A Master of Djinn & Mort

Episode 9

Release Date: 5/26/2021

Your hosts read the recently-released novel “A Master of Djinn” by P Djeli Clark and venture forth once more on their Journey to the Center of the Discworld with a discussion of “Mort” by Terry Pratchett.

They also complain about the word “February,” (because no one has ever done that before) and Sara proposes an alcoholic alternative: Fe-brew-ary

Thanks to Scott Buckley for use of his song “Twilight Echo”

Other music provided by Audio Library Plus: “Travel With Us” by Vendredi; “Sérénade à Notre Dame de Paris” by Amarià.

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

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Episode Transcript*

*this transcript is AI generated, please excuse the mess.

Lilly 00:05

Hello, and welcome to fiction fans, a podcast where we read books and other words, too. I'm Lily. And I'm Sarah. And let's start things off on a positive note, shall

Sara 00:17

we? Sounds good.

Lilly 00:20

Sir has anything good happened this week.

Sara 00:23

My good thing is a little small, not specifically this week, I guess. But I went out and looked at my tomato plants. And for the first time, this summer, for the first time this season, I saw a little tomatoes on them. So that was exciting.

Lilly 00:41

That is exciting.

Sara 00:43

I'm very happy.

Lilly 00:44

I'm over here accidentally killing my strawberries.

Sara 00:48

We've all been there. I'm extra

Lilly 00:50

excited on your behalf.

Sara 00:54

Thank you, I appreciate it. Anything good happened for you lately.

Lilly 00:58

My good thing is really just that I had a very, very nice day to day, which is not super specific, but also true. So I'm gonna keep it.

Sara 01:08

Good. There's good days are nice. Nice days are good.

Lilly 01:11

I didn't have a lot of work to do, which is good because I was frantically finishing our books for this evening. But I read outside in the sunshine. And I ordered Ethiopian food, which is not the same thing as Egyptian food. But it was the closest geographically that I could get that would deliver to my house. And it was delicious. Because of course, we read a master of gin by P jelly Clark, and we'll get into it later. But oh, man, all of the descriptions of that place made me want to go to there. And the closest I could get was Ethiopian food delivered to my house.

Sara 01:53

I tweeted about this last night when I finished but I think that out of everything that I've read this year, a master of jinn has made me want to travel the most. Yes. But well, we'll shelve that discussion later. Have you read anything good lately, besides podcast books?

Lilly 02:14

Oh, gosh. Confession Subnautica Sub Zero came out last weekend. So no, I've just been getting spooked by scary sea monsters.

Sara 02:26

I was going to say I don't know what that is. But I am inferring. It's a video game,

Lilly 02:31

the video game where you're on it. It's a survival game, and you're on an alien planet. And it's the first one is entirely almost entirely underwater. And the second one is a little bit less. But Subnautica. It's, it's an underwater survival game. And a lot of the game is just swimming around. And then suddenly, a shape coalesces out of the darkness below you and you're like,

Sara 02:55

ah, that sounds terrifying. And also, I will never play back.

Lilly 02:59

I love it. Anyway, that's all I've done, basically, like a terrible person. I have a whole rant about sea monkeys that I won't get into. But a conspiracy theory and I'm very concerned for them.

Sara 03:15

I kind of want you to get into it. But I do recognize that if you did, you'd probably have to cut it.

Lilly 03:24

More relevant, though. What are you drinking tonight?

Sara 03:29

Do I not get to answer what I'm reading?

Lilly 03:31

Oh, you do?

Sara 03:33

I just I completely skipped over that. What are we drinking question? I just forgot about us.

Lilly 03:39

That's fine. It is also more relevant, though. What read anything good lately, because I bet you'll actually have an answer for this.

Sara 03:46

I do have an answer. I'm not sure if it qualifies as good. I have I finally finished reading. I know I've mentioned in previous podcasts that I have been reading a lot of Leigh Bardugo books and I finally finished reading rule of wolves, which is the final Grecia verse book that is out at this point, although it it very clearly leaves an opening for more books. And I just had such mixed feelings about everything in rule of wolves and the book that precedes it king of scars. I had reservations about the plot and the characters and the romance and how things were kind of shoehorned in. It just it wasn't it wasn't the book for me, I guess or the the books for me, which is a shame because I really really liked Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom, which are the two books that come before

Lilly 04:46

the duology they do ology Yes. Which is apparently a word that exists and I hate it.

Sara 04:54

Yeah, so that's my, my answer to that question. I'm fine. I like going back to Wheel of Time. Now. After, after this minor detour, this six book minor detour. six books not counting the podcast books. So really it's more like 10 books.

Lilly 05:13

Yeah, it's been a little while, huh?

Sara 05:14

It's been a while. Yeah.

Lilly 05:17

Are you what? When does that come out? You're trying to finish it before the show comes out. Right?

Sara 05:22

We'll have time. Yeah. I mean, I would I would like to finish we'll have time before the show comes out not because they're going to be incorporating any material from book 12 in season one. Fair. But just because I want, because I because I can. I mean, it's the same, the same motivation that made me read all of the Shadow and Bone and Six of Crows books before I watched Shadow and Bone on Netflix, that like completionist. Oh, you have to read the source material before you watch the show, which is ridiculous. I admit, I fully admit it's ridiculous, but I can't help myself.

Lilly 05:58

But also, why not?

Sara 06:01

Well, when you're trying to read four books in five days on top of work, I think there's some there's an argument for why not, but

Lilly 06:09

that's why not. It's crazy. Yes, I did it.

Sara 06:13

I did do it. A little

Lilly 06:15

crazy. But also

Sara 06:16

it was crazy. Anyway, but the Wheel of Time show, as far as I know, does not have a an air date yet. But it's probably going to be in November.

Lilly 06:28

Oh, you have time.

Sara 06:29

I have time. Yeah, time. Yeah. I mean, I'm not I'm not worried about it.

Lilly 06:33

Also, because the only one inflicting this schedule on yourself, is you? Yes, that too.

