Soul Music was one of Pratchett's worst books

[AstralFire]

I really couldn't enjoy it. It's fairly inaccessible to anyone who's not getting every single obscure* musical reference which shunted out a lot of the enjoyment, and... I dunno. Most of the Discworld books that center around some newfangled Roundworld element feel very forced. Humor-wise (Music With Rocks In? Seriously? That doesn't even make sense.) and plot-wise (I like steampunk, but I have a hard time buying the Clacks system in a world that's very low-magic.)

And it's a reality-warping book. Reality-warping inherently makes plots harder to understand and execute well.

And it's a Susan Bones book. Susan Bones, even more than Rincewind, is an interesting character that was a trademark of meh stories. Thief of Time was the only good book she was in and she was, notably, a low point of the book when we weren't just getting random funny scenes out of her.

I will say, however, that "He looks like he's Elvish" and the very cleverly buried reference to Buddy Holly were good. But that's about it.

* Let me clarify - the musical references are far from obscure... I mean, if it was really bad they'd be metal references. But they're certainly oldies-topical. And anyone who doesn't care much for that stuff won't get half the book, and the plot's so thin and the characters often bizarrely unrecognizable (Dibbler is very weird in that book) that if you don't get the jokes, nothing's carrying the book.

[H. Zee]

Umm... I'm pretty sure she's called Susan Sto Helit, not Susan Bones. And personally, I think she was good in Hogfather as well as in Thief of Time.

I have to say I mostly agree with you, though there are as always in Pratchett's books some bits which are pure genius - I laughed for ages when I finally realised, on the second read-through, that the band called "We're Certainly Dwarfs" was a reference to "They Might Be Giants."

[Dhavaer]

Umm... I'm pretty sure she's called Susan Sto Helit, not Susan Bones.

True. Susan Bones is a bit character from Harry Potter.

[Artemician]

The references to to the music to be the main draw for me, TBH. This book introduced me to the music of bygone eras, something for which I am extremely grateful.

Also, I found Susan *actually tolerable* in this book, which surprised me. Maybe it was because she actually got her ego deflated somewhat. Good times.

[Closet_Skeleton]

I liked it...

But I actually watched the animated adaptation first.

[banjo1985]

I agree that Soul Music isn't really one of Pratchett's best books, it's a bit slow and not particularly funny.

Susan Sto-Helit is a mildly annoying character but an interesting one. The Hogfater was a good book with her presence, though I must agree that Thief of Time was probably her best outing.

[SoD]

I actually really enjoyed Soul Music, especially the Blues Brothers references: the fried rat and some coke scene, "Are you the watch?" "No ma'am. We're musicians." and, of course, "We're on a mission from Glod."

[Evil DM Mark3]

I did not enjoy soul music much because I am not a music fan, but some bits where very good. Also on clacks, you are aware that it has been shown as a perfectly viable system for a pre-electronic mass communication system right? As in, people read about it and then did experiments to prove that it could/would work, even financially?

[Spiryt]

I loved Soul Music. I didn't get all references, what doesn't change the fact that they're funny.

It was "reality warping" in good sense. "The thief of time" is the bad "reality warping book" IMo.

Plus, I love all books where Death is a main, or one of the main characters. Those alwazs have specific, great atmosphere.

And the ending is great.

[pendell]

I *am* a music fan, and I loved Soul Music, especially
the bit when the shop owner decides to hire a troll to
rip off the arms of anyone who tries to play 'stairway to heaven' on
one of his guitars?

"Doesn't he get a warning first?"
"That will *be* the warning".

I also owe the book a debt because it's the one that hooked my wife --
also named Susan -- on Terry Pratchett, and started a long history of
reading them together. Nothing like the power of audience identification.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[AstralFire]

Sorry, she's always been Susan Bones in my head since well before I picked up a Potter book. I'm not sure why.


I did not enjoy soul music much because I am not a music fan, but some bits where very good. Also on clacks, you are aware that it has been shown as a perfectly viable system for a pre-electronic mass communication system right? As in, people read about it and then did experiments to prove that it could/would work, even financially?

More information? *curious*

Still, it's the sort of thing that feels... too randomly advanced. Discworld went from Victorian tech to rapidly looking late 90's-ish.


I loved Soul Music. I didn't get all references, what doesn't change the fact that they're funny.

It was "reality warping" in good sense. "The thief of time" is the bad "reality warping book" IMo.

Plus, I love all books where Death is a main, or one of the main characters. Those alwazs have specific, great atmosphere.

