Terry Pratchett has a new book out!

Sometime back in high school, I came across a Terry Pratchett book in my local library. I'm pretty sure it was Interesting Times. The prologue:

There is a curse.

They say:
May you live in Interesting Times

Here's another of his beginnings from The Colour of Magic, first in the Discworld series:

In a distant and secondhand set of dimensions, in an astral plane that was never meant to fly, the curling star-mists waver and part...

See...

Great A'Tuin the turtle comes, swimming slowly through the interstellar gulf, hydrogen frost on his ponderous limbs, his huge and ancient shell pocked with meteor craters. Through sea-sized eyes that are crusted with rheum and asteroid dust He stares fixedly at the Destination.

If that isn't enough to draw you in, you may as well go and stick your head in a well and stay there.

Ever since that first book, I've been an avid reader of his books, usually devouring them in one sitting, uninterrupted even by toilet breaks. With delightfully memorable characters like Rincewind, Death, Granny Weatherwax and Sam Vimes, all set in a flat, round world called the Discworld, Terry Pratchett's award-winning series is an immensely satisfying satirical take on all the crazy little things that happen here in our own boring little world.

From the Colour of Magic to the 35th and latest book in the series, Making Money, not much has been spared by Pratchett's wicked pen. From continents and cultures to little things like sausages in buns and building a city on top of another city, he points out the little foibles that make us all human. Even famous historical personages like Leonardo da Vinci and Conan the Barbarian are parodied as Leonard of Quirm and Cohen the Barbarian.

Then sometime last year, Terry discovered that he had early-onset Alzheimers. I was in shock when I found out. Alzheimers is a terrible disease, slowly eating away at your mind, your memories, your very being until nothing is left. Worst (and perhaps a little selfishly) of all, every day, the world is losing bits of the fantastic Discworld that's locked up in Terry's head.

It doesn't seem to have stopped him, though. I just found out about the new release of the first two books of the series - this time in graphic novel format! *jumps up and down* I can't wait to get my hands on it. Take a look!



And at the end of the month, he's releasing a new book, Nation! :) Yay for new entertainment!