Fiction Fans

The Shepherd's Crown by Terry Pratchett

• Episode 170

Share episode

Your hosts finally reach the end of their Discworld reread with The Shepherd's Crown by Terry Pratchett, and they're feeling all sorts of ways about it. They talk about Tiffany Aching's arc over her mini-series as a whole, tying up (and leaving) loose threads, and everyone's favorite Kelda, Jeannie.


Find us on Discord / Support us on Patreon

Thanks to the following musicians for the use of their songs:

- Amarià for the use of “Sérénade à Notre Dame de Paris”
- Josh Woodward for the use of “Electric Sunrise”

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

Lilly:

Hello and welcome to Fiction Fans, a podcast where we read books and other words, too. I'm Lily.

Sara:

And I'm Sarah.

Lilly:

And we are about to discuss The Shepherd's Crown by Terry Pratchett. Our final step on our journey to the center of the Discworld. Which still makes no sense, but we made it through the whole series with that dumb segment name, so

Sara:

we did make it through the whole series. And it is also our final episode of 2024.

Lilly:

A lot of endings, but first, we have our quick five minute introduction. Sarah, what's something great that happened this week?

Sara:

I just got back from a trip to Japan and the trip to Japan was pretty darn great.

Lilly:

I bet, yeah! You were there for over a week, right?

Sara:

I was actually in Japan for like eight days. But then with travel time, it was more like 10 days.

Lilly:

I mean, eight is still over a week, technically.

Sara:

Yes, I think we landed late Monday night and left late Monday night, Monday to Monday.

Lilly:

Well, it's not a competition, but my good thing is actually better than that. I know you weren't expecting me to be able to top you.

Sara:

I don't, I don't know if, if your good thing can top the best whiskey bar in the world, which I found in Yokohama,

Lilly:

I do want to hear more about that later, but

Sara:

You can try.

Lilly:

while my parents were visiting for Thanksgiving, My mother made a Deez Nuts joke completely independently, perfectly in context. Like, no, no prompting from me or my husband or anything. She just, like, fucking nailed it. It was incredible.

Sara:

Okay, you're right. That is pretty good.

Lilly:

Yeah. My dad was cooking something and he asked her to hand him, I don't know, it was almonds or something. And she said, oh, Deez Nuts? And I died. I died. It was amazing.

Sara:

Way to go, Aunt Kathy.

Lilly:

Yes. So what are you drinking today?

Sara:

So initially I thought that I would have a cider just to make this special because it is the final Discworld novel. And then it's really cold and rainy out, so I am drinking Lazy Man's Mold Cider.

Lilly:

Nice. I also have. Well, it's called a cider. It's a Honeycrisp cider, but it's apple juice. It's just chunky apple juice. Who am I kidding? in this book, drinks quite a bit of cider. So, I think we were both on that wavelength.

Sara:

yeah, that's, that's why I originally wanted to drink an alcoholic cider, but then it was cold,

Lilly:

Mm hmm.

Sara:

so it's Mold for me. And non alcoholic.

Lilly:

Have you read anything good lately?

Sara:

I did get a fair amount of reading done on the plane to Japan. Not on the way home. On the way home, I just slept. But let's see, what did I read? Oh yeah! I read A Demon's Guide to Wooing a Witch by Sarah Hawley, which is book two in her Glimmer Falls series. I read the first book a long time ago. And this is, like, a traditional romance book. series in that the main couple in this book are secondary characters in the first book. yeah, so it's, it references things in the first book, but it's not like a continuation. And I really enjoyed it. I think I liked A Witch's Guide to Fake Dating a lot. But A Demon's Guide to Wooing a Witch was still very, very good.

Lilly:

Is fake dating a trope that you particularly like?

Sara:

Not necessarily. I just thought that the first book was a little funnier and this book was a little more serious,

Lilly:

Mm hmm.

Sara:

Which fit for the characters, but I, I enjoy humor. I mean, not that it wasn't still funny because it was still funny, but it just, I think, dealt with some more serious things. so I liked the first book a little bit better.

Lilly:

Cool. I have bounced over into Baldur's Gate 3 fan fiction

Sara:

Oh,

Lilly:

that I have been cramming into my eyeballs lately. It is fun in that I haven't encountered a fandom personally in a while that has ship names, which is such a fun thing. I don't know. I love it so much and I have not seen it in years.

Sara:

I feel like that's a very nostalgic thing.

Lilly:

isn't it? But yeah, so like, that's just been especially delightful. But we've stalled long enough, and now we have to talk about the last Discworld book!

Sara:

It is indeed the last Discworld book which is very sad.

Lilly:

Period, end of

Sara:

Period. End of sentence. Yeah. I mean, both because the book itself is sad, in many respects, but also just the fact that it's the last Discworld novel is sad.

Lilly:

It felt very different in tone from, I would say, the majority of Discworld for that reason.

