In the first part of\u00c2\u00a0Feet of Clay<\/i>, I AM VERY EXCITED. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to read\u00c2\u00a0Discworld<\/i>.<\/p>\n
I DON\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T KNOW WHAT\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S GOING ON, BUT THAT\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S OKAY. LET\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S DO THIS.<\/p>\n
Golems<\/b><\/p>\n
So, I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know all that much about this bit of Jewish folklore beyond a surface-level understanding of golems. They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re clay figures brought to life! But Pratchett opens\u00c2\u00a0Feet of Clay<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0with a bizarre bargaining sequence in which a golem sells\u00c2\u00a0another<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0golem to someone while also being terrible at negotiating. LIKE REALLY REALLY BAD. Like, continuously lowers the price, sometimes without prompting. But the mystery here confuses me, as is often the case in a\u00c2\u00a0Discworld<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0book. Why would a golem sell a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153perfect\u00e2\u20ac\u009d golem to someone? What are the shapes waiting outside the man\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s house?\u00c2\u00a0More<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0golems? And why does the golem immediately give away the thirty dollars they made??? If it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not about money, why even sell the golem?<\/p>\n
I DON\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T GET IT. Who is Father Tubelcek? What is he a priest of? Did a golem kill him, too?<\/p>\n
Commander sir Samuel Vimes<\/b><\/p>\n
YES, IT\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S A CITY WATCH BOOK. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122M EXCITED. And what an introduction! Vimes\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s life is so\u00c2\u00a0surreal<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0now, especially once you think about where he was when he was first introduced in the\u00c2\u00a0Discworld\u00c2\u00a0<\/i>series<\/i>. He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s adapted to a different lifestyle, but only somewhat. Unsurprisingly, he hasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t changed much as a person, and the whole procession that comes with being rich has no real appeal to him. Hell, I got the sense that he went along with most of what happens to him on a daily basis because it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just too much work to fight it.<\/p>\n
(Though I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll still maintain that getting shaved by someone else is a goddamn beautiful luxury. I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t care. I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t wait to be in London this summer so I can experience it again.)<\/p>\n
It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s through showing us Vimes\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s morning routine that Pratchett reveals that THE CITY WATCH HAS EXPANDED. I mean, we knew that it was going to, and that bit in\u00c2\u00a0Maskerade<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0about the secret police told us so, too. But the City Watch in\u00c2\u00a0Feet of Clay<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0is not the same as the one in\u00c2\u00a0Guards! Guards!<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re far more efficient. They seek out crime rather than react to it. (And poorly, I might add.) But the biggest change is the response to the Watch. Vimes and the Watch have becme so efficient that PEOPLE ARE CONSTANTLY TRYING TO KILL HIM. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s gotten so bad that Vimes molds his life around the inevitable reality that someone will try to assassinate him every day. Now, Pratchett portrays this largely as a humorous thing, but I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m fascinated by it. Note this bit:<\/p>\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We had Lady Selachii\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s son up before the Patrician last week,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Vimes. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Now, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a lad who needs to learn that \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcno\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t mean \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcyes, please\u00e2\u20ac\u2122.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Could be, sir.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153And then there was that business with Lord Rust\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s boy. You can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t shoot servants for putting your shoes the wrong way round, you know. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s too messy. He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll have to learn right from left like the rest of us. And right from wrong, too.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n AHHHHH IT WAS JUST SO EXCITING TO READ THIS. Look, I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t consider Vimes to be an amoral man by any means, but his\u00c2\u00a0apathy<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0is what held him back prior to this. And I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t see apathy in any part of this section of the book. He knows that his expansion of the Watch is pissing off lots of powerful people \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the kind who can spend twenty thousand dollars on an assassination!!! \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and HE ISN\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T THREATENED BY THIS. Instead, he offers the assassin sympathy\u00c2\u00a0and<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0a chance to escape. Not unscathed, of course, because those adorable little swamp dragons are eager to do a little light roasting. But I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m already excited by the growth we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve seen in Vimes in TEN PAGES at the start of this book. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s so cool!<\/p>\n Captain Carrot<\/b><\/p>\n Carrot\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s section is a lot more explicit about the changes in the Watch and how odd it is for him. If the original crew are spread out among the four (four!!!!) Watch Houses, I admit that I will probably miss some of the camaraderie, too. BUT THERE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S A MYSTERY. AND TWO MURDERS. Maybe they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll all come together??? Oh god, but what if Colon really retires? What if this is his last book?<\/p>\n Regardless, I still think this is a good introduction to the book. Angua is here, and we learn that her and Carrot are still utilizing her werewolf abilities to work cases. AND THEY ARE STILL DATING OMG. These are great things! I AM VERY EAGER TO READ MORE.<\/p>\n Mr. Hopkinson<\/b><\/p>\n So, about that second murder\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 why kill the curator of the Dwarf Bread Museum? What could there possibly be in that place that someone would need???<\/p>\n THIS IS A GREAT MYSTERY, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122M EXCITED.<\/p>\n Diane Duane is still offering a massive discount on the first 9 books in the\u00c2\u00a0Young Wizards<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0series just to this community, so please take advantage of this deal while you still can:<\/b><\/p>\n http:\/\/bit.ly\/markreadsYW<\/a><\/p>\n https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=eHlxA8gQnCE<\/p>\n Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n – I am now on Patreon<\/a>! There are various levels of support, from $1 up to whatever you want! You’ll get to read a private blog, extra reviews, and other such rewards.<\/b> In the first part of\u00c2\u00a0Feet of Clay, I AM VERY EXCITED. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to read\u00c2\u00a0Discworld.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[451],"tags":[517,463,248],"class_list":["post-3858","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-discworld","tag-feet-of-clay","tag-mark-reads-discworld","tag-terry-pratchett"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3858","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3858"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3858\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3858"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3858"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3858"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n– I\u00c2\u00a0will be at numerous conventions in 2016! Check the full list of events on my Tour Dates \/ Appearances page.<\/a>
\n– My Master Schedule<\/a> is updated for the near and distant future for most projects, so please check it often.\u00c2\u00a0My next Double Features for Mark Watches have been announced here.<\/a>
\n<\/b>-\u00c2\u00a0Mark Does Stuff is on Facebook!<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0I’ve got a community page up that I’m running. Guaranteed shenanigans!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"