Corporal Carrot's crusade

Tom Hutchinson MEN AT ARMS A Discworld Novel By Terry Pratchett Gollancz, £14.99

This sequel to Guards' . Guards' , is Terry Pratchett's most intriguing yet. It sticks closely to the usual template of cartoon medievality, set on a Discworld lolling on the back of a vast turtle, and in the city of Ankh - Morpork whose river is pollution - gelled and whose people are our own burlesqued mirror-images . It is on the Night Watch plod - ders , and on Corporal Carrot, that the narrative focuses. A killer is loose, gathering unto Death a variety of Ankh-Morpork subjects, including a clown. A clown-killer is almost too heinous for the Night Watch to contemplate. Pratchett's neo-Wodehouse tech - nique could be called The Explod - ing Boot Effect. He kicks a joke into play, the reader watches it detonate on impact, but then realises that the original site of launch has also been booby trapped. Here is a comedian who thinks upon thought, as sweet - ly woozy asides mingle with spicy

dissertations on philosophy, to combine with the wincemeat of monstrous puns ("it was more highly bred than a hillip bakery" ). So, the lovable Corporal Carrot leads a Pilgrimage through a world very like ours, what with inter - species hatred and the snobbish - ness of aristo-power to become a Carrot destined for higher things. The art of Pratchett parcels up modern acrimonies to place them on a cosier plane. Sex rears its enjoyable head only to be made hurtful by what it entails in the way of love. Some - body has to give up something; in this case, life. To that extent this is a new beginning for Pratchett, hitherto escape-team leader from grim real - ity . For once he brings us down to Earth from Discworld with a bump of self-sacrifice . Not...