Pyramids
Ratings239
Average rating3.8
This was a delightful read, which really illustrates the strength of Pratchett's writing - his good-natured humour and joie de vivre really carry what would have been an otherwise average story.
3 stars, Metaphorosis reviews
Summary
Pteppic, heir to a 7,000 year dynasty and a tiny kingdom, has been sent to Ankh-Morpork to train as an assassin. It's given him some funny ideas about change being desirable. When his father dies and Pteppic receives a sign to come home, his new-fangled ideas clash with the traditions of a rather elderly high priest.
Review
I seem to be having quite a different reaction to Discworld this time around. Books that introduced me to the series, and that I quite liked, now seem halting and disjointed. Books, like this one, that I don't really remember, seem much more effective. I suppose that then, the novelty worked better on me than the story.
This book has possibly the strongest story so far, in that it doesn't rely on parody as much, and seems much more self-contained. It's funny, too; no guffaws, but plenty of chuckles and an occasional chortle. There is a certain amount of repetition of jokes from earlier books. Not a lot, but a little worrying so early in the series.
Unfortunately, a key portion of the resolution relies on deliberate cruelty to an animal. One that's smarter than all the other characters, but it's cruelty nonetheless. It ruined what for me had been the best Discworld story so far. For a moderately old, but popular book, there are a surprising number of careless errors in my new e-book version.
I must be getting too old for Mr Pratchett's Discworld. I barely crack a smile while reading his books, including this one.
I loved the twist on the life of an Egyptian Pharaoh, the Afterlife, and the Guilds as usual especially the final exam.
Pyramids is an often overlooked entry into the Discworld series. It's a story about Teppic, a young person exposed to new cultures (Ankh Morpork), and brings this to his home, a place that has kept to itself, unchanged for hundreds (thousands?) of years. Later books explored similar themes with the Dwarf storylines in the Night Watch subseries and Small Gods.
Pyramids of a science fiction element than usual on the Disc, with the pyramid blocks that are moved via a time warping/quantum mechanics that causes crazy temporal hijinks. It's as interesting a solution to the problem as any I've seen. There's also the Idea of a pyramid shape that creates “null time” inside so the buried king would “live forever.”
When Teppic becomes king of Djelibeybi (meant to reflect our ancient Egypt, he inherits an advisor named Dios, who also advised his father, and his father before him. Dios represents resistance to change in all forms, including his own freakish longevity.
There is humor in the absurdity/impracticality of repeating the same things without thought. For instance, when Teppic does/says anything at court he's supposedly “presiding” over (Dios actually making all the calls), Dios must announce all of Teppics titles “Harken to the interpreted wisdom of Teppicymon XXVIII, Lord of the Heavens, Charioteer of the Wagon of the Sun, Steersman of the Barque of the Sun, Guardian of the secret knowledge, Lord of the Horizon,...” etc.
Pyramids connects to the rest of the series, notably with an inside look at the Assassins school in Ankh Morpork, run by Dr. Cruces.
One of my favorite things in Pyramids is You Bastard, a camel who is the greatest mathematician on the Disc. Pratchett had a gift for creating these animal characters who are outside of, and most of the time above, the main action of the stories.
Reading this a second time, I moved it from three to four starts. On the first read, I wasn't feeling that patient. I only sought it out because I wanted to read the series in published order. It suffers from being sandwiched between two more popular books, Wyrd Sisters and Guards! Guards!. It is a great story on its own, full of humor, adventure, and thoughtful content on youth vs. age and resistance to change.
Fun standalone novel. Don't miss it if you're a fan. Skip it if you only want to read the best books (like the watch, witches and death series)
Same as my opinion of Equal Rites. Terry Pratchett tries to be funny at every sentence he writes. He is witty, but this is far from tingling my sense of humor. I wonder when his books start to get good?
Read 01:07 / 09:12 12%
Executive Summary: Another good, but not great entry in the Discworld series. This one seems to read pretty much stand alone, though I think it would be best to have some knowledge of the series prior to this book.Full ReviewIt's been a few months since my marathon of several of the previous books, and I was in the mood for Mr. Pratchett's humor. I'd been in a bit of a reading slump after my previous book, and hoped this would be a light quick read to break me of that.Unfortunately that wasn't the case. It was light, and quite funny at times, and usually very quotable. I just never really got into it like I have some of the other books. I didn't care too much about the characters I guess. I found Teppic largely forgettable, Dios quite annoying and the camel and all its related jokes groan worthy.I loved the setting though. When I was younger I absolutely loved ancient Egypt, pyramids and the Sphynx. I'm surprised I didn't like it more as a result. A lot of the pyramid related humor was pretty good, but not enough to always hold my interest. I went many days between reading, and was never really in a rush to get back to it.In a series this long and varied, there are likely to be some books I'll enjoy more than others, and this one just falls into that latter category for me.I'll probably take another month or two long break before finally tackling [b:Guards! Guards! 64216 Guards! Guards! (Discworld, #8; City Watch #1) Terry Pratchett https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1431127356s/64216.jpg 1128601], which will hopefully live up to the high expectations people have built up for me.
Pratchett è un genio e questo penso sia uno dei suoi romanzi meglio riusciti. Non si riesce a smettere di ridere e di meravigliarsi di fronte alle scene descritte, dalle prime parole fino alle ultime. A mio parere, per i fan di Terry, questo libro è un must.
The best thing about this story was learning the identity of the greatest mathematician on the Disc.
This book is good in parts. I love the beginning in the Assassins' School, and I like Pteppic and Ptraci (who comes on later), but the pyramid-related parts of the story are rather boring, and the Ephebian philosophers are very boring—fortunately they're a small part of the book.
Unusually, it features none of the regular Discworld characters except Death, who tends to be ever-present, but doesn't have a big role here. Most of the other characters are making their only appearances in the series. I would have been quite pleased to see Pteppic, Ptraci, and perhaps Chidder appearing briefly in some other book, but they never do.