Sara 06:41

Anyway, the question that I skipped, what are you drinking tonight?

Lilly 06:46

Well, we have bourbon in the house. So I'm drinking basil Hayden's originally on the rocks, but now it's just whatever the word for with a little bit of cold water in it is. There's probably a fancy term for it. Because everything for whiskey has a fancy. But my ice melted is what I'm saying. Oh, all I

Sara 07:09

can think of is that when I'm drinking whiskey or when I was doing distillery tours, like you would add water to open up the whiskey.

Lilly 07:17

Yeah, it's a thing. Yeah, it is a thing. Because I like the like the water a little bit. It makes it taste better. Honestly, I know. I'm a monster.

Sara 07:25

No, I mean, I think I think it depends on the whiskey. Or there's some whiskey that I think works better with a little bit of water.

Lilly 07:32

It makes me appreciate the flavor instead of just going oh, yes. Which is really not a not a sipping beverage that you want.

Sara 07:42

You can you can taste some of the flavor profile, rather than just the alcohol.

Lilly 07:49

There you go. Oh, about yourself.

Sara 07:52

I'm drinking a white wine from a bottle this time. And not from a camera box. Fancy. Very fancy. I mean, it was only like a $10 bottle. It's not that

Lilly 08:03

fancy. We're still glass involved.

Sara 08:05

That counts. There is still glass involved. Yeah. So the first book that we're going to talk about tonight is a master of Jen. And I suggested that we read this book because I had read one Friday night. And I have family dinner with my parents on Friday night, which involves a significant amount of alcohol. But one Friday night, I read the prequel to it, a Dejan in Cairo. And yes, I was very drunk. And yes, it was late and I was very tired. But I really enjoyed it. When I heard that there was a novel set in the same world coming out. I thought that we should add it to the calendar. So I had an excuse to read

Lilly 08:50

it. Now you refer to a dead Jin in Cairo as the prequel to this book. I know that Clark also has a couple of other works, published short stories and things that sound suspiciously like they're also in the same world. Can you speak to that at all?

Sara 09:10

i So I think and I haven't read any of his other work yet. But he has another short story, or novella I'm not sure if there's like a word.

Lilly 09:23

There technically is but it's more of how it feels.

Sara 09:27

Well, I haven't read it so I'm so I can't speak to how it feels. But he has. We'll call it a short story. He has a short story called The Haunting of tramcar 15 that is set in the same world in the same setting, but doesn't involve the main character of both a dungeon and Cairo and the master of gin. He also has a novella out called ring shout but that doesn't have anything to do with his master of gin. You know Are you? Okay? Yeah,

Lilly 10:01

I will say at one point in this book, there is referenced events that happened on a tram car. And I was like, perhaps this is connected in some way.

Sara 10:16

There's actually a lot of references to the prequel short story. And I think yes, there is the one reference to The Haunting of tramcar 15. I haven't read it. So I don't know if there are more. But I was wondering, Lily, if you felt that you needed some of the backstory that is given in a dungeon and Cairo to enjoy? Like, did you did you feel that you were coming into this book missing any information? Because it's not technically the first in the series?

Lilly 10:49

Not in the least bit? No. I think these felt like characters that had really rich lives. And that existed before this moment in time. But you would want that from a novel. Yes, and a fully fleshed out world. So I did not get the feeling that I was missing out on anything. It was really just, I think the phrase tramcar that literally made me think that's the title of something. And maybe there's a connection here.

Sara 11:20

I don't I don't think that the character actually says tramcar. Yeah, they definitely

Lilly 11:25

do. Because I wouldn't have noticed it if they

Sara 11:29

hold on. I'm gonna find the quote, because I did. I did mark it down. And no, it's CD shrugged. Just give some advice. There was a problem with the haunted. Oh, I guess they do say tramcar later on. Yeah, I think

Lilly 11:44

car yeah. tramcar 15. That's yeah, pretty.

Sara 11:48

Yeah. No, I take it back. I was thinking specifically of what CD said. And then, but you're right. They do say tramcar. Yeah, they

Lilly 11:57

do come right out and say it. But even that, I think, I think only because we had been discussing his other titles to possibly read them. I had them in my head pretty fresh. So I noticed it. It didn't feel like it was awkwardly shoehorned in there at all, even though it was almost exactly the title of Yeah. Now, I am not usually a supporter. Okay. I'm still not a supporter of the idea that the first sentence of a novel makes or breaks the whole book, and you have to grip your characters right from the first word. That being said, this book starts with the extremely powerful name, Archibald James Porton door, which is just good. It's just good.

Sara 12:54

It's a it's a good start. I mean, it's, it's a good book. I really enjoyed it.

Lilly 12:59

Right. And normally, I wouldn't say that the first word sets up a book that much, if at all, but holy shit. It really just nails the tone of the time period. And also that kind of, frankly, silliness that pops up in this book. Not what I expected it, but it felt very right every time that it did. It kept from being out of place by reminding me by using names like Archibald portion, Dorf. I don't care if that's a real name. It's serious.

Sara 13:39

That also does. I mean, this this book, pokes fun at British colonialism that comments on British colonialism quite strongly. And I feel like like it uses Clarke uses these ridiculous names to highlight just how ridiculous the British aristocracy is.

Lilly 14:00

Oh, absolutely. Like I said, it serves its purpose. Yeah. And it's not misplaced silliness. It is very pointed. But that doesn't stop it from being silly. Yeah. At the end of the day, it can be spark funny, but it's still funny.

Sara 14:20

It does double duty.

Lilly 14:22

That's a very long way to say the world building in this book is so masterfully done.

Sara 14:31

I loved all of the rich details that are just kind of dropped in. I don't want to say as afterthoughts, but like just just snuck into the text without having any real purpose beyond creating ambiance. Like yeah, so there's there's a line just casually dropped in then again, at a city and rulers also kept live lions wandering about their palaces, which report rigidly had the ability to speak. So like it just just that kind of little detail I really loved. And I thought that it added so much depth to the world.