Sara:

Yeah, and I don't know how much of that was the novel itself and how much was me bringing it Like my own baggage to it. Maybe a little bit of column A and a little bit of column B. I had read it before but I didn't read it until last year, I think. Like I didn't read it when it came out because I just was not ready to read it. read the final Discworld novel.

Lilly:

Yeah. And I think we have actually spoiled this book on this podcast before, but we're not going to. We're gonna save the big plot points for the spoiler section, which is sometimes touch and go for Discworld books if we think it needs a spoiler section. But this book does.

Sara:

I, I think so. I do think that while this book definitely felt more complete than Raising Steam like much less disjointed I think I talked a lot about how I felt Raising Steam felt very disjointed to me in that episode. And this one doesn't suffer that same problem, but it still feels, for me, a bit like Raising Steam. A third or fourth draft, not like a final polished product, because I do think that there are some loose ends that don't get tied up That would have if Pratchett, A, hadn't had Alzheimer's, and B, hadn't died before finishing the book.

Lilly:

I was ready to fight you. When you first put this note in, and in fact, my note is I don't feel that way. But then, as I was going through all of my notes for the spoiler section, I was like, Gee, I ended up with a lot of questions, didn't I? Maybe you're onto something.

Sara:

Yeah, like, I just feel like some of, some of those things, and we'll talk about them later when they come up in our notes, but. Some of them, I think, would have been fleshed out if he had had more of an opportunity to continue working on and polishing this book.

Lilly:

Yeah, I think Loose Ends is the right way to describe it. Because the book as a whole feels much more, like the plot feels, More

Sara:

Coherent?

Lilly:

yeah, whereas Raising Steam was so kind of just two separate things smushed together. And so, reading this right after that, I was like, no way, this one's fine.

Sara:

Yeah, I definitely agree there. I think raising steam felt like, like you say, two things smushed together, not very coherent. This book feels like a book. It feels much farther along in that, in that book writing process.

Lilly:

And I wonder if part of those loose ends are, I mean, as the final Discworld novel, it did sort of feel like Pratchett was trying to get in, like, A not best of, but

Sara:

Well, but

Lilly:

we get a lot of things pulled in, references to things that we haven't necessarily seen in a while, and so I think that they didn't get, like, fully figured out.

Sara:

I mean, yes, I agree with you to a certain extent, but he wasn't intending on this being the last Discworld novel. he had more ideas that he was going to write.

Lilly:

Well, sure.

Sara:

it's just that he died before he could.

Lilly:

You don't think he knew this was gonna be the last Cause, like, there's so many references to things that feel like make it feel like a goodbye. Like the ending montage of a movie where you see all of the characters you've met along the way.

Sara:

I mean, I don't disagree. Because I think that he probably did know that he wasn't necessarily going to get a chance to start working on those other further ideas that he had. At the same time, when he was first diagnosed, his doctors gave him two years and he, like, lived for another seven or ten or something. So, I feel like, I don't know, I feel like he was, More hopeful than that.

Lilly:

I mean, maybe it wasn't supposed to be the last Discworld novel, but I think it was clearly the end of an arc, shall we say.

Sara:

Yes. I agree that it was clearly the end of an arc.

Lilly:

In the way that Vimes last novel sort of had a similar vibe to me. Where we see a lot of characters and themes that he gets a chance to sort of, he as Sam Vimes, gets a chance to sort of say goodbye to. Except the character doesn't know that.

Sara:

Yeah. I don't necessarily think that Pratchett intended this to be the last Discworld novel, but I agree with you that I think that this was going to be the last Tiffany Aching novel, regardless.

Lilly:

And it was a great Tiffany Aking novel. I think that might be my favorite miniseries out of Discworld as a whole,

Sara:

Hmm.

Lilly:

overall. I do still love going postal. But I don't think the rest of Moist Von Lipfig's books hold up.

Sara:

Yeah, I would, I would agree with that.

Lilly:

Whereas I have loved every single Tiffany Aking book.

Sara:

And I really like the, way that her character progresses, not just through each book, but over the series as a whole. Like her character arc is great.

Lilly:

Yeah, she actually grows up. And struggles do sort of continue from one book to the next. This book has a lot of, Hey, you need to ask for help. Which was dealt with a lot in, Was it I Shall Wear Midnight was the previous?

Sara:

Yeah, I think so.

Lilly:

However, it wasn't frustrating because I wasn't like, we already went over this. Because in that book, she was trying to do everything herself because she didn't think she could ask for help. Whereas in this book, she was like, from who? And so, it didn't feel like retreading ground in that way.

Sara:

Yeah, it felt like the same struggle in a sense, but new and understandable. And like, it was something that she was, she had matured, right?

Lilly:

And what is the timeline for her series? I don't think we know actually how old she is in this

Sara:

We do. She's 18.

Lilly:

Oh, it does say that? That was the sense I got,

Sara:

I'm pretty sure that at some point she does say that she's 18.

Lilly:

Okay, I was definitely getting late teenager.