And the ending is great.

*blink* ...Thief of Time has hardly any reality warping in it. Like, there's none of it that's actually plot relevant.

[puppyavenger]

(I like steampunk, but I have a hard time buying the Clacks system in a world that's very low-magic.)


Diskwrold..low magic...not seeing any connection here.

[AstralFire]

Diskwrold..low magic...not seeing any connection here.

There's very little actual magic accessible to most people, even Wizards and the Witches don't favor spellcasting over less dangerous solutions. It's a highly supernatural setting, but that's not the same thing.

[puppyavenger]

There's very little actual magic accessible to most people, even Wizards and the Witches don't favor spellcasting over less dangerous solutions. It's a highly supernatural setting, but that's not the same thing.

I guess so, anyway, haven't read the book, but the clacks seemed to work fin as a plot device in going Postal

[endoperez]

I didn't get the music stuff out of Soul Music. I'm pretty much a musical unbeliever. I enjoyed it even despite that. It's true that it's just a good book, instead of great, like many Pratchett books are... and I liked the scene where Death heard the Llamedos music.
Other books that didn't strike me as great were Monstrous regiment and Jingo, and perhaps Moving Pictures. I think Hogfather and Thief of Time were on the good side, personally. And I'm sure some people here disagree.


The world has developed very quickly. It's annoying if you miss a book. Still, I rather have development and somewhat unconsistent world than a stale, consistent world. Take trolls, for example. First books had trolls that were stone whenever sun was up, in later ones Detritus only shut down in a desert (in Jingo), but I much prefer having trolls like Detritus to them turning to stone.

[WalkingTarget]

(I like steampunk, but I have a hard time buying the Clacks system in a world that's very low-magic.)


I'm wondering what the Clacks has to do with the availability of magic in the setting to begin with. :smallconfused:

There's nothing magical about the Clacks at all, it's just a mechanical semaphore system used to relay messages. These really existed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semaphore_line). Granted, by the more recent books it's a bit more sophisticated than the "real" ones managed (being closer to a Discworld internet than the initial telegraph analog).

In the very first Discworld book, Rincewind bemoaned the fact that there should be something that was "better" than magic (i.e. science and technology). The people of the Disc have been catching on and making developments for much of the series. Sure, the development rate is pretty fast, but it's in a setting that's been described as a "world and mirror of worlds" within the books themselves, so there's a good reason for it to begin to approach "real" developments once the setting grew out of being a simple parody of general fantasy books.

[puppyavenger]

I'm wondering what the Clacks has to do with the availability of magic in the setting to begin with. :smallconfused:

There's nothing magical about the Clacks at all, it's just a mechanical semaphore system used to relay messages. These really existed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semaphore_line). Granted, by the more recent books it's a bit more sophisticated than the "real" ones managed (being closer to a Discworld internet than the initial telegraph analog).

really, what book, if I remember they were barely mentioned in makng money, and thats the only book after going postal (where they were defiantly telegraphs I've read. strangely going postal was my favorite book

[Evil DM Mark3]

*blink* ...Thief of Time has hardly any reality warping in it. Like, there's none of it that's actually plot relevant.
*blink**blink* ...Time breaks... Um...:smallconfused:

As for the Clacks, I think it first really gets mentioned in The Fifth Elephant (basically you had all the necessary bit lying around for centuries and then suddenly someone (presumably a Mr Dearheat) went "hang on...") and then develops from there. The other advances, well iconographs are in the first book, movable type is first mentioned as being not done for reasons of wizardly disapproval books before The Truth and disorganises come in in The Truth. As far as I am aware there isn't really much else that isn't an aplication or evolution of these few basic things.

[Spiryt]

*blink* ...Thief of Time has hardly any reality warping in it. Like, there's none of it that's actually plot relevant.

Eeeh... One powerful being in two people? Ageless Auditors trying to live? Stopped time?



I think Hogfather and Thief of Time were on the good side, personally. And I'm sure some people here disagree.


Hogfather is fantastic. Thief of time is kinda meh, as stated before.

[WalkingTarget]

really, what book, if I remember they were barely mentioned in makng money, and thats the only book after going postal (where they were defiantly telegraphs I've read. strangely going postal was my favorite book

Well, in the early books that had the Clacks, it was simple one-letter-at-a-time semaphore. In Monstrous Regiment, Lt. Blouse basically talks about data compression, almost anything involving The Smoking GNU in Going Postal is a direct parallel to hacking/phreaking, and the parts where the Clacks operators talk about the overhead is a lot like network protocol. HEX is connected to it, which essentially means he has the disc's first modem.