Lilly 15:09

It tells you so much about well, not only are these people who keep exotic pets, but also a lion that speaks is not outside of the realm of believability. The only reason why it's unbelievable is because Are they really that eccentric or not? Is this really possible?

Sara 15:34

Before we actually go any further in our discussion was the book I feel like we should give a short summary a brief summary of what the book is for those listeners who haven't heard of a master of gin, or are not familiar with the series.

Lilly 15:49

That's a good point. So far, all they've gotten is port endorphins talking by ins not accurate.

Sara 15:55

I feel like we should, we should give some context like background information for a discussion like setting and characters and things like that. So the story takes place in an alternate Cairo in 1912. And our main character Fatma works for the ministry of alchemy and chants and supernatural entities, and essentially, boiling, boiling a very good book down to one sentence. She's trying to solve a mystery. I was gonna

Lilly 16:29

say, oh, what's the magic FBI? Yes, it's

Sara 16:33

It's the magic. Cairo, FBI, or Egyptian FBI, because it's not specific to Cairo. She just works for the Cairo branch for him right?

Lilly 16:43

When I first read, it's not the back of the book, because the back of the book is all quotes. And we're not going to get into that right now. But the idea of an alternate, alternate history, I don't want to say I rolled my eyes a little bit, but I broke my eyes. But that's actually like the perfect way to describe this setting. What if, in the early 1800s. So what had released a bunch of magic and gin into Egypt slash the world? Yes, alternate history. But then it also does get into some of the not the politics of World War One, of course, because the landscape of the world has changed quite a bit. But you do still see sort of the echoes of the world that is in the world that could have been? That's a very dramatic way of saying it, but I can't think of a better one, so I'm gonna stick with it.

Sara 17:51

No, I don't have a better way of phrasing it.

Lilly 17:53

I just thought it. world that could have been sounds a little bit too wistful. And I'm not saying I would just if only one thing had happened differently. We could have had gin in the world like No, it's not exactly what I mean. I thought so. As you mentioned, the main plot of this book is a murder mystery. And I thought the detective tropes you know, the detective story tropes in this book were very, very well done, and I quite enjoyed. But it also did not have a typical detective mystery plot. I'm just, I mean, straight from the get go. The Prologue is the murderer.

Sara 18:42

But you you don't know who the murderer is, or you know who the murderer purports to be. But, but there is more to it than just that

Lilly 18:52

actually did not catch on to that, until the main character spelled it out for me very, very clearly.

Sara 19:00

I mean, to be fair, neither did I but

Lilly 19:04

but but that's still not typical. This it's not a typical murder mystery in that you're trying to figure out who done it. You're trying to figure out what the fuck which is still like it's still different.

Sara 19:18

Yeah, I'm just I'm trying to think of the detective mysteries that I've read, which are admittedly not many, most, most of them by Andrew Cartmel. And those are obviously hard to compare to a master of Gen because they're set firmly in the real world, or mostly firmly in the real world.

Lilly 19:38

Well, I'm talking purely about plot structure. Like I said, this is not a who done it,

Sara 19:43

but it it kind of is a who done it. The

Lilly 19:47

question may be who has done this, but this is not a who done it. Okay. We know how they did it. First of all, we do know how they did it is usually a A huge portion of that. And just the fact that the reader knows more than the detective for the first portion of the book is extremely atypical.

Sara 20:12

Do we really know more than Fatma does?

20:14

Yes.

Sara 20:18

Like we know that much more than my does.

Lilly 20:20

How about we still do?

Sara 20:23

Okay, but like, what, what more?

Lilly 20:26

Do we know? I can't say that we're in the non spoilery part.

Sara 20:30

I just I actually think that we know more than Fatma does in the latter half of the book than we do in the beginning. Interesting.

Lilly 20:40

One of the detective story tropes that are familiar in this book is the brand new rookie partner. So, agent, Fatma is the main character, and she's the only woman agent in Cairo, not the only woman agent in the supernatural bureau. I'm not going to say the whole name every time I'm not going to do it. But pretty early on, she gets assigned a partner, which she's very grumbly about because I go loan and all sorts of other extremely stereotypical detective novel lines. But her spunky, wide eyed, go get them. First day on the job partner, Agent Hadiya. is fantastic.

Sara 21:35

I, one of the things that I really like about the relationship is that they actually work through their issues fairly quickly. I mean, you don't have to, it's not like in some books, where you have the whole novel is them bickering about whether or not the rookie should like actually be on the job. And they're just setting up that relationship for like further on down the series. Do you actually see them work through their issues like work through fatmus issues with having a partner and work through Hadiya saying, Oh, actually, I can handle myself

Lilly 22:11

and Hadiya frankly, calling out Fatma for saying you are dismissing me because I'm a woman and not realize how hypocritical that is. I'm simultaneously glad that Clark addressed that dynamic. I mean, I think that's a very real thing that some people face when they're putting in position in minority positions like this. But he also resolved it early on, like you said, not only did we not leave the book with this unresolved, but we didn't even have to deal with this unresolved issue during most of the action.

Sara 22:49

Yeah, it would, it would have started to drag if you had to deal with that. Absolutely. But like you say, to your to your point, it's completely understandable that there are those sorts of issues. So I'm glad that that they were included. I'm just also glad that we didn't have to sit through an entire book of them.

Lilly 23:09

Yeah, the characters were able to address this dynamic and grow from it without it being an albatross around their neck for the entire novel. In a sort of similar vein, Fatma and her love interest CD, who Ding ding ding detective trope alert. Best femme fatale you know,

Sara 23:36

fantastic I love CDW

Lilly 23:38

But absolutely, especially with her introduction seen such a fence at all. But they argue they like they have arguments, and not even about trifling issues like about some pretty significant relationship things that they work through. They have the argument, they resolve it, and then they move on and they don't bring it up constantly throughout the book. They just handle it like adults.