Sara:

so her series covers the span of like 10 years or something.

Lilly:

Yeah, and what a done arc to take a young woman, I mean a girl, through that phase of life and have it feel so sincere in a way. It was really, really nice. Yeah.

Sara:

to see her grow up over the course of the series and to feel like she is changing and growing. Not just that she's random ages, depending on what the book needs.

Lilly:

We also get an advancement of witch lore in Discworld. We meet our first boy witch, although he doesn't officially get that title because the witches are weird about calling a boy a witch, and that seems fair.

Sara:

Yeah, they come around to him though.

Lilly:

Yeah. I thought that was a really fun concept, especially because you know, Equal Rights was the sec well, not the second book, the third book,

Sara:

Some, some really early novel, yeah.

Lilly:

Which is the one where a girl becomes a wizard, and so that kind of like also nicely bookends the series in that way. I did struggle with Geoffrey, which, boy, which, a little bit. But I think that conversation is entirely spoilers.

Sara:

Yeah, I, I was with you on the struggle bus there. I, A little bit, but I can't talk about why right now, because that is also spoilers.

Lilly:

But we can say there's a lot of gender stuff in this book, in ways that have come up in other Discworld novels. Everything on the page, all of the explicit gender stuff is always like, Yes, good job, A boys and girls should be able to have the same jobs, etc. and so on. And then there's like really weird marriage dynamics in the background that you're like, where did that come from?

Sara:

Yes, and I, I do have that problem with this book, too.

Lilly:

Yeah.

Sara:

One thing that I did really enjoy is, with this book, is how Tiffany's relationship with Jeannie the Kelda evolved, because I think we've complained in previous books that It's kind of unnecessarily and unreasonably antagonistic, and it's settled into some very stable, compassionate friendship, and I really liked that.

Lilly:

I loved it. It was a journey for them to get there that I think maybe could have been a little shorter, but where they end up is exactly where I wanted them to be.

Sara:

Yes.

Lilly:

It is a little weird that Genie was more jealous of Tiffany when Tiffany was ten. than when Tiffany was 18.

Sara:

I don't know I I think I can kind of understand some of the jealousy when she first gets in, and marries Rob because

Lilly:

For listeners who maybe missed previous conversations, Rob is one of the We Free Men and he was briefly engaged to Tiffany due to a loophole that they needed to do for some reason.

Sara:

Yes, not, not romantic whatsoever. And Tiffany was like eight. But I can kind of see Genie having issues with that just because of the way that the, that their society is like organized. But I wish she had gotten over it within like the first like quarter of the book that it shows up in. Not that it lasted like basically the entire book.

Lilly:

Well, and then after that, Tiffany is so salty that Genie is like trying to help her and look after

Sara:

Yeah.

Lilly:

which makes sense because Tiffany is young, but it was still frustrating.

Sara:

Yeah. So there's, there are issues on both sides.

Lilly:

Oh, for sure. And actually thinking about it, I think if we abstract it a little bit and look at their relationship and how it evolved as maybe two people in their late teens through to like their early thirties, like, antagonistic rivals that are not actually rivals over anything through realizing that they're being ridiculous and have a lot in common and can really, like, trust and rely on each other. I think that works very well. It's just weird when you put it into this, like, Young adult series with a child protagonist.

Sara:

Yes. Agreed. Agree entirely.

Lilly:

But they get there. I love Genie. I love Tiffany. It was, it's good. We're good. In this book, it was good.

Sara:

In this book it's very good. They have a great relationship and I appreciated it, especially because we have seen them with their not great relationship.

Lilly:

we also see Tiffany's relationship with her parents change. I mean, partially because she's now 18. So that's, you know, gonna happen. But also, she's a witch now, right? I mean, in some ways, she has more authority than her parents in their community.

Sara:

I mean that has been the case for the last like three books,

Lilly:

Yeah, okay, but we're talking about, we're now seeing the end of this change that has been happening, not that it was introduced for the first time. But in this book, we did get a very sweet moment where she breaks down in her kitchen and her parents are there to comfort her, and she's like, this is the place where I can still do this. And that was very sweet.

Sara:

It's nice to see that she still has a good relationship with her parents, that her being a witch hasn't really changed anything except that they acknowledge her competence. And that she is comfortable enough to have these emotional breakdowns.

Lilly:

She's still their daughter, right? It's one of those, you know, out in the village she might be the witch, but at home she is still their child. And that was, it was really nice. It was very touching.

Sara:

yeah, but not in,

Lilly:

Not in a condescending

Sara:

yeah, like

Lilly:

a supportive way.

Sara:

yeah, not, not in an infantilizing way.

Lilly:

Right. She needed comfort, and they

Sara:

Mm hmm. Mm hmm.

Lilly:

I think our final thing that we can say without spoiling everything is that More goblins! Sarah, there were more goblins in this book.

Sara:

There, there were more goblins. We don't see a ton of them. But they were there.

