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yossarian7's review against another edition
emotional
funny
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
orcinus_olive's review against another edition
adventurous
hopeful
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
tldr/summary:
In general, there’s a good story here that sadly suffers from having too many characters. Pretty much all of them are fun, but often they can be kind of flat. This abundance of characters also flattens the central theme of gender stereotypes and expectations a bit, because we don’t go into too much detail about the individual misogyny characters have experienced in their backstories or about their identities as men/women. Still, they are a lot of fun to read about and watch grow as people, which is the central appeal of the novel.
The war plot happening in the background is at first not too interesting, but Pratchett really has written one of the more elegantly executed finales a story can receive.
Long version:
This story is in essence deeply character driven. While there is an overarching plot of reaching a certain fortress and turning the tides of war, possibly ending it, most of the book focuses on how the characters travel from place to place and develop as people. The story features a lot of one-off encounters along the way that contribute to the final climax and resolution, but most of them feel quite episodic and don’t factor in a lot until the end.
The characters that fill these events are quite compelling and colorful. There are a few guest appearances of characters from other Discworld stories and while they are nice to be around, they barely hog the spotlight and don’t develop a lot or reveal much about themselves. Much more interesting are the characters original to this novel – especially Polly and her squad, who are the focus point for almost the entire story.
But the out-of-squad side characters are great too, be it the funny joke ones like Prince Heinrich or the more serious ones. The Duchess is surprisingly interesting, considering the precious little time she gets to show herself off. A similar thing can be said for Corporal Strappi, who uses his limited page time effectively to be as insufferable as possible (which he is supposed to be. He’s really compelling in how detestable he is.).
Polly herself is quite a compelling character. Though her starting motivation may be simple, it does gain interesting/important additional layers beyond ‘She wants to protect her brother’ and is subverted a bit. Either way, as said before, the end goal of the travels isn’t all that important for the journey while it is still being undertaken. Polly discovers quite a few perks (hehe) of her own identity that she wasn’t aware of before, and that is quite satisfying to watch. She is a character who can truly prove what a strong woman she is – to herself, the world and the readers – and it is really satisfying to watch.
Many of Polly’s fellow soldiers have interesting reasons for why they would join a loosing army, fighting for a country that doesn’t really respect the rights of women. Though some of them – Shufti, Tonker and Lofty – might have profited from there being less squad members so that the story can hone in on the interesting ones and explore them more deeply than they were. The squad has quite a few members, which has the sad side effect that not all of them are equally interesting or present. Especially the character of Carborundum/Jade feels like there is no point to her being in the story at all. Also, weirdly enough, all of the characters with more interesting motivations and struggles are humans. The vampire, troll and igor all only have the same, very nebulous motivation of “Well, misogyny exists in all races.”, which is rather disappointing and boring.
This general theme of being a woman in a misogynistic society/country is executed nicely, but if you are already interested in the topic of misogyny and emancipation, there’s nothing here that you haven’t seen or heard of before. It’s really quite barebones in that regard.
One thing that reduces the complexities of the theme is the fact that literally everyone in the squad and quite a few characters beyond turn out to be a woman. As the result of that most stakes and conflict that are said to arise from the characters being women are not actually real once the characters actually have to confront them. It also makes it harder for the less spotlighted characters to distinguish themselves from one another.
Lieutenant Blouse (a truly brilliant side character) – though he doesn’t oppose the main characters – does introduce some interesting dimensions to the theme and world. It would be quite interesting to see an actually villainous, actually misogynist character in this story and disrupt the plot, not just people pretending to be that.
Maladict especially drew a hard lot with her gender reveal. The scene in which it happened felt rather clunky, as if Pratchett had forgotten to write it in earlier, so it has to happen now, in the middle of more interesting things. Why would she wait so long to tell the others? She already knew everyone was a woman and perfectly fine with the other being women too. It just isn’t explained.
Worse, Maladict already had a rather unique and fun place in the plot, an interesting side plot and character arc of her own, wholly unrelated to her being a woman. Once she reveals she is a woman however, that stuff is mostly neglected, partly because the character herself is barely in the spotlight from that point onward. She starts off very self-confident, but once she’s openly a woman, she is almost trying to disappear in the background. So while she is one of the cooler characters in the story, she leaves the plot completely understating herself. Weirdly enough, she somehow feels like her character arc isn’t completed, even though it is.
Now while the plot of traveling towards a battlefield and fighting another country’s army isn’t too complex or at the center of attention, it is still quite compelling. All the events and encounters along the journey culminate in a final siege where everything comes back to either reward or hinder the protagonists. It is truly one of the more elegantly executed story finales.
And while the epilogue part could have been shorter in certain regards, it was still a nice epilogue that gives the last few details and resolutions to certain character arcs.
In general, there’s a good story here that sadly suffers from having too many characters. Pretty much all of them are fun, but often they can be kind of flat. This abundance of characters also flattens the central theme of gender stereotypes and expectations a bit, because we don’t go into too much detail about the individual misogyny characters have experienced in their backstories or about their identities as men/women. Still, they are a lot of fun to read about and watch grow as people, which is the central appeal of the novel.