Sara 24:07

It's it's really nice to see, I guess what amounts to like a healthy relationship between adults in a book and to see characters argue and then grow from that. And not have it be some sort of like life changing argument, you know, that they can't move on from

Lilly 24:27

and I think this also speaks to how Fatma as a character is extremely deep and well rounded. She She is that headstrong Maverick detective, but she's not stupid. Frankly. You she has that dimensionality of being stubborn. Absolutely. People call her stubborn often. But she's not I mean, stupid is the only word I can think of. There's got to be a better one.

Sara 25:04

Yeah. I mean, she's not she's not stubborn to the point of detriment.

Lilly 25:08

Yeah. It's not the only thing she does.

Sara 25:12

Yeah. It's not her. It's not her defining character trait. Also, can I just say, she's a very sharp dresser and I want all of her suits.

Lilly 25:22

Oh, my God, I texted you that? You did text it to me. I need all of these. Every single one.

Sara 25:31

Yeah, I just those suits and her her bowler hat and our cane. I'm in love

Lilly 25:38

completely.

Sara 25:41

So Lily, why should you read this book?

Lilly 25:44

Gosh, if you want to immerse yourself in an amazingly vivid, not just world, but physical location that feels both familiar and new at the exact same time. You should read this book.

Sara 26:01

If you like mysteries and non western centric fantasy novels, you should read this book. Do you want to see just a lot of strong female relationships, both romantic and platonic? Like, this is a great book for that.

Lilly 26:21

If you want some badass gin fights, this book has that too. Like, we would be remiss to not include that.

Sara 26:30

I agree. I agree. There are some very bad questions I have

Lilly 26:36

to avoid spoilers for a master of gin, skip to 3610. Should we talk about some of the isms in this book?

Sara 26:50

As that sounds good to me. There are a lot of isms that are commented on.

Lilly 26:55

I mean, the first one, just chronologically, and that it shows up in the very first paragraph is the theme of racism. And especially with well, it's I'm kind of mixing it in with colonialism, but they already mix them together.

Sara 27:14

Yeah, I was I was gonna say it's hard to extricate the one from the other.

Lilly 27:20

But they're very well, I'm still talking about the prologue. But the very subtle way that you hear the disdain for the local population from the British secret society is just well, not mind blowing, because it's not news. But

Sara 27:40

it's not news, but it's it's especially pointed because they are a secret society dedicated to the research and almost worship of a local magician. So it feels very hypocritical of them to be so dismissive of the people who live in the city around them.

Lilly 28:04

So hypocritical. That was something I pointed out right away. And you see that especially blunt with how they're treating Mustafa,

Sara 28:14

I think, the man servant of this man is an answer, but the right phrase, yeah, he is. He is called a manservant. Dawson's manservant Mustafa.

Lilly 28:25

And they're so rude to him just because of, you know, who he is and where he's from, while at the same time obsessing over all junkies, who is this mysterious magician? Like almost simultaneously? It's very stark. But then, of course, there's racism within the people of Cairo, too. It's not just the would be colonizers.

Sara 28:53

Yeah, I mean, there's there's racism based on the color of your skin still. And there's also racism against like the jinn. There's just, there's racism everywhere.

Lilly 29:05

But there was also what I, I used heavy quotation marks around familiar classism just in just because this story clearly is using this alternate world to explore classism in our world. I mean, it's it's hard to not draw the parallels, so familiar with some heavy quotes.

Sara 29:37

Yeah, I mean, Algebra he is or the person who is impersonating algebra use. The return to algebra he is takes advantage of a lot of the class tension to create conflict in the city of Cairo, but it's it's not I mean, it's understandable class tension like the people like just because he is the villain of the story doesn't mean that the things that he's saying don't have basis in truth. Well, I

Lilly 30:07

think the characters are all very clear about that, too. It's not that he's lying. It's just that he's using it for his own gain. Yeah,

Sara 30:15

I mean, like, that's, like you said, that's, that's quite evident in the text and in the characters, but

Lilly 30:21

what there is this weakness in the society that he can exploit to great effect. And it causes huge amounts of chaos. I mean, he's, he's very

Sara 30:30

successful at it. Yeah. There's also a great quote on page 263, about respectability politics and the toll that trying to make yourself fit the mold of the predominant you know, culture, society and x. So Fatma is talking with a gin, who is apparently in truth, a half Gen. And there are all these stereotypes of being half Gen, that they're quick tempered, and untamed, and prone to violence and things like that. And so this, this character is saying, I worked hard to counteract that bias. I became the most dignified of Jen, I carried myself with grace, so that none could cast aspersions on my lineage. All of that taken for me now, at last reduced to the half civilized day of a prone to murderous rage, he released a weary sigh. It's a terrible thing, this politics of being perceived as respectable, to be forced to view your frailties through the eyes of others, a terrible thing.

Lilly 31:36

I am probably just putting less elegantly what respectability politics already means. But that line or that dialogue, reminded me quite a bit of that awful phrase, one of the good ones. I suspect that that's already encompassed by respectability politics, and I'm just not well read enough to know it.

Sara 32:01

But yeah, I mean, I thought that that that discussion was particularly poignant.

Lilly 32:06

Absolutely. And so many of them are, possibly because agent Fatma is the main character, and she is navigating these sort of sticky public relations situations, she's able to have conversations about perception that don't feel forced. So we're able to actually hear these characters talk about these things, instead of just having to guess about them from what's on the page.

Sara 32:39

Yeah, it feels like we are able to have a almost want to say, a discussion with the book about these issues, rather than just inferring,

Lilly 32:52

well, absolutely. And because different characters are discussing it, the book does not necessarily, you know, come down on one side or the other. It truly is just an exploration or a discussion of, of these topics. Because we're able to see multiple sides from different characters.