Lilly:

They're not really in this book at all. It's just more talking about goblins and using the railroad and goblins that we've sort of seen over the last couple of books as shorthand for society evolving over time,

Sara:

I mean, there are two named goblin characters.

Lilly:

they do show up on the page, just not a lot. People talk about them much more than they are actually there.

Sara:

Yes.

Lilly:

But I do really love the Discworld shorthand for if someone is mean about goblins, you know they're a bad guy. And anyone who defends goblins is a good guy.

Sara:

that shorthand was definitely prevalent in this book.

Lilly:

And even the barometer for one character undergoing growth, like literally. You can track one character's growth from Their opinions on gobl Anyway, this is Lily's morality compass based on goblins. Or Pratchett's morality compass, maybe.

Sara:

The Discworld morality compass, certainly.

Lilly:

Yeah. Well, the who should read this book question seems unnecessary.

Sara:

Probably. But

Lilly:

definitely not one of the first Discworld novels you should read.

Sara:

no, absolutely not. Do not start here.

Lilly:

But I think if you had worked your way through The Industrial Revolution slash Moist Von Lipwig miniseries, whatever we're calling that whole weird thing. The one that ends with raising steam. If you have read The Witches miniseries, which I consider Tiffany Aching a sub series of The Witches, but we can fight about that off air.

Sara:

We,

Lilly:

the Tiffany Aching series.

Sara:

for, yeah, for the purpose of this question, think they should be separate because I think that you could read this book if you've read it. All of the Tiffany Aching books and not if you've read the other witch books.

Lilly:

true. But I think if you read The Witch books and liked them, the Tiffany Aching series is sort of the next one that I would recommend.

Sara:

Yes, I don't think we would argue about that.

Lilly:

Yeah, it feels like the natural continuation of the Witch series.

Sara:

Yes.

Lilly:

Then yeah, I would definitely recommend reading this book because it does emotionally tie together a lot of things. Even if it is very sad and then is over and leaves you with some questions.

Sara:

Yeah, I, I mean, I wouldn't necessarily recommend reading this book if you haven't read any of the Tiffany Aching books. Like, I think that that's the baseline. You have to have read the Tiffany Aching books. At least a couple.

Lilly:

Yeah, maybe just the first one.

Sara:

Possibly just the first one, yeah.

Lilly:

I'm trying to think. It references, obviously, some of the adventures Tiffany has gone on. And her boyfriend. But, I don't think you would need any of the, like, character background. Anyway, yeah, definitely not a first book. Probably not even an early book. But, highly recommended.

Sara:

A book worth reading,

Lilly:

Yeah.

Sara:

even if it is sad for multiple reasons on multiple levels. This episode of Fiction Fans is brought to you by Fiction Fans.

Lilly:

That's us. We really appreciate our patrons because otherwise we fund this podcast entirely ourselves.

Sara:

Patrons can find weekly bonus content, monthly exclusive episodes, and they have free access to our biannual zine, Solstitia.

Lilly:

You can find all of that and more at patreon. com slash fictionfanspod. Thank you for all of your support.

Sara:

The remainder of this episode contains spoilers.

Lilly:

But, if you stick around till the end, we have a short Words Are Weird segment for you. I'm a hundred percent sure that we have said that Granny dies in this book on air.

Sara:

I am, I am pretty sure that we have as well. I do think we have spoiled that. It does happen within the first, like, 25 percent of the book. So it's not like a late book spoiler, but also, yeah, granny, granny dies.

Lilly:

Yeah, oh, sad.

Sara:

I sobbed the first time like I knew that it was coming because I had spoiled that for myself but I sobbed the first time I read this book and I sobbed this time too.

Lilly:

for me, the sobbing kicked in actually more when Nightshade died, just because she didn't deserve it. I mean, Granny didn't either, but Granny died peacefully in her sleep of old age, which is very different. Yeah,

Sara:

death and Nightshade doesn't. But I was just, I was heartbroken when Granny died. I'm still heartbroken. and it felt like appropriate. Like it doesn't feel bad or, or. out of left field or anything, necessarily, but it's still very sad. I'm still sad.

Lilly:

I think that's what makes this feel so much like an ending.

Sara:

Yeah,

Lilly:

And even if, I, we can quibble over whether having more Discworld ideas means he intended to write them or not, but this was definitely the end of The Witches or Tiffany Aching or something.

Sara:

I, I agree it was the end of Tiffany Aching and all of the ideas that Rob Wilkins mentions as Pratchett having started to think about like none of them involved the witches or Tiffany Aching as far as I can tell.

Lilly:

So, the end of Granny, obviously heartbreaking. Our longest running Discworld character for, like, hands down, right?

Sara:

Mm hmm. I mean, she shows up for the first time in Equal Rights and is there all through the series until The Shepherd's Crown.

Lilly:

Yeah. But I do actually think I was more affected by Nightshade's death. She is the Queen of the Fairies. Who is a long standing villain in Discworld novels, so that's fun. I mean, she's in two, but still.

