Jingo: (Discworld Novel 21) (Discworld Novels) - Softcover

Terry Pratchett

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0552167592 ISBN 13: 9780552167598

Publisher: Corgi, 2013

Synopsis

'Generous, amusing and the ideal boarding point for those who have never visited Discworld' Sunday Telegraph

The Discworld is very much like our own - if our own were to consist of a flat planet balanced on the back of four elephants which stand on the back of a giant turtle, that is . . .
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'Neighbours... hah. People'd live for ages side by side, nodding at one another amicably on their way to work, and then some trivial thing would happen and someone would be having a garden fork removed from their ear.'

When the neighbours in question are the proud empires of Klatch and Ankh-Morpork, those are going to be some pretty large garden tools indeed. Of course, no-one would dream of starting a war without a perfectly good reason...such as a 'strategic' piece of old rock in the middle of nowhere.

It is after all every citizen's right to bear arms to defend their own. Even if it isn't technically their own. And even if they don’t have much in the way of actual weaponry. As two armies march, Commander Vimes of Ankh-Morpork City Watch faces unpleasant foes who are out to get him... and that's just the people on his side. The enemy might be even worse.
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The Discworld novels can be read in any order but Jingo is the fourth book in the City Watch series.

About this title

Review:

Jingo is the 20th of Pratchett's Discworld novels, and the fourth to feature the City Guard of Ankh-Morpork. As Jingo begins, an island suddenly rises between Ankh- Morpork and Al-Khali, capital of Klatch. Both cities claim it. Lord Vetinari, the Patrician, has failed to convince the Ruling Council that force is a bad idea, despite reminding them that they have no army--"I believe one of those is generally considered vital to the successful prosecution of a war." Samuel Vimes, Commander of the City Watch, has to find out who shot the Klatchian envoy, Prince Khufurah, and set fire to their embassy, before war breaks out.

Pratchett's characters are both sympathetic and outrageously entertaining, from Captain Carrot, who always finds the best in people and puts it to work playing football, to Sergeant Colon and his sidekick, Corporal Nobbs, who have "an ability to get out of their depth on a wet pavement". Then there is the mysterious D'reg, 71-hour Ahmed. What is his part in all this, and why 71 hours? Anyone who doesn't mind laughing themselves silly at the idiocy of people in general and governments in particular will enjoy Jingo. --Nona Vero

Review:

"'Pratchett's writing is a constant delight. No one mixes the fantastical and the mundane to better comic effect or offers sharper insights into the absurdities of human endeavour'" (Daily Mail)

"'Generous, amusing and the ideal boarding point for those who have never visited Discworld'" (Sunday Telegraph)

"'Vintage Pratchett... Perennially funny...A sharp satire on the futility of war'" (Metro)

"'One of those rare writers who appeals to everyone... He satisfies the need for fast-moving breathtaking plots with entirely satisfying endings, and the equally primitive desire for an alternative world, full of thrills but benign, into which one can step for pleasure and enlivenment'" (Daily Express)

"'Both his inventiveness and his moral shrewdness seem inexhaustible'" (Daily Mail)

About this edition

• Publisher: Corgi
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 0552167592
• ISBN 13: 9780552167598
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 464