Sara 33:12

There is a quote that I really, really liked, because it is such a dig at West centric scholarship. And Clarke is a professor of history at a university. So I think he probably has a lot of experience with how the West centers itself in scholarship, but the quote is, Fatma is talking with Abigail, who is the daughter of the murdered English Lord, and the quote is Fatma glance to the book remembering it sensational content, it looks like utter nonsense. Most of these orientalists thought their bad translations and wrongheaded takes might help them better understand the change is sweeping the world. It seems reading from actual Eastern scholars was beneath them, I just had to laugh when I when I read that. I think it is it is both funny but also a very pointed commentary on racism.

Lilly 34:13

I mentioned earlier that I really appreciated the plant and pay off with hottie as character. One thing that I did not get that pay off for were the boiler plate Unix, the sort of the automatons, the robots, if you will, the robot Butler's that show up quite a bit, except they're basically just set pieces. And there were a couple of slight comments about a little I heard some boilerplate Unix had gotten sentience, just like once or twice, and I kept waiting for something to happen with them and it never does. Which makes me think maybe in one of the other works, it does like with the ghouls but I was honestly a little disappointed that we didn't get anything from them at all.

Sara 35:05

Yeah, I am trying to think of like, I think I said at the beginning of this episode, I was fairly, I had consumed a lot of alcohol the night that I read the prequel, so my memory of that is fairly blurry, blurry and indistinct. But my thought regarding the automatons is that it might come up in like a follow up novel

Lilly 35:33

it better. I really feel like I was left hanging there.

Sara 35:37

I would be I would be interested to see if it does play a part in a later book. Yeah, I just, yeah, it

Lilly 35:45

feels like there's something missing there. And that's so out of character for all of the other parts of this world that it stands out.

Sara 35:52

Yeah.

Lilly 35:54

Frankly. So maybe we've just blown open what his next book is gonna be about. I'm so sorry.

Sara 36:05

I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Lilly 36:12

And we returned, after a short delay due to reading too many books at once, to the journey to the center of the disc world.

Sara 36:22

It's good to be back.

Lilly 36:25

It is I'm having so much fun rereading these books. Honestly, it's been a while. It has

Sara 36:31

been less time for me, but I'm enjoying reading them too. I will be happy when we are because I had started a reread six months before we started the podcast. So we're still rereading, or we're still reading books that I had read quite recently. And I'll be happy when we get to where I was. But I think that's going to take a while.

Lilly 36:52

Well, sorry. And thanks.

Sara 36:57

The things I do for you, Lily. Not that not that this was really a hardship. I mean, reading Terry Pratchett. Oh, the difficulty

Lilly 37:05

is the secret. You keep your requests, very easy. And then people don't realize they're doing you favors.

Sara 37:12

I mean, I didn't realize that I was doing you a favor. I'm doing you a favor with this whole podcast really?

Lilly 37:23

Anyway, this week, or today, if you are some of us, we read Mort by Terry Pratchett,

Sara 37:32

which is book four and his Discworld series published in 1987.

Lilly 37:37

And it's the first book that centers around the character death.

Sara 37:42

Yeah, death is I mean, it's it's all about death and an exploration of what it means to be death. But I have to admit that as much as I enjoy the character of death, this is not my favorite Terry Pratchett book, because I just I found most of the characters pretty. Unusually, for Terry Pratchett. I found most of the characters pretty unsympathetic, I have to say,

Lilly 38:09

well, we're gonna get into that a little bit more, once we're talking with spoilers. But before then, as you said, this is an exploration of what it means to be death. And we're accessing that through death, hiring and apprentice. Everything he does is so charming, he being death. Sorry, I quite like this character. And also death really likes cats. It's like, that's really all you need to know. Death does

Sara 38:43

really like cats death has some really good scenes. I think that we are still early enough in the series that Terry Pratchett is, as as I've said, for all of our discussions up until now, Terry Pratchett is still kind of consolidating his idea of what he wants from the characters and the wider world of Discworld.

Lilly 39:01

I agree. But I do think this book, we start to see some very concrete aspects of the setting that do now show up throughout the series as they are imagined in this book.

Sara 39:13

Yeah, I think this is really where you start to see that solidification. But there are a couple of things or at least one, there's one thing that I noticed when reading this is he talks briefly about an order of monks called the listeners which parallel very closely to the history monks who show up in later books. They both have an abbot who reincarnates you know, they both have an abbey in the mountains. There is a member of the Order named Lobsang and both of them so like you, you do still see even though a lot more of this book is concretely described in a way that the first three books weren't, you do still see some aspects that will morphing into more recognizable bits of Discworld later on, in my opinion,

Lilly 40:04

but in this book, we get some really iconic visuals. We see deaths home in a way that we recognize because we do briefly visit that in the light. Fantastic.

Sara 40:18

I think I think so yeah,

Lilly 40:20

one of the first two, which are secretly just one book. And it is a completely different place than we, as we see it here. And as we see it here, I think, is really how it I mean, of course, things grow and change. But this is the concept that sticks.

Sara 40:37

Yeah, no, I, I mean, I agree with you.

Lilly 40:41

And then of course, we see death operating from his side of things, instead of just watching him appear from the other side.

Sara 40:49

And just characters is much more stable than or consistently with what we expect from later books than it isn't the first three books

Lilly 40:59

completely. I mean, we see his I'm going to overuse the word charming, because I don't want to call him cute. And that's like the only thing I got. But death is sort of going through a midlife crisis in this book, he is trying to get a life, so to speak. And his attempts at doing that at trying to mimic what humans find fun. I'll say it is extremely adorable.

Sara 41:30

i Yeah, he does have, as I said, he does have a lot of really great, adorable scenes.

Lilly 41:35

I also think the tone is really starting to shine. In this book, there are a couple of excellent moments that aren't particularly important. They are just so Pratchett in their humor.

Sara 41:51

I guess I kind of agree. But I also think, I guess I kind of agree that he does have some moments that are very Pratchett esque, but I think in general, this book strikes me as being a lot less humorous than many of his books.

Lilly 42:12

I'm not talking about the story I'm talking about.

