Wait I'm Genuinely Surprised By The Results! (Tumblr Apparently Doesn't Let You View Your Own Poll Results

Wait I'm genuinely surprised by the results! (Tumblr apparently doesn't let you view your own poll results before voting closes unless you vote in it, which I didn't do)

I really wasn't expecting it to be that close, and I didn't think Going Postal was going to win??? I truly believed that it was shaping up to be an absolute sweep by Monstrous Regiment...

observations, personal opinions, and discworld spoilers below the jump

Observations from the sideline: Although both books have their fans, the Monstrous Regiment fans really made an impression with their passion! The pro-MR commentary was thoughtful and persuasive. I saw folks saying that MR is more emotionally and thematically complex, and that there are more characters who are well-rounded. And of course, the queer rep in MR makes it special for readers as well.

Another idea I saw pop up a few times was the special place that one's first/introductory Discworld book holds in one's heart. Couple of people mentioned that factor in conjunction with Going Postal. I personally know someone whose first Discworld book was MR, and I have gifted MR to someone to try to hook them. (My first Disc book was sourcery btw and I was like 8 so I didn't understand... most of it. i'm pretty sure i got it in an airport???) People also commented that Going Postal is more "fun." It's lighter, it's more of a romp. This might make it more of an "easy sell" for trying to hook your friends into Discworld, but I'm sure it depends on your friends :)

One thing I love about GP is how the plot is resolved. That message on the clacks? The message from the dead--giving them not only a chance to be heard again, but a chance to strike back at the company that killed them--feels so right. And yet, it's fake. It's a lie. It's an unethical, unscrupulous lie, and it works. It's real, but it's fake--but it's real enough. It makes a difference and changes the world, at least the world of Clacks operators. By implication, "the dead" speak one more time, and they save lives by forcing a management change at the Trunk. This is the book that gave us the shorthand GNU. GNU Terry Pratchett. We're in on it, too. A man's not dead while his name's still spoken. Is that real? "It's what should have been true," so--maybe it's real enough to make it through the night.

Going back and forth--there are really good points to be made in favor of both books. Monstrous Regiment is a great book. Pratchett did an amazing job with it. There's so much meat on that bone. It's well-written, it's funny, it's heartfelt. The gender stuff is really interesting (I'm not doing Discworld and gender, but if I were it would be its own chapter at least). There's Igorina! The scene at the end with the Duchess and sending the soldiers home permanently changed part of my brain--but I don't know if it was as strong, in terms of character and theme, as GP's big scene.

Comparing MR to GP was, I realized after the poll was underway, comparing apples to oranges. The number of rounded characters is different, the plot complexity is different, the character of the story itself is different. It's a weirder comparison to make than I realized at first. But I really appreciate that people not only voted but also shared their thoughts. It was genuinely thought-provoking in a way I haven't gotten to enjoy in a long time :) So (if you read this far!) thank you for voting and sharing your thoughts!

Bonus: why did you pick the one you did?

...Or tell me the options are wrong and [your write-in candidate] trounces both of them

Happy Pumpkin Spice Season to the guy who would have loved them the most!

What is this book for you?

In a literal sense, I re-read several Discworld books as a kid that fell to bits (not sure why, but ‘Interesting Times’ in particular). As a teenager, this was ‘High Fidelity’, ‘The Prestige’ and Brett Easton Ellis books, none of which I’ve returned to since!

I don’t re-read much as an adult, except that I listen to the audiobook of ‘I, Partridge’ every few months and read ‘A Christmas Carol’ every December and revisit short stories by Kelly Link, George Saunders and Carmen Maria Machado quite often.

How about you?

i started reading one of us is lying by karen m mcmanus. i don't know if i'll finish it. I love tropey pulpy books but it's a little odd to read... the characters are very familiar "types"- the jock, the brainiac, the misfit, the popular girl. the details about the school are also very weird.

for example, the plot kicks off when a teacher finds the characters' phones in their bags. this is framed as his standard practice at the beginning of class, which is like... if you need to search a backpack for an object as small as a phone, you need to get into all the nooks and crannies. i'm not in high school any more, but my every-day backpack has more than 8 separate, zippered areas that could hold a phone. imagine doing a thorough check for a class of thirty high school students. imagine doing it for, i dunno, four classes. imagine doing it five days a week every week. already, it's kind of a weird concept. ALSO at my local public schools, there are rules about searching students' possessions and persons like the requirement to get school administration involved. (obviously there's more to it than that, and there are provision for emergencies and immediate threats to health and safety, and different rules about stuff like private property vs school lockers... but random spot-checks of students are not allowed.)

there's also this thing with epi-pens. at the book's fictional school, the nurse keeps some epi-pens in a drawer in the health room and it's clearly marked and you can run in there and grab one if there's an emergency. i'm not saying that's a terrible idea, i'm saying that at the schools where i have familiarity with epi-pens rules, it doesn't work liek that. each kid/family provides the epi-pen for themselves. the epi-pen can be kept in the health room, or the family can sign a form allowing the student to carry their own epi-pen. but each epi-pen belongs to a specific kid, and you can't give a kid someone else's epi-pen (i mean you're not supposed to; no one i know has ever been in the horrible situation where they had to decide to do/not do that. but officially you're not supposed to do that!!!!)

plus the police keep questioning the students without any indication that their parents/guardians have been contacted. and the principal is just kinda letting it all happen? Idk how police investigations work in schools but i hope that if the police showed up to question my kid, the school would at least call me to let me know.

so like. is the book good? i dunno, but the book is weird. i'm still reading it for now but it'll have to do something interesting soon or it goes on the "donate" pile.

Graphics glitch makes for entertaining weather report…🔊 🔊

This badly cropped Terry Pratchett quote I found is here for anyone who wants it