Terry Pratchett: Here's what we know about his upcoming book
The upcoming book by Pratchett, who died recently, will reportedly be titled 'The Shepherd's Crown' and center on a familiar character.
Terry Pratchett attends the Conservative party conference in Birmingham, England in 2010.
Kirsty Wigglesworth/AP
The newest novel by recently deceased fantasy author Terry Pratchett will reportedly be titled “The Shepherd’s Crown.”
According to the website io9, “Shepherd” will center on the witch Tiffany Aching. Tiffany is part of Pratchett’s “Discworld” series and was previously seen in such books of his as “The Wee Free Men” and “I Shall Wear Midnight.” As she was a witch, she also encountered such famous Pratchett characters as the witches Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg during the novels in which she appeared.
There is not yet a publication date for “Shepherd,” according to io9.
Pratchett was knighted in 2009 and published various works, including those that were set in his “Discworld” universe. He had recently released the novel “Raising Steam,” which came out in 2013, and the short story collection “Dragons at Crumbling Castle.”
“The world has lost one of its brightest, sharpest minds,” Transworld Publishers managing director Larry Finlay said of Pratchett in a statement. “In over 70 books, Terry enriched the planet like few before him. As all who read him know, Discworld was his vehicle to satirize this world: he did so brilliantly, with great skill, enormous humor and constant invention.”
Don’t know Pratchett’s work? NPR writer Tasha Robinson recently told readers not to be afraid of the large number of the author’s works in an article titled “There’s No Wrong Place To Start Reading Pratchett.”
“There's no terrible place to start with the Discworld books, at least for readers who accept one caveat off the bat: No single Discworld novel is fully representative of the others,” Robinson wrote. “Pratchett's writing style, interests and humor evolved considerably over decades of work, so the series evolved with him… The important thing isn't finding the perfect starting point. It's accepting that Pratchett created a messy, beautiful world that can't be summed up with one individual book — and diving in anyway.”