Sara 42:15

No, I'm not. I don't mean the story either. I just mean the tone of the writing, like the humor used in the writing itself.

Lilly 42:24

One of the things that Terry Pratchett does is he uses footnotes quite a bit, mostly entirely for jokes. And that's why they're footnoted, they don't have anything to do with the story. Really, it's just silly asides. And here was an example that I felt was really in line with how he uses footnotes later, he stood up, reach behind him and produced a flat reddish mass, which might have once been half a pizza asterisk. The first pizza was created on the disk by the catchy and mystic Ron Ron revelation, Joe sua hottie who claims to have been given the recipe in a dream by the creator of the Discworld himself, who had apparently added that it was what he had intended all along.

Sara 43:17

I mean, yes, that's very Pratchett.

Lilly 43:20

And this is the first will P has footnotes in the earlier ones, but they aren't quite that off the wall. And so we're seeing it here in a way that we weren't before.

Sara 43:30

Yeah, I'm not exactly disagreeing with you. I just it, it still doesn't really feel like the culmination of a project. Okay. I mean, I, I don't have any, this is this is just my my feelings. I don't have any hard evidence to back myself up.

Lilly 43:49

I mean, writers are allowed to grow and get better. That doesn't mean their early work is not their work.

Sara 43:54

No, I'm not. I'm not saying that. It's it just I don't know this, this book really? doesn't I mean, it's like it's good. And I enjoy it. But honestly, I rank it pretty low. And in my scale of projects,

Lilly 44:09

I do too. But the pros is not why

Sara 44:12

I it's not the pros and specific. It's the feeling of the pros. That I'm saying doesn't, doesn't feel as much like Pratchett, as I think you're saying it does.

Lilly 44:23

Yeah, I'm not sure how the feeling of the pros is not the pros.

Sara 44:26

It's just It's the feeling that it engenders in me. I don't know.

Lilly 44:30

I think I think we're complaining about the same thing, which I do not consider prose. I think we're saying that the story and the characters are not great. Maybe I and so even if the prose is funny, it's funny about a not great story.

Sara 44:46

Maybe, but also like, I think that and maybe I'm mistaken about this. It's quite possible. I'm mistaken about this, but a lot of the humor just feels really dated to me in a way that Terry Pratchett that humor doesn't, for the most part doesn't feel like, like he has things about, you know, disc men and things like that, or Walkman, like just just things that are so clearly a product of the 80s that it doesn't feel as relevant and timely, as his books often do, even if they were written a long time ago.

Lilly 45:23

Interesting, I didn't have a problem with that. But I also tend to favor concrete references like that. So maybe it's just a personal taste.

Sara 45:33

It could be or it could be that I'm just letting my feelings about the plot seep into my feelings about everything else,

Lilly 45:41

I kind of feel like that's what's happening. I'm gonna be honest, I'm gonna, it's quite possible.

Sara 45:48

I'm not going to argue that it's not

Lilly 45:50

I because I do think his prose is becoming extremely familiar in the humor. And I think maybe you didn't find it funny, because you were not amused by what was happening. That's possible, even if even if the word play was still there. It's hard to get swept away by it when you have these sorts of thorns in your side. Yeah. So why should you read this book?

Sara 46:15

I think you should read this. Well, if you want an exploration of what it means to be the personification of death, or what it means to be death, then you should go read Reaper man, I think you should come back and read this book.

Lilly 46:30

I think that's kind of where we're going with this. In our discussion about where to start and Discworld, we generally say, pick the topic that interests you and start from the beginning. That's the vague overview, we go more in depth, except for the death books, because of mort. So I think after you've read the other death books, if you then want to come back and experience, the inception, and the beginning of all of that, then you come back and read mort.

Sara 47:03

Yeah, having just reread more, I feel good about our stance that we took in that discussion of where to start and Discworld because at that point, we had not reread more. It was not fresh in our heads. We've been a little

Lilly 47:17

bit hard on this book, but before we transition into are also extremely hard on this book, Euler conversation. Sara, why don't you leave us with a one of your favorite parts.

Sara 47:33

Okay, so there's a little bit of setup for this but more goes to reap someone's soul and tries to warn him and death and he have a conversation afterwards. You tried to warn him? He said removing binkies nose bag. Yes, sir. Sorry. You cannot interfere with fate. Who are you to judge who should live and who should die? Death watched more its expression carefully. Only the gods are allowed to do that he added to tinker with the fate of even one individual could destroy the whole world. Do you understand? More nodded miserably? Are you going to send me home? He said death reached down and swung him up behind the saddle? Because you showed compassion? No. I might have done if you had shown pleasure. But you must learn the compassion proper to your trade. What's that? A sharp edge?

Lilly 48:29

To avoid spoilers for mort, skip to 106 32. What is wrong with all of the female characters in this book, though? And by all of I mean both, and saying both feels too strong? Because it's really like one in a quarter.

Sara 48:50

Yeah, the one of my major problems with this book is just how one dimensional the female characters are. Especially when you compare them to death and Mort who both feel much more well rounded.

Lilly 49:07

Even Albert, even Albert Yes. Because you could say they're the main characters like that. That would be a fair argument. But Albert who is death's sort of manservant. I mean, I think they're really more like grumpy, grumpy life partner.

Sara 49:23

Saboteurs.

Lilly 49:26

not romantic at all,

Sara 49:28

but a roommate? Yeah. I just

Lilly 49:31

feel so let down by the character of Isabel, because she is death's adopted daughter. And she should be so cool. Yeah, but she sucks. And I'm not saying she sucks. I'm saying the characters is

Sara 49:48

black. There's so for much of the book. She's just kind of this presence that resents more For being like in death's domain, and she's also she's she's described really problematically, like she's described as eating too much chocolate. And that's basically her one defining trait is that she hates more her two defining traits, or that she hates more that she likes chocolate.

Lilly 50:15

I don't think it's problematic to like chocolate. I think it's problematic to have a character where the only fucking thing you know about them is that they're fat.

