August 2008

Pratchett writes on Alzheimer’s drug Aricept

17 August 2008 (15:02) Comment!

The full text Terry Pratchett’s article, which begins with “The NHS is seriously injured,” and was found on page six of today’s News of the World, can be found on the website today.  In it, Pratchett complains that the NHS in Britain is not doing it’s job:

A drug called Aricept can slow the progress of the disease, and the good news is it costs just £2.50 a day.

The bad news is there are 400,000 Alzheimer’s sufferers in the U.K. so Aricept has been ruled out for NHS use in the mild stages of the disease everywhere except Scotland…. I’m a millionaire so I have no trouble paying, but there are people who can’t…. I would very much like to know the basis on which these decisions are made because some of them don’t seem to make very much sense. It is interesting to note I could get Viagra for free. I’m not too certain it’s the State’s job to provide Viagra.

He also points out that the NHS is not equipped to handle the upcoming wave of aging baby boomers.
Other interesting tidbits:

My wife and PA both noticed real changes in me after two or three months on it. I used to fumble with buttons and needed help with seatbelts. Now, I get dressed normally and seatbelts slide in first time. Mentally, it’s the difference between a sunny day and an overcast day. Ye Gods, that’s worth it!

—————

 I can still work at home and control my environment, and my rare variant of the disease is not yet a real burden. The novels turn up as they always have — only the typing is hard. There will now be a moment when the letter A, say, vanishes. It’s as if the keyboard closes up and the letter A is not there anymore. Then I’ll blink a few times and concentrate and it comes back.

I’ve handed in my driving licence — if my brain won’t let me see that A, it might not let me see the child on the pedestrian crossing. Unlikely, at this stage, but who would risk it?

—————–

And I can afford a voice recognition programme for the computer. There’s no way I’m going to retire, I’ll be writing until I die. It’s my passion.  I stood up and said I had Alzheimer’s. I didn’t expect all the fuss, or my mailbox to melt. Good grief, you write best sellers for 25 years in a kind of welcome obscurity, then you catch one lousy disease and every chat show wants to talk to you.

Also, catch Pratchett tomorrow on a special Panorama program called The NHS Postcode: It Could Be You Monday at 8:30 p.m.

It’s August 8, 2008–otherwise known as 08-08-08!

8 August 2008 (10:07) 1 Comment

It’s an important day for Discworld fans.  While celebrating the coincidences of an arbitrary calendar system may seem irrational, that’s no reason not to have some good fannish fun today!  Some Discworld-y things to do today, in honor of the triple-eight (or is that 7a?):

• The Wikipedia entry for the number 8 starts like this: “8 (eight) is the natural number following 7 and preceding 9. The SI prefix for 1000⁸ is yotta (Y), and for its reciprocal yocto (y).”  Sounds fun, for those math-oriented types.
• Feel like you’re a Discworld fan?Well, you won’t after you see this amazing Discworld wedding cake!
• But if you want a non-perishable Discworld, get some paper and start folding.
• Seen C.M.O.T. Dibbler recently?  He’s been hiding out in January 24’s Non Sequitur comic.
• Check out our page of online quizzes!  They’ll quiz you on your Discworld knowledge and tell you which Discworld character you are, and entertain you for at least a few minutes.
• You know you read too much Discworld when …
  • … you have tasted dried frog pills.
  • … you know the recipe to Mr. Dibbler’s sausage-inna-bun.
  • … you go tobed with a sign reading “I ATEN’T DEAD.”
  • … you ask the orangutans at the zoo for help navigating the library’s referene section.
  • … you are always kindto cats, just in case the dude with the glowing blue eye-sockets shows up unexpectedly.
  • … you talk to gargoyles and expect an answer.
  • … you actually have gotten an answer.
  • … you ask to see a license if you are being robbed, mugged, or assassinated.
  • … you know all the words to the Hedgehog Song.
  • … you ask salespersons for the suitcases-with-legs section, and complain loudly when you discover there isn’t any such section.
  • … and so much more at the Discworld Compendium.
• Watch an old interview Terry Pratchett gave when Wintersmith came out in the U.S.
• Discworld fans, being the smart people they are, seem to make the news a lot.  Check out some other authors, spelling-bee winners, actors, and even some regular Joes on our Fans In The News page.

Other suggestions are welcome in the comments!

Unofficial Discworld guide The Turtle Moves!, now available!

6 August 2008 (21:19) Comment!

The Turtle Moves: Discworld’s Story So Far (The Turtle Moves!: Discworld’s Story Unauthorized in the U.S.) is now available in paperback.  Published by Benbella Books, the unofficial guide “offers 62 chapters describing the Discworld for fan and neophyte alike,” according to the product description on Amazon.co.uk.  Another description reads:

From the banks of the river Ankh to the walls of Sto Lat, the entirety of Terry Pratchett’s renowned Discworld series is explored in this expansive resource. Essays discussing a range of topics—among them Pratchett’s place in literary canon, the nature of the Disc itself, and the causes and results of the Discworld phenomenon—accompany a chronological account of the more than three dozen novels in the series. Perfect for veteran fans and neophytes alike, this is the complete guide to the world on the cosmic turtle’s back.

The book is “highly recommended by those in the know,” according to fan newsletter Wossname.

Pullman, Pratchett, and Potter author denounce age banding for children’s books

5 August 2008 (22:19) Comment!

Prominent children’s author Philip Pullman is leading a campaign against age banding, a program designed by publishers to guide consumers buying books for children. More than 700 authors and illustrators, including of course Terry Pratchett, have signed the Statement by Philip Pullman, which says, in part, “the proposal to put an age-guidance figure on books for children is ill-conceived, damaging to the interests of young readers, and highly unlikely, despite the claims made by those publishers promoting the scheme, to make the slightest difference to sales.”

