Chaulking Up Another Pratchett

The first couple of Terry Pratchett books I read I read simply to assess the general style and character so I could tell the friends who recommended them that, unlike my normal modus operandi, I did actually follow their advice. I didn't set out to become a devotee. But after five books, Going Postal being the most recent, I've read enough of Terry Pratchett's books now to be beyond the "getting the feel of them" stage. I think it's safe (and time) to admit that I've become quite a fan.

The five that I've read (Soul Music, The Colour of Magic, The Light Fantastic, Equal Rites, in that order, and now Going Postal) have been all over the map in terms of when they were written and the characters they've incorporated (though they've all been in the Discworld series), so I wouldn't have been surprised to have found the strengths and weaknesses shifting and varying among them. But I've found them, rather, to be all very consistent and even - clever satire and humor, and both in good portions. While they are on one hand light and silly and funny, they are nevertheless very dense in terms of allusion and innuendo - practically every sentence makes you stop and try to figure out just what was being poked at or obliquely referenced. You can pretty much count on each having some target, though it may well be something obscure or too "British" to be readily identifiable to we Yanks. In fact, his books are so loaded that there seem to actually be people willing to devote large amounts of time researching and cataloging exhaustive lists of all the references and satires found within the books. Sort of running commentary on the in-line commentary. One such website I like to visit (so I understand just how many jokes went over my head) is The Annotated Pratchett. It's like reading Cliff Notes on that other less well-known English writer, Shakespeare.

I've read somewhere that medical issues may keep Pratchett from writing too many more books, but I'm happy to know that there are probably twenty-plus books already out there that I have yet to look forward too.