Mort

So I thought that i'd carry on with the fantasy style books by posting about Terry Pratchett's Mort.

Pratchett's discworld novels contain a lot of characters, but you can separate them by character. Mort is the first discworld novel about the character DEATH.
If any of you have seen the film 'Hogfather'.. it is another Death novel.
Mort was also made into a musical and put on in the rose theatre in Richmond a few years ago.

Plot:
DEATH takes on an apprentice: Mort. Death's job is somewhat like the Grim Reapers. Death comes when you are dying and completes the last step of your death... removing the soul from the body. Death can suspend reality... meaning that he moves through time while effectively, the rest of the world is moving very slowly or has in fact stopped moving.
He trains Mort on how to do this job effectively, how to ride the horse, that Witches and Wizards can see him and are always difficult, and that he has to read the books and look at the hour glasses. On no account whatsoever is he allowed to turn the hour glass up the other way to give someone more life.
So guess what he does!

He is sent to remove the soul of a queen... or almost a queen. A young girl who is about to be killed. Instead, he kills the people that have been sent to kill her and turns over her hour glass.

Then the story really happens...
Death has adopted a daughter... guess what? She falls in love with Mort, Death turns over her hour glass.

Death has a wizard living in his house called albert. He is there because he will die if he goes back into the real world. His time was up and he refused to die.


I have to be honest and say that I never really got into Terry Pratchett. I started reading them when I was about 8 or 9 and that's too young to be reading his work. I started off by reading all the ones about DEATH and have now moved on to some of his others. There are a lot and I have a long way to go but i'm gradually doing it! If you haven't read any of his discworld novels, I suggest that you start like I did and read the ones about DEATH first.
Pratchett has possibly an acquired sense of humour, but the more you read, the more that you will understand so long as you accept the fact that it's all mostly made up and mostly completely insane!
One last thing... The album 'Wintersmith' has just been released and Terry Pratchett collaborated with the band Steeleye Span because the album is about his book 'Wintersmith'.