Reviews with content warning for Outing - Monstrous Regiment

Monstrous Regiment is Book #31 of the Discworld series by Terry Pratchett. It works fine as a standalone, and you don't need read the rest of the series to understand it.

Polly Perks grew up working as a barmaid in the family tavern, where she heard the song Sweet Polly Oliver sung drunkenly many a time. So when her enlisted brother Paul goes missing, Polly disguises herself as a soldier boy, "Oliver", and joins the Borogravian army in order to find him.
But before long, this motivation is swept aside by the challenges of war. The forces of enemy countries Zlobenia and Ankh-Morpork are on the march, and the Borogravian army has already been decimated. Polly's squadron might be one of the few remaining. Can she keep up her disguise long enough to save her brother - and her country?

This summary doesn't do justice to the brilliance of this novel, which is a hilarious satire of sexism. It also pokes fun at intolerant religion via the conservative, sexist, censorship-happy religion of Borogravia, where more and more things are designated as "Abominations" each week. This was contrasted with the more enlightened culture of Ankh-Morpork, where they have such mysterious concepts of "free speech", female officers, and "newspapers" that aren't printed by the government.

There's also character development in spades. When we first meet Lieutenant Blouse, he's a street-dumb dandy who's hardly able to handle his own sword; by the time we bid him farewell, he's

an intelligent and capable leader who backwards-engineers the Clacks from scratch, sneaking the Monstrous Regiment to victory at the final castle

. Meanwhile, Sergeant Jackrum seems like a reliable ol' font of advice who tells the hard truths of war, but before the end of the book we see him to be

an unrelenting liar who doesn't tell the hard truth of anything

.

Something else I loved about the book was how many twists it had. I'd expected it to follow the same basic plot as Mulan: "A woman disguises herself as a male soldier for some purpose. Through her hard work she gains the respect of her male colleagues, and keeps it even after her true gender is revealed."
However, Monstrous Regiment subverted this so thoroughly that it was hilarious. Firstly, there's a particular running joke (a series of reveals) which sent me into a fit of laughter when I realized what was going on, and which completely throws out the whole Mulan plot. Secondly, there's a scene near the end of the book (

disguising as washerwomen

) which is literally the exact opposite of what happens in Mulan, in the funniest way possible.

Another thing I liked about the book was the endlessly intriguing character of Sgt. Jackrum:

He's shown as (a) a massive liar who seems to be faking his military history and age for some reason, and (b) a man who has genuine good advice and seems to mostly act in the squad's interests... although perhaps not Lt. Blouse's. Jackrum gets into various scrapes and is challenged by the higher-ranking military, but he always seems able to talk his way out of every situation in a sly, conniving way.
Such an interesting character to read. He reminds me of Professor Quirrell as depicted in Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality - extremely intelligent, cynical, seems to be on your side, but it feels like his entire personality is a facade that he switches on or off as necessary (and indeed it is). For more about Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, see my review here.

.

You can read this book as a standalone, but there are also treats for serial Discworld readers. Sam Vimes makes a few appearances (having become

the second-most powerful man in Ankh-Morpork

), as does journalist William de Worde. This was done very well and neatly tied the book into the Discworld canon.

Was there anything bad about the book? Well, the plot did seem a little aimless at times, with the squadron just wandering through the wilderness and encountering various "random" challenges, but it didn't bother me too much.

Now, a comment on the book's themes. Wikipedia categorizes this book's topic as "transgender" (as well as the expected topics of "war", "crossdressing", etc).
This is simply not correct. The number of trans characters in the story is zero, so don't get your hopes up. Actually, it is continually assumed that everyone is cis and there is no such thing as being trans, in the sense that whatever is under a person's clothes reveals the truth.
For example, Polly makes a comment that she checks every day to see if she's still a woman under her clothes. And

another female soldier comments that she could just drop her trousers to prove that she's a woman

.
Of course, there's nothing wrong with this - the characters have no reason to think any differently. But ultimately, you shouldn't get your hopes up: there are no trans characters and this is not a trans novel in any sense.

Overall, Monstrous Regiment is a very funny and insightful novel, and definitely worth a read.

Content Warnings

jjjreads's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

Content Warnings

More...