Hell, people even have c-mail addresses.

I guess that it can still simply be equated to a telegraph system, but so can the Roundworld internet when you get down to it. The way it's being used is what's drifting towards the internet.

[AstralFire]

I'm wondering what the Clacks has to do with the availability of magic in the setting to begin with. :smallconfused:

I should have said "low advancement" for more clarity. Discworld has neither magically automated carriages, more than one firearm, etc.


Granted, by the more recent books it's a bit more sophisticated than the "real" ones managed (being closer to a Discworld internet than the initial telegraph analog).

A LOT more sophisticated. I know mechanical semaphore systems existed.


*blink**blink* ...Time breaks... Um...:smallconfused:

Time broke before Thief of Time. Time got frozen in that book and there weren't any changes to the reality of what occurred during the plotline.


Eeeh... One powerful being in two people? Ageless Auditors trying to live? Stopped time?



Hogfather is fantastic. Thief of time is kinda meh, as stated before.

Reality alteration is "Hitler decided to become a mime and 1+1 equals 3".

[Evil DM Mark3]

I should have said "low advancement" for more clarity. Discworld has neither magically automated carriages, more than one firearm, etc.

I would like to point out however that it also has gone through the industrial revolution, has near-modern trade union activity even in the first book, etc.

I think you may have made an error that many fantasy readers and fantasy authors make, you assume that humanity's technoogical and sociological advancemnt has to follow a set pattern. (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TechnologyLevels)

This is kind of ludicrous when you compare what was invented when in Europe as opposed to the orient. Not to open that can of worms but one of the reasons that they where still making Katanas with folded steel long after European sword makers had abandoned their similar techniques is that Japan never invented a form of steel making that they could control the temperature of properly. Likewise the wheelbarrow was almost 500 years later in Europe than China.

[AstralFire]

While I see your point, it's a little hard to swallow that they've effectively perfected the early internet when they've just figured out the printing press and have no form of physical rapid transit.

[Evil DM Mark3]

While I see your point, it's a little hard to swallow that they've effectively perfected the early internet when they've just figured out the printing press and have no form of physical rapid transit.

Omnia seems to have been using movable type for about 100 years... That is not recent.

[TeeEl]

Hmm. I sort of agree with the premise, but I still found Soul Music better than the earliest Discworld books. For that matter, really, all the way up through Soul Music or so I've always thought Pratchett's work was a bit hit-and-miss. It wasn't until the Watch books started taking root that the series really took off for me.

[alchemyprime]

Well... I'ma go read this book. And since Susan is one of the three favorite characters, followed closely by Death and Rincewind, I'm certain it will be a fun read for me.

Plus, you know, I know a lot of songs twice my age.:smalltongue:

[BRC]

While I see your point, it's a little hard to swallow that they've effectively perfected the early internet when they've just figured out the printing press and have no form of physical rapid transit.

They've HAD Printing presses for awhile, it's just that culturally they were banned.

They are working on physical rapid tranist, Vetinari is working on somthing called "The Undertaking" involving the Axle they captured from the dwarves in Thud. There hasn't been much detail, but it sounds alot like a subway system.

Other forms of mass transit would be a cultural thing once again, somebody getting around to organizing carts to act like buses, it is independent of technological advances.

Edit: Also, the Clacks isn't the Internet, it's much more like a Fax system that runs off semaphore.

[Ramien]

The worst of the books, in my opinion, was Monstrous Regiment. The best for me kinda flip-flop between the Watch Series and the three Science of Discworld books.

[Dervag]

The references to to the music to be the main draw for me, TBH. This book introduced me to the music of bygone eras, something for which I am extremely grateful.

Also, I found Susan *actually tolerable* in this book, which surprised me. Maybe it was because she actually got her ego deflated somewhat. Good times.This is before she fully develops her ego. At the beginning of the book, she doesn't know she's a demigod (so to speak). So she hasn't quite developed the "Lord, what fools these mortals be!" attitude problem.


Still, it's the sort of thing that feels... too randomly advanced. Discworld went from Victorian tech to rapidly looking late 90's-ish.Well, in some ways. Not in a lot of very important ways- no personal telephones, no cars, no railroads...

He incorporated the imp-driven PDAs and a few things like that, but that has its roots in the imp-driven pictograph box from the first book. The clacks don't actually advance technology beyond the Victorian level. They play more or less the same role telegraphs and ticker-tape machines did in real life.