Sara:

But the first one that she shows up in is quite earlier on in the series. So

Lilly:

Yeah. And in this book, she gets deposed and, like, flung from Fairyland or whatever they call it. She has no powers, and Tiffany finds her and is, like, rehabilitating her physically and emotionally. And, oh my god, when she stands up at the end and is like, She's my friend! That's that was when it started for me.

Sara:

I, I found that very sad, but that's, Didn't make me cry, but I did find it very sad. Is this the only Discworld novel where a good guy dies because of the actions of the bad guys?

Lilly:

Maybe. I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of all Discworld deaths.

Sara:

I feel like there's not usually a lot of death in Discworld. Certainly not in Discworld. death by violence like this or maybe I should say death of a semi main character.

Lilly:

But also, there was just a lot of death in this book, and I feel like that's not super common.

Sara:

Yeah,

Lilly:

Maybe a joke about an assassin or something, but there's not a lot of on screen violence.

Sara:

I'm trying to think. We do get a fair number of characters who die because Death gets a lot of cameos in the entire series, not even counting his books. And like characters who die, but

Lilly:

That's true.

Sara:

I feel like when they die, it's not usually because of direct violence like this

Lilly:

Or on page direct violence.

Sara:

Or they're not usually main characters.

Lilly:

true. But I also, I mean, Nightshade is not the only character who dies in this book. Tiffany murders a bunch of elves.

Sara:

All of the witches do.

Lilly:

Yeah. I think Tiffany's body count is higher than Sam Vine's.

Sara:

I think you might be right about that.

Lilly:

I'm pretty sure.

Sara:

I don't think Vimes kills a lot of people.

Lilly:

And maybe the hand wavy thing there is that elves aren't people, but like, that's a weird distinction to make, and I'm not gonna go there.

Sara:

I mean, they do kind of try to make that distinction. The witches.

Lilly:

Well, Nanny's speech, because Tiffany was, like, really upset about it, reasonably so, and Nanny's does kind of say they're not exactly people, but I think more the spirit of her rallying speech was They are trying to literally destroy the world. Sometimes violence is justified. And I did really appreciate that, actually.

Sara:

Yeah, and I mean, it does feel correct because the elves are not going to be dissuaded by I don't know. negotiations.

Lilly:

No, they're literally on a goal to enslave humanity. A little bit of violence to prevent that is like, yeah, okay, do what you gotta do, girl.

Sara:

I did kind of think that Nightshade's death was a little bit anticlimactic though, because it's sad in the moment and then never referenced again really? I don't know. It felt like one of those loose ends that could have been polished up a little bit.

Lilly:

I think you're right. In the moment, I was like, well, deeply affected. But then they just move on so quickly. That I think my comment was, So she's not actually dead for good then, right? Otherwise, something else would have been said here, right?

Sara:

Nope, she's dead for good.

Lilly:

Yeah, that was crazy.

Sara:

Yeah. We did mention in the non spoiler section How there's a lot of gender stuff and the explicit on page gender stuff is always really good. But then there's some implied dynamics that are less good. And for me, that was the implication that men need man sheds because their wives, like, hen peck them and treat them as furniture. And Steamroll them all of, the time. And that didn't work for me. That was not great.

Lilly:

Yeah, that was weird, but kind of just a continuation of the really weird matrimonies in Discworld.

Sara:

Yeah, it felt consistent with the other married relationships that we've seen, but I still don't like it. I did. I like the old men themselves, though and I like the way that they come together to help the witches stop the elvish incursion into Lancre.

Lilly:

absolutely. Maybe if it had leaned more on an age thing. Like, oh, our societies think we're not useful anymore because we're old now.

Sara:

Yeah, if,

Lilly:

would have landed better with me.

Sara:

and it, it does lean on that a little bit, but I think if it had leaned on that entirely and taken away the, relationship aspects of it, it would have been much better and much stronger.

Lilly:

Yeah. It is sweet that Geoffrey rallied. them. But that was kind of part of my weird feelings about Jeffrey, our young boy witch.

Sara:

Yeah, I

Lilly:

kind of rolls up and is perfect and is like, oh, no one even wants to fight around Jeffrey because he's just so great. And there were definitely some Glass Elevator vibes with him.

Sara:

yeah, like, I, I actually really liked his calming influence. I thought that was interesting. But what I didn't like about Jeffrey was the way that the old men took to him rather than The witches who had been caring for them, like he's instantly accepted by them because he's a boy. And so that just felt a little bad to me.

Lilly:

Yeah,

Sara:

like them saying, oh, we wouldn't have shown this to anyone else, but because you're Jeffrey, we'll, we'll show our new weapon that we're holding. Going that I've been building or whatever Again, it felt like weird gender dynamics and I didn't like it.

Lilly:

yeah, Jeffrey rolling up and being so perfect at everything and misunderstood because he's a boy, was like, well, maybe stop comparing him to Tiffany, please. They can both be good at stuff. It's okay.

