release in the United States, so I've been waiting for it for a long time, and I'm not disappointed. I'm sure you won't be, either.