Sara 50:23

Well, you know, what I'm saying is it was problematic because that's the only thing like is, is she's overweight because she likes chocolate. Like that's that's how she's described.

Lilly 50:34

Yeah, I just, you know, it would be fine if the she had literally anything else going on? Yeah.

Sara 50:41

And in in a book that is how many pages 200 And, and 41 pages 243 pages. Isabel doesn't have like, a defining moment, until page 171. Even then.

Lilly 50:59

She feels so much more like a plot device than a character. She is inconsistent. She is sort of just whatever does whatever is convenient for the story to move forward. She doesn't have any like driving motivation. She's just, she just sucks.

Sara 51:23

Yeah, she is. She was not a great character.

Lilly 51:27

Especially when you consider Susan, who is not in this book at all, but comes up in later books as deaths. Granddaughter, and I love

Sara 51:37

Susan Susan Susan is Isabel's daughter. Yeah,

Lilly 51:41

I guess we're in the spoiler section.

Sara 51:43

So we're in the spoiling.

Lilly 51:46

But I love Susan.

Sara 51:48

Susan has a lot more agency. Yeah,

Lilly 51:51

she's the actual character. Just set dressing. Yeah, but Okay, so we can all agree Isabella is the worst. It feels bad saying it just because she has so little. I mean, you've you've said it. She has so little agency. Yeah, she swoops in at the end of the book as if we're suddenly supposed to care about her. I mean, it's like what is she doing? There?

Sara 52:15

I do. I do like the moment the one moment in the book basically where she shows some character. We're smart. No, no, not not that okay. It's the scene on page 171 that I was talking about where death has gone missing and more an Albert have realized that there's an integral part of deaths job that Mark doesn't know how to do and they're trying to figure out how to do it and more an Albert are talking and more says it's all clashing to me said more. I don't even know whether it should be read upside down or sideways, spiraling from the center outwards, sniffed Isabelle from her seat in the corner. Their heads collided there being more than Albert. Their heads collided as they both appeared at the center of the page. They stared at her. She shrugged. Father taught me how to read the note chart. She said when I used to do my sewing and here, he used to read bits out. You can help said Mark. No, sit, Isabel, she blew her nose. What do you mean no grovelled, Albert, this is too important for any flighty, I mean, said Isabel and razor tones, that I can do them and you can help. And like I liked that scene, even though yes, it's it's basically just plot device because they need like, Pratchett needs Isabel to do something. But I also did just just like the image of her being like, No, I'll do them. And you could help.

Lilly 53:38

That was good. I would have liked it better. If I cared about her. It was just there was just the fact that she waits until a dramatic moment to speak up instead of during the conversation of oh, we have to figure out how to read this. Do you know how to read it? Like, why does she not say Oh, I do. Like she might love it. She

Sara 54:03

I mean, that's, that's fair.

Lilly 54:05

It's just completely manufactured for those punch lines.

Sara 54:09

It is it is manufactured for the scene. Yeah. And so it's not even

Lilly 54:13

her really, it was just my problem like yes, that is a moment that is good for her but even then it is handled so clunky. Yeah, I want to like her because like I said, I like Susan and it feels kind of like you said in that way. I think this is the half baked version of later Discworld proto Susan's? Yeah, he wishes she was Susan she really isn't she being Pratchett?

Sara 54:43

Yeah.

Lilly 54:44

Now, literally the only other female character I guess there's probably some side characters.

Sara 54:51

I mean, there's there's the witch that what rapes? Who is there for

Lilly 54:56

all weird way to say it?

Sara 54:59

I mean, he Cecil,

Lilly 55:01

yeah, that's better because there's more context. Saying riepe is like, you can't do that, Sarah

Sara 55:12

but that's just basically what he that's what he does.

Lilly 55:15

Okay, but but phonetically you can't do that.

Sara 55:21

I'm gonna keep it like that just to bug you. Oh, no. Okay, but the witch that more the witch whose sole work reaps

Lilly 55:32

Is that better? Yes, that's better. Thank you. You're welcome.

Sara 55:37

The witch who sold more reaps shows up for like, a page and a half. If that, I think I think she gets at least a page and a half.

Lilly 55:48

I really liked her and she gave me some warm and fuzzies. But she she's still like a. In this book, we see several characters. Who Mort is the like, provides the service of grim reaper for well, death is off having a midlife crisis. And she is just sort of one in a long stream of them. Versus Isabel and Princess Holly, who we who are actually like characters that are throughout the

Sara 56:19

story. I'm not saying that, that she has any sort of plot similarity to or plot function to Princess Kelly and Isabel, just that she is I think, literally the only other woman. I can recall showing up for this book.

Lilly 56:38

I was giving us caveats in case someone is like, well, the innkeepers wife shows up on page 58. Which, I mean, okay, maybe, but that doesn't count. I'm saying they don't count. And I'm kind of putting that which in with the leader. Yeah. But I actually liked Princess Kelly, a lot more than you did, which I think is interesting. I wasn't

Sara 56:59

I wasn't a fan of Princess Kelly. I think as a character. She is a lot better than Isabel like she, she has a character

Lilly 57:10

because she had one. Yeah.

Sara 57:12

And she has a lot more agency, but I found her completely unsympathetic. And so I didn't like her.

Lilly 57:21

I mean, okay, she had a character to have a goal that we knew. And I think it's fairly understandable and realistic, as in, she's supposed to be dead, but she's alive and does so trying to make the best of it.

Sara 57:40

Which I can I mean, that I found quite reasonable and understandable. Yes, yeah.

Lilly 57:45

I do agree with you, that she's definitely the sort of out of touch royal figure. But I think because I was bouncing between Princess Kelly and Isabel, Princess Kelly was such a breath of fresh air. I was just rejoicing that here was this entire person who actually has an internal life that I can imagine we don't see. But I can imagine

Sara 58:12

I just she was the epitome of clueless, kind of thoughtlessly cruel, not intentionally, so just obliviously, so royal that I couldn't get behind her.

