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Men at Arms

Discworld, Book 15

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Men at Arms

By: Terry Pratchett
Narrated by: Jon Culshaw, Peter Serafinowicz, Bill Nighy
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Over 1 million Discworld audiobooks sold – discover the extraordinary universe of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld like never before

'What's so hard about pulling a sword out of a stone? The real work's already been done. You ought to make yourself useful and find the man who put the sword in the stone in the first place.'

The City Watch needs MEN! But what it's got includes Corporal Carrot (technically a dwarf), Lance-constable Cuddy (really a dwarf), Lance-constable Detritus (a troll), Lance-constable Angua (a woman... most of the time) and Corporal Nobbs (disqualified from the human race for shoving).

And they need all the help they can get, because someone in Ankh-Morpork has been getting dangerous ideas - about crowns and legendary swords, and destiny.

And the problem with destiny is, of course, that she is not always careful where she points her finger. One minute you might be minding your own business on a normal if not spectacular career path, the next you might be in the frame for the big job, like saving the world . . .

The Discworld novels can be read in any order but Men At Arms is the second book in the City Watch series.

'Funny, wise and mock heroic . . . The funniest and best crafted book I have read all year' Sunday Express

© Terry Pratchett 1993 (P) Penguin Audio 2023

 Action & Adventure Epic Epic Fantasy Fantasy Fiction Humorous Literature & Fiction Satire Comedy Crime Funny
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Critic reviews

'Funny, wise and mock heroic...The funniest and best crafted book I have read all year'

'Like Jonathan Swift, Pratchett uses his other world to hold up a distorting mirror to our own, and like Swift he is a satirist of enormous talent ... incredibly funny ... compulsively readable'

'His spectacular inventiveness makes the Discworld series one of the perennial joys of modern fiction'

'The great Terry Pratchett, whose wit is metaphysical, who creates an energetic and lively secondary world, who has a multifarious genius for strong parody ... who deals with death with startling originality. Who writes amazing sentences'
'Persistently amusing, good-hearted and shrewd'
'This has everything to recommend it...one of his most inventive'
'Pratchett's most intriguing yet'
All stars
Most relevant
Many, many years ago I found this book at a friend's place. I asked him if it was any good and he said he thought it was OK. Back then I was an avid reader, especially of fantasy stories, so I asked if I could borrow it and give it a try. He said yes and it quickly opened my eyes to the amazing world of Terry Pratchett and the Discworld. It is still today, one of my favorite books of all time. Joined over the years by most of the other Discworld books.

This audiobook was all I wanted and more, bringing the characters to life with their unique personalities and voices.

I can't recommend it enough to anyone. (Though it might be a good idea to start from, at the very least, the first book about the city watch)

The book that made me a Pratchett fan

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I really enjoyed the book, but this narration takes it to another level. Highly recommended.

Great book

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I enjoyed Pratchett’s prose as ever but the narrator did not gel for me at all. The narrative was fine but the characterisation was off. I don’t mind characters not being portrayed as I imagine them or as previous narrators had done them but this was a different kind of problem. The more rustic characters especially (Nobby et al) were exaggerated to a very hammed up degree, some voice narration jarringly contradicted subsequent text on how it had been delivered by the character in question, and Angua was painfully misjudged as an occasionally girly, occasionally matronly personality.

The story is brilliant

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It's hard for a man such as myself to pick a favourite amongst the great works of Sir Terry Pratchett. The man had a grasp of storytelling and humor that will not likely be seen again in this generation. Indeed given the rise of AI and the subsequent death of creativity I very much doubt any aspiring author has the imagination to meet any of the works that I love. Amongst the Discworld novels in particular, the one character I have always enjoyed the most is his Grace the Duke of Ankh Sir Samuel Vimes Commander of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch. The character growth that took Vimes from a gutter dwelling despot to the most important man in the most important city on the disc is nothing short of thrilling. Night Watch will always be my favourite book in the series but the events of Men At Arms lay the foundation for the whole AMCW series. Carrot, Angua, Detritus and even Gaspode are easily as relatable and believable as any real person I know. Men at arms and The filth elephant easily take the second and third spot in my top three. I strongly urge anyone who has not yet had the pleasure of delving into the world Terry created this book is as good a place to start as any. You won't regret it and you can thank me later.

One of Terry's Best

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I really should give this full marks, Culshaw does a fantastic job only hindered by my own expectations from knowing this book so well beforehand I’ve already built the characters in quite some detail in my head.

Great book, great series

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