Granted, by the more recent books it's a bit more sophisticated than the "real" ones managed (being closer to a Discworld internet than the initial telegraph analog).Yes, but a lot of it is plausible. The improvements in what the semaphores are capable of are like what we might expect to see in a world where there is not and cannot be a wired or wireless communication system (telegraph or radio). Discworld is precisely such a world- electricity and magnetism have to act very strangely, from a physics standpoint, for the speed of light to be (canonically) slow.

The really startling aspect is how fast the system has evolved, with the implication that the Grand Trunk has only been around for five years or so as of the latest books. That's the only part that strains belief from my perspective.


Well, in the early books that had the Clacks, it was simple one-letter-at-a-time semaphore. In Monstrous Regiment, Lt. Blouse basically talks about data compression, almost anything involving The Smoking GNU in Going Postal is a direct parallel to hacking/phreaking, and the parts where the Clacks operators talk about the overhead is a lot like network protocol. HEX is connected to it, which essentially means he has the disc's first modem.

Hell, people even have c-mail addresses.

I guess that it can still simply be equated to a telegraph system, but so can the Roundworld internet when you get down to it. The way it's being used is what's drifting towards the internet.You're right, but the bandwidth is still so low and the system so centralized that it's fundamentally more like Victorian telegraphy than turn-of-the-millenium Internet. You may have a c-mail address, but that's just a code for your real name so that someone knows where to send the telegram, and so on.


I think you may have made an error that many fantasy readers and fantasy authors make, you assume that humanity's technoogical and sociological advancemnt has to follow a set pattern. (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TechnologyLevels)

This is kind of ludicrous when you compare what was invented when in Europe as opposed to the orient. Not to open that can of worms but one of the reasons that they where still making Katanas with folded steel long after European sword makers had abandoned their similar techniques is that Japan never invented a form of steel making that they could control the temperature of properly. Likewise the wheelbarrow was almost 500 years later in Europe than China.Thing is, technology heterodynes. Two techniques will work together to suggest a third.

For example, wheelbarrows are a very straightforward technology that only very clever people will think of. Anyone who has wheels can build one; there's no obvious reason why wheelbarrows weren't invented in the Bronze Age. China could invent the wheelbarrow at one 'tech level' while France could invent it at another, because there's nothing in the nature of wheelbarrows that requires you to invent much of anything else first. Any civilization with wheels can build one if they think of it.

Whereas telegraphs are another matter entirely. There was no possibility of the medieval Chinese figuring out telegraphs before they figured out electricity and magnetism. And to make telegraph wire they'd have needed industrial-style wire mills to produce mile after mile of insulated copper cable. To build a telegraph network around their civilization, they'd have needed what we'd call "early 19th century" knowledge of physics and "early 19th century" industrial technology: water power, if not steam power.

You can make a darn good case that the telegraph could not have been invented and used until civilization reached the "technology level" that Europe was at in the early 1800s, because you need to have the tools to understand and build them.

This is why technological pace has become more uniform, with a single cluster of nations leading in almost all fields today. Back in pre-industrial times, you could have advanced farming techniques while being behind the curve in metalworking, or something like that. Today, advances in all fields of technology rely on a large and complicated set of mental and physical tools. You can't invent anything new without having mastered all the old technologies.
________________________________

Discworld is near the line dividing those two environments. On the one hand you have inventions like the wheelbarrow and telescope that anyone could think of at almost any level of general technology. On the other, you have stuff like the clacks that is outstripping what that civilization can do with it. Yes, it allows you to communicate with Genua, 3000 miles away, in less than a day. But given that any physical cargo must take several weeks to get from Ankh-Morpork to Genua by stage coach or sail, that ability is less useful than it would be in a world with airplanes- or even steamships.

At which point it's hard to explain the booming demand for the semaphores.

[Turcano]

Most of the Discworld books that center around some newfangled Roundworld element feel very forced.

You mean both of them?

Personally, Small Gods seems to be the dividing line between the good stuff and the "meh" stuff, probably because that's the point where he stopped doing explicit parody and moved on to stuff with more depth. (Out of the roughly three-quarters of the Discworld series I've read, my least favorite was Mort.)


At which point it's hard to explain the booming demand for the semaphores.

I don't remember exactly when it happened, but they switched to Aldis lamps at some point.

[Closet_Skeleton]

You mean both of them?

Soul Music
The Truth
Moving Pictures
Any scene with Ponder Stibbons

That's at least three.