Sara:

Yes

Lilly:

I did come around to him for very specific Magrat related reasons. Not that she interacts with him at all, but I'll get there. I'll get there. He had a pet goat who was weird and baffling and delightful and really angry but also, like, knows how to use the toilet.

Sara:

And count

Lilly:

his name was Mephistopheles, which, like, is a demon name, but I feel like I'm missing something there.

Sara:

Again, I feel like that's a loose end That we would have gotten tied up if this book had been able to be worked on just a little bit more

Lilly:

Yeah, you're probably right.

Sara:

Mephistopheles goes nowhere and it feels like, like there should be something there with him.

Lilly:

Well, there's so much about him. Like, every time Jeffrey shows up, there's like a whole conversation about his weird goat. Which is fun, but also It's like Chekhov's goat in here. Like, you gotta do something with him in the end.

Sara:

Yeah. But how does, how does this relate to Magrath?

Lilly:

Oh, well, Magrat fucking rocked in this book. We haven't seen her in a while. She was one of the first Which is, and has sort of graduated from those into being a background character. But we see her again in this book, and she's great, and I loved everything about her. And her dynamics and plot points balanced out the weird gender stuff with Geoffrey's plotline in a way that made me go, Okay, okay. If I get Magrat, I can deal with Geoffrey.

Sara:

Ah, okay.

Lilly:

So, not actually related at all. But she balanced him out for me.

Sara:

I didn't necessarily feel that way. I mean, I liked seeing Magrat and I liked seeing her relationship with Varence. But I wouldn't say that the balance of her and Jeffrey is what made me like Jeffrey.

Lilly:

It helped me overlook the weird old men. Made miserable by their wives who they're ostensibly supposed to like because they're married to them. Because we get Magrat and King Varence and their delightful conversation. She's like preparing to go to war and Varence is like, Gee, honey, I'd really like to go with you. that whole conversation where she's like, This is my job. Like, let me handle this. They're very respectful of each other. she's not dismissive of him or his concerns and her chess analogy, or like the king stays safe and the queen goes off and does stuff, was like very fun. Also,

Sara:

I do think that they have one of the healthiest relationships in the world. that we have seen in this Discworld series as a whole. Like, not just in the Tiffany Aking novels or the Witch novels, I think they have one of the healthiest relationships in all 52, or however many Discworld novels there are.

Lilly:

I hope them and Harry King and his wife like do happy hour together.

Sara:

41. I'm just making up extra Discworld novels. Yes, I hope, I hope that them and Harry King and his wife have a lot of fun together.

Lilly:

Yeah, because that, I think, is the only other perfect relationship.

Sara:

Well, I would say that Tiffany and Preston is pretty good.

Lilly:

That's true. That's true.

Sara:

And Preston is not really a character in this book. He shows up on page, like, once, but she thinks about Preston a lot. And she does internally, like, reflect on their relationship, and I appreciate how they're very supportive of each other having their own careers. And they're still kind of figuring out what that means for their relationship, but that's okay, they're 18, they don't have to have it all figured out by now.

Lilly:

Yeah, he's just like, off at med school, and she's off being a witch. Okay, actually, at first, I was a little disgruntled because I'm a romance person, so I was like, bring him back! But as I read through the book, in the end I actually really liked how completely uninvolved he is with this adventure. Not because they've like, broken up or they've had a falling out, but it's just, yeah, they're a couple who have separate adventures and that's okay.

Sara:

Yeah, he doesn't get shoehorned into it, which is good.

Lilly:

And of course they miss each other and they write letters and it's very cute, but it's just entirely unnoteworthy. It's just there, and that's fine. We're moving on. We got fairies to kill.

Sara:

Yeah, it was, it was a good dynamic.

Lilly:

I really liked it. More things about why Magrad is the best though. Not just her relationship with the king, but we also see her balancing being a queen and a witch, which I know we've sort of missed. had in previous books, that she was in more. But I think we see her, like, doing it well and confidently in this book.

Sara:

feel like in previous books where she has had to make that judgment, it's usually, she's usually fallen back to queening rather than witching. And here she, I feel like she's more confident in her ability to juggle both and to be both queen and witch.

Lilly:

Yes. And her using that social status for being a queen to help her being a witch was also really fun. One of the characters from the last book is, I don't remember everyone's names. The Baron, Roland.

Sara:

Letitia.

Lilly:

Yeah so Roland is Tiffany's friend, he's the new Baron, and his new wife, Letitia, I'll now his wife as of this book, or as of last book, for all of this book.

Sara:

They got, married in the last book, yeah.

Lilly:

She is a very good witch, but like, refuses to practice because she is the Baroness, and is like, well that's my role, and Magrat going, Oh, we'll see about that. Because how can she argue with a fucking queen? It was great. It was great.

Sara:

that was very good.