The statement also claims that “each child is unique, and so is each book.  Accurate judgments about age suitability are impossible, and approximate ones are worse than useless….

“Everything about a book is already rich with clues about the sort of reader it hopes to find – jacket design, typography, cover copy, prose style, illustrations. These are genuine connections with potential readers, because they appeal to individual preference. An age-guidance figure is a false one, because it implies that all children of that age are the same.”

Pratchett explained why he was opposed to age banding, saying “when I was a child I read books far too old for me and sometimes far too young for me. Every reading child is different. Introduce them to the love of reading, show them the way to the library and let them get on with it. The space between the young readers eyeballs and the printed page is a holy place and officialdom should trample all over it at their peril.”

Most children’s publishers in the U.K., including Scholastic and HarperCollins, were to introduce age banding this fall.  The plan, led by Random House, featured a motif placed near the bar code with the categories 5+, 7+, 9+, 11+ and 13+/teen.
The Publishers Association’s Children’s Book Group claimed that 86% of book buyers approved of the proposed age guidance, while 40% said they would probably buy more books with the plan.

As of July 3, publishers are divided, as Bloomsbury (the Harry Potter publishers), Walker Books, and other major publishers are opposed to age banding, while Random House, Scholastic, and Egmont continue to support it.

Scholastic agreed to dispense with age banding on Pullman’s books, but as Pullman found that not all authors had that advantage, he “signed this petition because I believe passionately in what it says. It is an act of solidarity not only with other authors, but with booksellers and librarians.”

The authors’ campaign placed a full page ad in Britain’s book trade premier publication The Bookseller, where Philip Pullman and over 80 others publicly disassociated themselves from age banding.

J. K. Rowling, Jacqueline Wilson, Alexander McCall Smith, Neil Gaiman, Quentin Blake, Beverley Naidoo, Eva Ibbotson, Iain Banks, Diana Wynne Jones, Lynne Reid Banks, and Anthony Horowitz all joined the anti-age banding campaign.

If you would like to add your name to a list of over 3500 readers, librarians, teachers, writers, and others, send an email to signup@notoagebanding.org.  See the contact page of the No to Age Banding site for more details.

Philip Pullman’s statement against the age guidance concluded, “writers take great care not to limit their readership unnecessarily. To tell a story as well and inclusively as possible, and then find someone at the door turning readers away, is contrary to everything we value about books, and reading, and literature itself.”

An update from Terry Pratchett

4 August 2008 (8:58) 2 Comments

www.PJSMPrints.com has another update from Terry Pratchett. Here it is in full:

Folks,

To those that want to know, it would be true to say that my life right now is occasional short periods of writing interspersed and interrupted with requests for interviews.  As my UK readers will know, merely catching a variant of Alzheimer’s has propelled me onto more prestigious chat show sofas than I have ever seen in 25 years of quietly writing the Discworld series. 

My general health is good.  The most recent test by my specialist indicates, in effect, that I am no worse now, and possibly slightly better than I was at the back end of November.  I have no idea when Unseen Academicals will be finished, simply because of the amount of media interest that continues to be generated by recent developments in the treatment of AD.  Frankly, and with the agreement of my publishers, I feel that this is something that I should give priority to.

In a week’s time we are flying to the States to talk to a number of specialists in AD research and, incidentally, go out with the LAPD officers who are tasked with – and I am not kidding – locating and bringing home those elderly joggers with memory difficulties who have jogged five miles and can’t remember where they live.  I thought this was an urban myth, but apparently it is true.  We will, obviously, be back in time for UK convention, which I would not miss for root canal surgery.

The bad news is that it looks as if, for various reasons, Going Postal The Movie will be delayed and shooting will not begin until the start of next year. However, the guys from Mob turned up this morning and filmed my sequence for the Colour of Magic DVD which will be released in October.

The Discworld Graphic Novels re-released

3 August 2008 (20:50) 1 Comment

In honor of the 25th anniversary of the publishing of The Colour Of Magic, The Discworld Graphic Novels: The Colour Of Magic And The Light Fantastic is being re-released (for the first time in hardcover) in both the U.S. and the U.K.

The synopsis:

Imagine a flat world, sitting on the backs of four elephants who hurtle through space balanced on a giant turtle. The Discworld is a place (and a time) parallel to our own—but also very different. That is the setting for Terry Pratchett’s phenomenally successful Discworld series, which now celebrates its twenty-fifth anniversary.

The Discworld Graphic Novels presents the very first two volumes of this much-loved series in graphic novel form. First published fifteen years ago, these fully illustrated versions are now issued for the first time in hardback. Introduced here are the bizarre misadventures of Twoflower, the Discworld’s first ever tourist, and possibly—portentously—its last, and his guide Rincewind, the spectacularly inept wizard. Not to mention the Luggage, which has a mind of its own.

The U.S. edition and the U.K. edition are both available on Amazon.

Terry Pratchett the most “evergreen” author

1 August 2008 (17:37) 2 Comments

The British book trade’s premier publication, The Bookseller, released today for the first time a list of “evergreen” titles–titles that have never fallen out of the top 5,000 bestseller chart since 1995.  The list consists of only twelve (out of more than 1.8 million) books, three of which belong to the Discworld series.

The Colour Of Magic, The Light Fantastic, and Mort all received the honor.  No author besides Terry Pratchett has more than one book on the list, earning him the title “‘evergreen’ king.”

Birdsong, by Sebastian Faulks, topped the list.  The other books on the list were Complete Cookery Course, by Delia Smith; The Celestine Prophecy, by James Redfield; A Long Walk To Freedom, by Nelson Mandela; and the favorites of The Hobbit, A Brief History Of Time, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and We’re Going On A Bear Hunt.