[Tengu_temp]

I think that Pratchett's worst Discworld books are The Colour of Magic and Equal Rites - he is still developing his style, and it shows. From the new ones, probably Monstrous Regiment - a nice read, but nothing beyond that. The best books are Reaper Man, Small Gods and Night Watch. Soul Music is somewhere in the middle, and middle for Pratchett means that it's a good, enjoyable book.

[Dervag]

I don't remember exactly when it happened, but they switched to Aldis lamps at some point.Only for night signalling, I think.

Anyway, my point is that the Discworld, or at least the part of it around Ankh-Morpork, is currently undergoing what might be called a "clockwork revolution." But they're bound to hit a limit unless they find sources of industrial power equivalent or superior to the steam engine- which is where the golems of Um and the Axle come in.

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

Yes, it allows you to communicate with Genua, 3000 miles away, in less than a day. But given that any physical cargo must take several weeks to get from Ankh-Morpork to Genua by stage coach or sail, that ability is less useful than it would be in a world with airplanes- or even steamships.

What if the prawns hold on to the wire with their little claws?

[TopRamen]

Still, it's the sort of thing that feels... too randomly advanced. Discworld went from Victorian tech to rapidly looking late 90's-ish.

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Well, in the early books that had the Clacks, it was simple one-letter-at-a-time semaphore. In Monstrous Regiment, Lt. Blouse basically talks about data compression, almost anything involving The Smoking GNU in Going Postal is a direct parallel to hacking/phreaking, and the parts where the Clacks operators talk about the overhead is a lot like network protocol. HEX is connected to it, which essentially means he has the disc's first modem.

Hell, people even have c-mail addresses.

I guess that it can still simply be equated to a telegraph system, but so can the Roundworld internet when you get down to it. The way it's being used is what's drifting towards the internet.

Others...

Are you freaking kidding me? Seriously, trying to scientifically analyze Discworld? That's worse than the guys who try and analyze comic book superheroes and criticize them for not being realistic. The point is not the technology or whatever, it's the plot and commentary Pratchett makes on our world. Plus the humor and entertainment value.

/rant

[TeeEl]

I liked Monstrous Regiment. :smallfrown:

I'm a bit puzzled about the arguments over what real world communication technology the clacks are supposed to be analogous to, when it's fairly clear the answer is "all of them". The clacks are simultaneously representative of the telegraph, the internet, ham radio, and a couple of cans on a string.

[Turcano]

Soul Music
The Truth
Moving Pictures
Any scene with Ponder Stibbons

That's at least three.

I guess I have a narrower definition of "Roundworld elements," since I make a distinction between those and organic (if rapid) development of technology. By that measure, only Moving Pictures and Soul Music qualify.

[Artemician]

Are you freaking kidding me? Seriously, trying to scientifically analyze Discworld? That's worse than the guys who try and analyze comic book superheroes and criticize them for not being realistic. The point is not the technology or whatever, it's the plot and commentary Pratchett makes on our world. Plus the humor and entertainment value.

Since one of the mainstays of the series is social commentary on the effects of technology on people, analysis thereof of the technology mentioned should not come as a surprise to you.

[Avilan the Grey]

Personally I loved it.

I am an average music listener, and I caught most of the references. I also have a very visual imagination, and therefore minor things(?) cracked me up to no end, like the ZZ top music video suddenly happening in the University (from memory: a number of bikini chicks pops out of thin air and starts dancing in one of the rooms, for example).
Or the Anarchy in Ankh-Morpork song...

[Gnomish Lab]

Soul Music
The Truth
Moving Pictures
Any scene with Ponder Stibbons

That's at least three.

Also : Going Postal (one of my top 5 disc world books) and Making Money.

[psycojester]

I liked Monstrous Regiment. :smallfrown:


Me too, i found it to be an amusing story, nothing world shattering or incredibly moving but entertaining enough. I've never really understood the waves of hatred it seems to generate. Can somebody please explain that?

[The_JJ]

People dont like MR? But it was good. Not great, but good. Especially when compared to some of the other stuff. Like Strata. Yeah, that's right, I read Strata, the real 1st Prachett discworld novel

Ahem...

My top TP, in order
Small Gods
Night Watch
Good Omens
Reaper Man
Hogfather, but only for the disertation on why stories are nessesary.

Everything else the man touches.

[Tengu_temp]

I think Strata were better than The Colour Of Magic.

[The_JJ]

But you gotta love the parody.:smallbiggrin:

I dunno, I've had a really hard time finding good fantasy, so it was fun to see all the bad cliches go up in smoke.