Men At Arms: (Discworld Novel 15) (Discworld series)

Product Information

For a rather short and humorously satirical book, this one in Pratchett’s trademark manner delves into pretty deep subject matters (responsibility, discrimination, ethnic tensions, gun control, just to name a few), peeks into the unpleasant recesses of human (or humanoid) soul, and while holding a mirror to the unsettling bits of ourselves still manages easily and seemingly effortlessly to shine with hope and kindness and sarcasm-tinged deep understanding of humanity. That’s quintessential Terry Pratchett for you. Heroic BSoD: Detritus, after Cuddy is killed. Subverted with Carrot after Angua is shot; there's a different reason why he missed a wedding to stay with her. Those bullets weren't silver. The Lethal Connotation of Guns and Others: The Gonne has a preternatural ability to make its wielders go Drunk with Power, thanks to the ease, speed, and accuracy with which it can kill from a distance. This and the metaphysical power of its Uniqueness Value make it more of an In-Universe threat than, say, the Troll Constable Detritus' handheld ballista that fires an incendiary javelin cloud.

The service itself was going to be performed by the Dean, who had carefully made one up; there was no official civil marriage service in Ankh-Morpork, other than something approximating to “Oh, alright them, if you really must.” A Riddle Wrapped in a Mystery Inside an Enigma: When the clowns ask Colon to search for their late compatriot's real nose, despite the fact he had one, Vimes, reading the report, reflects that "the whole nose business looked like a conundrum wrapped up in an enigma, or at least in Sergeant Colon's handwriting, which was pretty much the same thing". A less filthy but recognizable example: in the middle of Edward d'Eath's slides is an upside-down picture of a vase of delphiniums. Roundworld's hermit crab (which can be found on islands like Bermuda) behaves similarly: it has no protective shell of its own, so it utilises the shells of dead land snails. The reason why the hermit crab is one of the sadder species in our world as well is given in Stephen Jay Gould's essay 'Nature's Odd Couples' (published in his collection The Panda's Thumb): the shells that form the crabs' natural habitat are from a species of snail that has been extinct since the 19th century. The hermit crabs on Bermuda are only surviving by recycling old fossil shells, of which there are fewer and fewer as time goes on, thus causing the hermit crab to become, slowly but surely, just as extinct as the snails.

New in Series

Shout-Out to Shakespeare: The scene with SILAS! CUMBERBATCH! the town crier being recruited for Carrot's militia is quite similar to a gag in Henry IV, Part 2 where a former herald with No Indoor Voice is being drafted into the king's army. Bothering by the Book: Carrot's talent for this first begins to be really apparent here, as well as his way with Exact Words. Character Development: Compare Vimes and Carrot here to how they appear in Guards! Guards!— right from his first moments in the book, Carrot has significantly more depth than he did in his first appearance.

Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.

Discover

Edward d'Eath, an Assassin and son of a down-and-out noble family, becomes convinced that the restoration of the Ankh-Morpork monarchy will solve the social change in the city which he blames for his family's humbling. He researches the history of the royal family and determines that Carrot Ironfoundersson is in fact the rightful heir to the throne. There was a joyless iron bedstead. The springs and mattress had sagged so that they formed a sort of mold, forcing anyone who got into it to instantly fold into a sleeping position. There was a washstand, under a broken mirror. On the stand was a razor, carefully aligned toward the Hub because Vimes shared the folk belief that this kept it sharp. There was a brown wooden chair with the cane seat broken. And a small chest at the foot of the bed. It turns out that d'Eath has stolen the gonne, the Disc's first and only handheld firearm, from the Assassins' Guild, with the intention of discrediting Vetinari's government through the murders. Any possessor of the gonne seems to become obsessed with the device. After d'Eath reveals his plan to Dr. Cruces, head of the Assassin's Guild, Cruces murders him and takes up the plan himself. The Watch prevents Cruces from killing Vetinari, but Cuddy and Angua are killed in the process. Vimes and Carrot confront and disarm Cruces, and Carrot helps Vimes resist the gonne's allure. Cruces gives Carrot the evidence that he is the royal heir, upon which Carrot kills Cruces with his sword and has both the evidence and the dismantled gonne buried with Cuddy. Angua gets shot 3 times by Cruces but since she is a werewolf she can only be killed with a silver weapon so is revived upon the moon's rising. 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.'