Review: The Colour of Magic - Terry Pratchett

Oh this book was fun! I am so glad I happened to stumble across the Terry Pratchett reading challenge because it has given me the boost I needed to get on already and read these books! This book is so unique and so hilarious I urge anyone who likes fantasy to get to grips with it and be taken on one mad journey with some very peculiar characters! I aim to read the books in order but not all at once so I'll take a break in between each discworld book and then hop back into the world once I feel like it :) 

So here's my review for The Colour of Magic:

4/5 stars (I really liked/enjoyed it!)

There is one simple word to describe this book: FUN. It was a whole lot of fun. I just loved the not so serious attitude of the text with its crazy characters, insanely fantastic world and the hilarious storyline. Sir Terry Pratchett has one hell of an imagination and this first novel in his Discworld series reflects this brilliantly. The discworld is like no other fantasy world that I’ve read about before; it’s a flat, disc shaped world that resides on the back of four gigantic elephants that rests on the back of the giant turtle, Great A’Tuin. The sex of the turtle is a big mystery, a mystery that is central to some very funny happenings in this book. I laughed out loud when I read how the each turtle swims through space, carrying a world on its back, and it even sometimes mates with other turtles therefore creating new worlds. It sounds insane but the world just completes the whole attitude of this eccentric book. Now this is what you call unique!

I loved the characters in this book. I love how the author characterises them. Rincewind, a not so very good wizard, who really isn’t a wizard because he was expelled from the Unseen University, somehow finds himself in the most crazy situations, beginning with his unfortunate, unexpected role, as a very strange little man’s guide. This very strange little man is of course the naïve, rich tourist, Twoflower who has journeyed from far away lands, where he works in “inn-sewer-ants”, but dreams of seeing the world and all its not so glorious places (and people). I loved how Pratchett depicted Twoflower. He epitomises the stereotypical tourist, with his garish clothes and his picture box (a camera where a small little creature with an easel sits and magically paints the scene) and causes a massive stir in the city of Ankh-Morpork with his luggage full of pure gold coins. I think Twoflower was my favourite character. Everyone just thinks he’s stupid but he’s so eager to see the world he doesn’t even notice the filthy streets and dodgy people who reside in Ankh-Morpork and he always wants to take a photo of something when they are in the worst possible situations. My favourite part with Twoflower was him imagining a dragon and then falling asleep, making it disappear resulting in them first falling onto an aeroplane in a parallel dimension, and then dropping into the sea. The character of the Luggage is also a great one. He is loyal to his master, chasing Rincewind until he searches for him and then becoming a monstrous creature destroying and eating all in its path to return to him. And who couldn’t find Death hilarious? I just love how he pops up somewhere from his little cottage, and literally goes poof, and the life of the person/creature is transported with him to wherever they go in death. I love how he is so eager to take the lives of plague victims that he dresses up some other poor soul in his costume with his scythe to go take Rincewind; so funny. I have read the Hogfather before so I know what kind of character he is and what is in store for him, but I just loved him.

I also enjoyed the whole god/goddesses part of the book, where they gamble with the poor lives of the inhabitants below them by playing a kind of board game. I love greek mythology so this reminded me in parts of it.

This book is full of fun events but it did seem at times to jump from one thing to another but I guess it just added to the whole crazy adventure that Rincewind and Twoflower have embarked one. Things go from bad to worse but somehow everything seems to right itself with either Twoflower miraculously saving the day or Rincewind with some surprisingly heroic qualities (or maybe just the help of quick thinking and a magic sword!) saving everyone from imminent death (or worse!).

This book is full of satire, outlandish humour, peculiar characters and an eccentric world. It completely made me laugh out loud and laugh at the hopelessness of each situation, before something happens saving them from fate (literally Fate, who is very interested in the demise of Rincewind and Twoflower). It is unlike any fantasy I have read before. It is a fun read, one that I didn’t take too seriously but enjoyed for what it is. I cannot wait to read The Light Fantastic next and see what the inhabitants of the discworld are up to next!