I can’t remember when I first started reading Terry Pratchett – sometime in the late 80s I think, when Discworld was just starting out. Nor can I remember what the first one I read was. But I have been reading Discworld every since and I have a large collection of books on the bookshelf. He quickly became one of my favourite authors. I wasn’t alone in that – during the 90s he was UKs most popular author, only being surpassed by J.K. Rowling later on. And his fame was not limited to the UK. His 70 books sold 85 million copies around the world, in over 40 languages.
Waking up yesterday to hear the news of his passing hit me harder than I had expected. He’d been sick for some time so it wasn’t unexpected and nor am I the type to get caught up in the death of famous people. Yet in this case it did and I spent a lot of yesterday rather down.
It is sad to think that we will never get another Discworld book, which after getting 2-3 a year at his peak, will take some adjusting too. But his prolific nature left us a large body of work to go on reading over the years.
RIP Sir Terry Pratchett. You will be missed.
Mist and Shadows 