Casting my mind back some thirty-odd years to a reading of Thomas Hardy's Far From the Madding Crowd, I seem to recall the protagonist, a shepherd, attending a hiring fair and, humiliatingly, nobody wanting his services. All very sad.
And so it is with Mort, a young man from Sheepridge on the Discworld. No one at the local hiring fair is interested in employing him; then at the stroke of midnight Mort receives a most interesting job offer. The position: Death's apprentice. Can a mortal assume the role of Death and live to tell the tale? Mort is just about to find out.
In the fourth novel of the Discworld series, Terry Pratchett presents us with a tightly plotted and nicely paced story. As we follow Mort on his rounds, we get to see more of the Discworld and learn more about its people and customs. We also learn more about Death (who had cameo appearances in the previous books) and what goes on behind the scenes in his realm. And we find out the consequences of tampering with history. All this intertwines with a story of love, hate, infatuation and survival.
Also evident in this book is Pratchett's development as a storyteller: the narrative is sharper, the dialogue more powerful, the reasoning more intricate and the creative vision clearer. What Pratchett had begun in Equal Rites (I have reservations about the first two books in the series) is elevated a notch or two in Mort.
On a sadder note, I can't help drawing a comparison between Pratchett's explanation in this book of why ordinary humans are unable to see Death and his much later description of how Alzheimer's Disease was affecting his cognitive capacity (he was sometimes unable to see things that were there).
And the happy news? As good as Mort is, the best is yet to come - and lots of it.
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