Take a photo of a barcode or cover
kirill_reads_sff 's review for:
Men at Arms
by Terry Pratchett
I am (re)reading all Discworld novels: this is book #2 out of 41.
I liked a lot of things about Men at Arms, but the best is that it is full of apt and witty social commentary. It starts with ridiculing racial (or rather speciesist on Discworld) prejudices and goes all the way to discussing socioeconomic unfairness with the famous boots theory. The animosity of trolls and dwarves towards each other is described very deeply (not to mention attitudes of humans towards both) and I particularly liked the chapters following Cuddy (a dwarf) and Detritus (a troll), where their relationship transforms towards mutual understanding and eventually camaraderie.
Men at Arms is also a bit of a detective story, though an odd one. The perpetrator is in the plain sight, but as the story unfolds it gets quite confusing, since we realise that the main suspect cannot be blamed for all the crimes. The resolution to that story is reasonable, though a bit anticlimactic and it wasn’t the main highlight of the novel for me.
Men at Arms also continues the story of some familiar faces. The question of Carrot’s heritage (very much alluded to in [b: Guards! Guards!|64216|Guards! Guards! (Discworld, #8; City Watch, #1)|Terry Pratchett|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1431127356l/64216._SY75_.jpg|1128601]) is finally resolved, though I found the development of his story a bit rushed: at one point it’s Carrot we know from Guards! Guards!, but at another he’s already changed. Well, Pratchett put it aptly himself, so maybe that was the whole point anyway:
Vimes is undergoing a transformation in Men at Arms too, albeit a bit different: the retirement. As a result, he goes through a bit of soul-searching. And it doesn’t help that the social circles he finds himself in have changed:
But his story gets to a satisfying point too (I don’t want to say “conclusion”, because it continues in [b: Feet of Clay|34527|Feet of Clay (Discworld, #19; City Watch, #3)|Terry Pratchett|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1320490628l/34527._SY75_.jpg|3312754]) and he somehow manages to secure for himself the best of both worlds.
All in all, a very enjoyable read and I’ve already picked up Feet of Clay!
I liked a lot of things about Men at Arms, but the best is that it is full of apt and witty social commentary. It starts with ridiculing racial (or rather speciesist on Discworld) prejudices and goes all the way to discussing socioeconomic unfairness with the famous boots theory. The animosity of trolls and dwarves towards each other is described very deeply (not to mention attitudes of humans towards both) and I particularly liked the chapters following Cuddy (a dwarf) and Detritus (a troll), where their relationship transforms towards mutual understanding and eventually camaraderie.
Men at Arms is also a bit of a detective story, though an odd one. The perpetrator is in the plain sight, but as the story unfolds it gets quite confusing, since we realise that the main suspect cannot be blamed for all the crimes. The resolution to that story is reasonable, though a bit anticlimactic and it wasn’t the main highlight of the novel for me.
Men at Arms also continues the story of some familiar faces. The question of Carrot’s heritage (very much alluded to in [b: Guards! Guards!|64216|Guards! Guards! (Discworld, #8; City Watch, #1)|Terry Pratchett|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1431127356l/64216._SY75_.jpg|1128601]) is finally resolved, though I found the development of his story a bit rushed: at one point it’s Carrot we know from Guards! Guards!, but at another he’s already changed. Well, Pratchett put it aptly himself, so maybe that was the whole point anyway:
Colon tried to see a message in Carrot’s face. He’d got used to simple Carrot. Complicated Carrot was as unnerving as being savaged by a duck.
Vimes is undergoing a transformation in Men at Arms too, albeit a bit different: the retirement. As a result, he goes through a bit of soul-searching. And it doesn’t help that the social circles he finds himself in have changed:
He’d faced trolls and dwarfs and dragons, but now he was having to meet an entirely new species. The rich.
But his story gets to a satisfying point too (I don’t want to say “conclusion”, because it continues in [b: Feet of Clay|34527|Feet of Clay (Discworld, #19; City Watch, #3)|Terry Pratchett|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1320490628l/34527._SY75_.jpg|3312754]) and he somehow manages to secure for himself the best of both worlds.
All in all, a very enjoyable read and I’ve already picked up Feet of Clay!