Lilly:

Ugh. And then her whole thing. I do vaguely remember Queen Yinzee? I don't know how to pronounce it.

Sara:

I've always said Incy, yeah.

Lilly:

Who's just like a mythological figure, but at some point they made armor, so everyone's just sort of decided that she used to exist. But basically, It's just Magrat being cool.

Sara:

Yeah, so that shows up in Lords and Ladies, which is the witch's book. that features the elves where granny defeats them. And for most of that novel we don't actually know that Incy was made up. I'm pretty sure. And like Magrat finds the arm, this armor in the castle and puts it on. And she like really uses that belief in the Queen's in, in Incy's fierceness to fight the elves when they try to attack her and Varence and then at the very end, we've like, I think someone says that she was just made up. But that's where that armor comes from.

Lilly:

And Magrat makes her real though, like we now have a real warrior queen! Life imitates art. It's fantastic. I love Magrat. She's so good in this book. Or, this book is so good for her. Because we get to see where she's come. Right? She's Struggles as a young adult trying to be a witch, as I'm sure anyone would,

Sara:

I like her a lot in this. I know we've had some problems with her in previous books, but I do think she's finally kind of come into her own. And she's a great character in this.

Lilly:

And on the page, because we can assume that she's been thriving, living her best life in Lancre this whole time. But if we don't see it, does it really count?

Sara:

That's just fanfiction. Until you see it on the page, it's just headcanon fanfiction. But now we know.

Lilly:

Canon. Something that I know for a fact we complained about in a previous episode was how Tiffany, in I think her second book, that's the one with the hiver that kind of like possesses her and then she ends up with the spirit of an old wizard professor living in her head, theoretically forever. And he kind of just disappears at some point and we never see him again and it just like never comes back. And there's even a moment in I think it was the previous book that I was like, It would make a lot of sense for her to ask the entire consciousness in her head if he can read this wizard book.

Sara:

Yeah, we, we definitely complained about it in the last episode.

Lilly:

But he does come back for like, a hot second in this book, so I was like, oh, there he is, thank you.

Sara:

Yeah, he's, he's mentioned and he does make an appearance. So he's not gone.

Lilly:

No. And it like, doesn't really go anywhere. But I felt justified, because I was like, thank you. But you know which character kind of sees the most growth, I would say, over the course of this book? It's Mrs. Awish.

Sara:

I don't know if I would say she sees the most growth because I definitely feel like that's

Lilly:

Okay, you're right, you're right, you're right.

Sara:

But I think that Mrs. Awish Is the second most character who sees growth.

Lilly:

Yeah, I mean, they're not even in the same league. We just find out that she's not all bad, which is not the same thing as her actively striving to be good.

Sara:

she has some glimmers. And, again, I feel like this is one of those areas or plot points that could have been fleshed out more and probably would have been. Because nothing really ever happens with Mrs. Awish's character growth, and it feels like a loose end.

Lilly:

I think this one is the most egregious. Because if you take, okay, weird demon goat, sure. Like, he could just be a weird demon goat, that's okay. We find out in this book that Mrs. Awish is immune to the elves glamour. Which is kind of a big deal, hugely involved with the plot. I think the only other person who was immune was Granny Weatherwax, and she wasn't actually immune, she was just really good at keeping them out.

Sara:

Yeah, I mean, the impression that I got is that Mrs. Awish is so self absorbed that she is immune to the elves glamour.

Lilly:

I would agree, except I recall the book saying something very explicitly about, like, I think it's Tiffany going, but how could that be possible? It, or some, something implying that we're going to find out why, and then we don't.

Sara:

well, I, yeah, and I think that Nightshade says it was like hitting a wall or something. And I, I still think that that would have been the answer, but what for me feels unfinished is that she does make some remarks that are kind and considerate and kind of feels like she's going for a redemption arc and then just never gets it.

Lilly:

Yeah. It is started, I think, in which book was it? There was, A book. I don't think it was I Shall Wear Midnight. I think it was the previous one. I don't remember. She shows us a glimpse of some brief humanity. I think it's when Tiffany's previous mentor dies. Because, like, she mostly sucks, but then is a little bit nice at the end. I don't remember exactly. So, when she started being kind of cool in this book, I was like, Okay, we're picking that thread back up. Nice. And then, yeah, we don't really get to see where it goes.

Sara:

Yeah, it doesn't really go anywhere. I think the thread that I'm. most sad that gets dropped is the implication that Granny's consciousness was in you for this entire book. Like, she dies, but her mind stays on for this adventure, and then she goes. And that I'm pretty sure is something. I think that Wilkins says in his autobiography that that was the intention, and then it just kind of fizzled out because Pratchett died.

Lilly:

I think it's pretty clear. I mean, it's sort of a wink wink, nudge nudge at the beginning when Tiffany first finds Granny passed away. And hopes that maybe she's just projecting her consciousness into an animal, and then she looks at you and is like, Could you be? And you just kind of blinks at her. But then it's obvious that, Because like, Ewe the cat has always been a very clever cat, but her actions in this book were beyond the pale.