The war plot happening in the background is at first not too interesting, but Pratchett really has written one of the more elegantly executed finales a story can receive.
Long version:
The characters that fill these events are quite compelling and colorful. There are a few guest appearances of characters from other Discworld stories and while they are nice to be around, they barely hog the spotlight and don’t develop a lot or reveal much about themselves. Much more interesting are the characters original to this novel – especially Polly and her squad, who are the focus point for almost the entire story.
But the out-of-squad side characters are great too, be it the funny joke ones like Prince Heinrich or the more serious ones. The Duchess is surprisingly interesting, considering the precious little time she gets to show herself off. A similar thing can be said for Corporal Strappi, who uses his limited page time effectively to be as insufferable as possible (which he is supposed to be. He’s really compelling in how detestable he is.).
Polly herself is quite a compelling character. Though her starting motivation may be simple, it does gain interesting/important additional layers beyond ‘She wants to protect her brother’ and is subverted a bit. Either way, as said before, the end goal of the travels isn’t all that important for the journey while it is still being undertaken. Polly discovers quite a few perks (hehe) of her own identity that she wasn’t aware of before, and that is quite satisfying to watch. She is a character who can truly prove what a strong woman she is – to herself, the world and the readers – and it is really satisfying to watch.
Many of Polly’s fellow soldiers have interesting reasons for why they would join a loosing army, fighting for a country that doesn’t really respect the rights of women. Though some of them – Shufti, Tonker and Lofty – might have profited from there being less squad members so that the story can hone in on the interesting ones and explore them more deeply than they were. The squad has quite a few members, which has the sad side effect that not all of them are equally interesting or present. Especially the character of Carborundum/Jade feels like there is no point to her being in the story at all. Also, weirdly enough, all of the characters with more interesting motivations and struggles are humans. The vampire, troll and igor all only have the same, very nebulous motivation of “Well, misogyny exists in all races.”, which is rather disappointing and boring.
This general theme of being a woman in a misogynistic society/country is executed nicely, but if you are already interested in the topic of misogyny and emancipation, there’s nothing here that you haven’t seen or heard of before. It’s really quite barebones in that regard.
One thing that reduces the complexities of the theme is the fact that literally everyone in the squad and quite a few characters beyond turn out to be a woman. As the result of that most stakes and conflict that are said to arise from the characters being women are not actually real once the characters actually have to confront them. It also makes it harder for the less spotlighted characters to distinguish themselves from one another.
Lieutenant Blouse (a truly brilliant side character) – though he doesn’t oppose the main characters – does introduce some interesting dimensions to the theme and world. It would be quite interesting to see an actually villainous, actually misogynist character in this story and disrupt the plot, not just people pretending to be that.
Maladict especially drew a hard lot with her gender reveal. The scene in which it happened felt rather clunky, as if Pratchett had forgotten to write it in earlier, so it has to happen now, in the middle of more interesting things. Why would she wait so long to tell the others? She already knew everyone was a woman and perfectly fine with the other being women too. It just isn’t explained.
Worse, Maladict already had a rather unique and fun place in the plot, an interesting side plot and character arc of her own, wholly unrelated to her being a woman. Once she reveals she is a woman however, that stuff is mostly neglected, partly because the character herself is barely in the spotlight from that point onward. She starts off very self-confident, but once she’s openly a woman, she is almost trying to disappear in the background. So while she is one of the cooler characters in the story, she leaves the plot completely understating herself. Weirdly enough, she somehow feels like her character arc isn’t completed, even though it is.
Now while the plot of traveling towards a battlefield and fighting another country’s army isn’t too complex or at the center of attention, it is still quite compelling. All the events and encounters along the journey culminate in a final siege where everything comes back to either reward or hinder the protagonists. It is truly one of the more elegantly executed story finales.
And while the epilogue part could have been shorter in certain regards, it was still a nice epilogue that gives the last few details and resolutions to certain character arcs.
tonesofie's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Loveable characters? Yes
4.5
delaneybrown's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
inspiring
lighthearted
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Very funny, very well written, enjoyed the story through the whole book. Great themes about war, gender roles, and religion.
littlewitchuk's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.25
dream_attack's review against another edition
5.0
so funny that i happened to read this back to back with Before We Were Trans by Kit Heyam which speaks a lot on the historical realities of AFAB people joining armies as men…both books are really good and this one is pretty spot on for being written by a cis man in 2003!
pauledwards__'s review against another edition
4.0
Monstrous Regiment cements the fact that Terry Pratchett is untouchable. The entire book is a take on the multiple moments in history where women have disguised themselves in order to join the army. It challenges gender stereotypes and is a wonderful tale of feminism. It takes a humourous look at these serious matters without at any point making fun of them. The joke is not that these women have dressed as men, the joke is that they had to in the first place. It does however make fun of the pointlessness of war.
boxofbees's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
jmcd37's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.75
isaacks's review against another edition
funny
inspiring
relaxing
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Pratchett holds up - and this book has enough juice that even knowing the core gag in advance doesn’t diminish it. (It’s also just a great core gag.) Come for the gender performativity, stay for the psychosexual religious nationalism - it’s funny all the way through.