Terry Pratchett's Discworld 07- Pyramids

Pyramids

Corgi

 Pterry Pratchett

1989

Other Terry Pratchett Reviews- The Colour of Magic - The Light Fantastic - Equal Rites - Mort - Sourcery - Wyrd Sisters - Pyramids - Guards! Guards! - Eric - Moving Pictures - Reaper Man - Witches Abroad - Small Gods - Lords and Ladies - Men At Arms - Soul Music - Interesting Times - Maskerade - Feet of Clay - Hogfather - Raising Steam - A Blink of the Screen - Sky1 Adaptations- Dodger - The Long Earth (w Stephen Baxter)

'The king looked surprised.
"I understood that Death came as a three-headed giant scarab beetle," he said.
Death shrugged. WELL. NOW YOU KNOW.'

Moving on to the seventh novel in the series, Pyramids holds a particular place in the history of Discworld by being the first book not to feature any important recurring characters (aside from DEATH, who's in all but one, by my count), and as such still remains almost totally disconnected, though Pratchett's particular humour and twisted logic remains firmly in place. As the cover and the title suggest, Pyramids is a fun and imaginative parody of all things ancient Egyptian, told through the story of Pteppic, heir to the throne of Djelibeybi (say it out-loud), who begins the story in training with the Assassins Guild of Ankh-Morpork. When Pteppic's father dies, the young assassin gets a big surprise as the grass literally begins to grow beneath his feet. As the new King of Djelibeybe and essentially now a god on earth, Pteppic returns to his home country where things quickly begin to go drastically wrong. Magic, mysticism and the space-time continuum all collide, leading to zombie-pharoes, camels that know algebra, and plenty of running away from things.

Like Equal Rites and Mort before it, Pyramids is a twisted coming-of-age story in the most unusual of circumstances. Pratchett riffs on all the well-known Egyptian cliches with plenty of witty gags, but the plot as a whole isn't up to the author's typical standards; it's not bad, per se, but I found it hard to care about the characters, who actually all seem a bit flat of character, despite the landscape around them being pretty well-formed. Pteppic just isn't that interesting, especially compared to Pratchett's better creations such as Rincewind, the witches, and the cast of the next book in the series Guards, Guards! (which, spoiler alert, is brilliant). He's a little like Mort, but without the sense of innocent stupidity. 

Still, it's by no means a bad book, just one I wouldn't recommend in relation to the rest of the series. It's probably a little better than Sourcery so far in the series, and as well as being pretty funny, further develops one of the key themes of the Discworld series; through the power of magic, belief creates reality. The people of Djelibeybi believe without question that their ruler is a god incarnate, therefore that's what Pteppic becomes. Similarly, the time-warping powers of pyramids are key to the plot, but I'll avoid offering any more spoilers regarding this twenty-three year old book because I'm nice like that.

So, overall Pyramids is by no means a highlight of the series, but it's not without its positives, especially as somewhat of an early prototype of the ideas presented in the still-to-come Small Gods, which, when I get to it, I will fawn over until you become physically repulsed.