Sara:

Yeah, I guess I just wanted it to be.

Lilly:

I wanted it to be resolved.

Sara:

I wanted it to be resolved.

Lilly:

The wee freemen aren't in this book very much, but not in a way that was distressing to me. Just, they're around, they're helpful, but it's not their book.

Sara:

No, not at all. This book centers much more on the human characters than it does on them.

Lilly:

Yeah, and I think that's sort of been a Slowly growing over Tiffany Aching's books. I mean, her first one is The We Free Men.

Sara:

Yeah, and it feels, I don't know, it felt appropriate and right.

Lilly:

Yeah, I just, it was interesting. Especially since this book is about the elves who used to enslave the We Free Men. But this book dealt more with the elves being appalled that goblins are considered people.

Sara:

Yes, they were very appalled. It's

Lilly:

Yeah, and that's how you know they're the bad guys.

Sara:

true.

Lilly:

Well, this did kind of make me want to read the Witches series just straight and not do everything in chronological order,

Sara:

it would be nice to go back to the witches books. I'm really sad that our Discworld reread is over, like, I don't, I don't know what I'm gonna do when I don't have, when we don't have Discworld books to read.

Lilly:

I know. Well, Pratchett did write other books. He did not only write Discworld.

Sara:

It's true. He did write other books. Most of which I have not read. I've read a handful. A small handful.

Lilly:

really interesting to see if some of the weird subtextual, not subtextual, but the things that felt accidental, if they show up in his other works too. Like the weird married couple relationships dynamics.

Sara:

Mmm. Yeah, that would definitely be interesting to, to see if that shows up. And I would like to read, he wrote a science fiction series, or co wrote a science fiction series with Stephen Baxter. And I think it would be interesting to read his science fiction, and see how that compares to his fantasy.

Lilly:

Yeah, absolutely. Well, I guess we've got some books to pick out.

Sara:

I guess we do. Our journey to the center of the disc world might be over, but not necessarily our journey to, our journey through all of the Pratchett.

Lilly:

You struggled to not make that an awful double entendre, and I appreciate that.

Sara:

did really struggle.

Lilly:

was almost very bad, and you know if you had said something awful, I would have never let go.

Sara:

I know, I know.

Lilly:

have been the name of the, of the next segment.

Sara:

I know that. That's why you could, you could feel my, my second thoughts as I was saying that.

Lilly:

So I ran across a phrase while reading this book, that I had never heard before, which was, you'll have to mend your manners, mend as in to fix, and I had only ever heard mind your manners, and I'm guessing it's just a British versus American English thing?

Sara:

I mean, so I don't actually recall seeing it in the novel. I did, when you first wrote this down as a note, I did try to Google it and I didn't get anything. So I'm not sure if it's a British idiom so much as just the context of.

Lilly:

Yeah, I, like, the internet is bringing me nothing except for a translation of a Japanese proverb,

Sara:

Yeah, that's what I got too, which is not, not what we're looking for. But again, like, I don't remember the context of that phrase

Lilly:

All right, let me go find it. One second. Okay, it is the men of the village shooting the shit in a bar, and Tiffany's dad is there. Let's see. We don't have a head shepherd. We have a witch instead. Your Tiffany. So if we have a witch instead of a head shepherd, do you think any of you ought to arm wrestle her? Asked John Parsley with a big grin and a sideways look at Tiffany's father. Robert Thicke said, A witch? No fear. I would mend my manners. Joe chuckled as the others nodded in agreement. Like, I don't think there's anything going on there.

Sara:

yeah, I don't, I don't necessarily feel like that means that, mend really is the right word outside of any kind of idiom.

Lilly:

Anyway, it gave me pause because I was like, I just simply had never heard it before. That's all.

Sara:

It did not stick in my mind, but I too have not heard mend your manners.

Lilly:

Someone posted a YouTube short titled, Different Ways to Say Mend Your Manners implying that mend your manners is a thing people say.

Sara:

Maybe it is. I mean, maybe it is a Britishism and Just our, our Google search skills are not up to par.

Lilly:

WikiHow, how to improve my manners? No, I think it is just a slightly different saying. To mend your manners is to do. Stop behaving badly, whereas to mind your manners is to be mindful of the way you're behaving.

Sara:

Hmm. Could be. Very wild. Words are weird. Sounds Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Fiction Fans.

Lilly:

Come disagree with us. We're on YouTube, Blue Sky, Instagram, and TikTok at FictionFansPod. You can also email us at FictionFansPod at gmail. com.

Sara:

If you enjoyed the episode, please rate and review on Spotify and Apple Podcasts, or leave a comment on our YouTube channel and follow us wherever your podcasts live.

Lilly:

We also have a Patreon where you can support us and find exclusive episodes and a lot of other nonsense.

Sara:

Thanks again for listening and may your villains always be defeated. Bye.