Lilly 58:29

You're not wrong. I have a quote to support your side of things. So this is after she's supposed to have died, but more saved her life instead. But the entire universe is acting as if she is dead. And so people are having a hard time interacting with her and seeing her etc. She felt a couple of apples from a stall, making a mental note to have the chamberlain find out how much Apple's cost and send some money down to the Stallholder. And when I read that, I just thought how much could an apple cost Michael $10? Which, yes, out of touch. Jerk but she wanted to pay them back. She wasn't just stealing the apples.

Sara 59:19

No. And, and it's not that she's not well intentioned. It's just that she how to how to describe it was supposed to be like 16 I can't find the quote. I think she's supposed to be pretty young. Yeah.

Lilly 59:34

Yeah, she's kind of a brat. Yeah, true. But honestly, at least, she was a brat that was a person that had thoughts and feelings. I mean,

Sara 59:45

she was a person and not a cardboard cutout who just stood in, you know, for whatever Pratchett needed. Is this true?

Lilly 59:52

And in that vein, Mort has a big old fat crush on her. Which I think the story He makes fun of enough that I was okay with because yeah, that was he sees her once. And I mean, he's also like 16. So it's okay that they do dumb stuff.

Sara 1:00:13

The story is clearly playing on the love at first sight, you know, hero gets the girl kind of trope, because more has has, as you say this, this big old crush on Kelly. And then at the very end, it turns out that he's actually going to marry Isabella instead. And he and Kelly talked about it and decided that they weren't interested in each other. But it just doesn't work for me. Possibly because I also find more kind of unsympathetic as well. Like, I just I don't like any of the characters involved.

Lilly 1:00:46

Oh, I, I think through the lens of they are dumb children. It's fine. Like, it doesn't bother me that much. They're Yeah, they make bad choices, but they're still grow out of it.

Sara 1:00:59

It's not the trope itself. Like, if I liked the characters more, I would like how that was handled. It's It's just that I don't like more as a character. I don't like Kelly as a character. I don't like Isabel as a character.

Lilly 1:01:14

Interesting. I mean, I don't, I don't like the romance in this at all. That's not what I'm trying to say. I just think that the, the romance between Moore and Princess Kelly is the butt of so many jokes, that I'm like, Okay, this is supposed to be funny. But the fact that Mort and Isabel end up together means that we as readers are supposed to take it seriously. Even though that comes completely out of left field. There's, there's no. And

Sara 1:01:47

there's a scene where they arguing and insulting each other.

Lilly 1:01:51

Which I would have been fine with if that wasn't the only interaction they have before Isabel decides she's in love with him. And then also, her way of being in love with him is helping him save Princess Kelly. And I was like, why are you doing this? And she's like, because I'm in love with him. And it's like, where did that come from? I do not like it one bit.

Sara 1:02:16

No, but the romance is not great. The characters are not great. Death is great.

Lilly 1:02:22

Death is great. Can we do a quick overview of the things death does to try to have fun as a human? I think we should. So the very first thing he does is fishing. He makes his own fishing lures and goes fishing. And I mean, it's great. He catches a bunch of fish, he doesn't really get it. To be fair, I don't either. So I think his second attempt is, well, quote unquote dancing, which he accomplishes by joining a conga line.

Sara 1:02:59

He goes to a party at the Palace of Vonk more pork with all of the like Uncle more pork dignitaries that apparently they do conga lines all the time.

Lilly 1:03:09

I don't think I've ever been in a conga line. That's not a real thing. Is it? I've been in a conga line pretty early.

Sara 1:03:15

Yeah. There's there's at the the Tonga room in San Francisco. Is that the name of it? I think so. Yeah, it it is a tiki themed lounge at the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco. And they have a conga line. And this will this will show you just how cool I am.

Lilly 1:03:36

They just have a conga line. Like they hire people to have a conga line for join at their leisure.

Sara 1:03:43

I don't I don't think it's quite like that. But but for I went there for my 21st birthday with my parents because I'm, as I said, the epitome of cool. And at one point, someone started a conga line and it was my 21st birthday. So I joined in. And that's how I celebrated my 21st birthday.

Lilly 1:04:01

I take it back there is one instance of a conga line in all of the entire world. Yes, I think his next attempt is drinking.

Sara 1:04:12

He does try to get drunk. He methodically drinks all of the horrible, unusual alcohol that one finds in a bar, you know, like with with dead snakes in it and things like that.

Lilly 1:04:23

Well, he succeeds. He starts slurring his words. At least

Sara 1:04:27

he does at the end get drunk. He does get a hangover, but is that he allows himself to get drunk. I mean, he doesn't he just decide that being drunk is no fun. And then he Magic's it away.

Lilly 1:04:38

I mean, yeah, but I don't see how that's not him getting drunk.

Sara 1:04:42

But there's there's an aspect of it's not.

Lilly 1:04:46

It's not taking away his inhibitions, because it's still his active choice to

Sara 1:04:50

Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

Lilly 1:04:52

I mean, He clearly doesn't like it. It doesn't do it for him. It doesn't do it for him. Because his very last thing is he wants to get a job and he goes to an employment agency, and they place him as a short order cook, and he loves it. Inside the tiny cramped kitchen strategy with the grease of decades, death spun and world chopping, slicing and flying, his skillet flashed through the feted steam. He'd opened the door to the cool night air and a dozen neighborhood cats had strolled in, attracted by the bowls of milk and meat. Some of the ins best if he'd known, that had been strategically placed around the floor. Occasionally death would pause in his work and scratch one of them behind the ears.

Sara 1:05:43

Now I just want a TV show where death is a short order cook, and he has to solve mysteries or reap souls or something like on his off time. Be a really fun genre show

Lilly 1:05:57

or maybe just run the kitchen and he'd have to like hide the cats from the health inspectors. And the high jinks like more of a Bob's Burgers type of thing, but instead of the Bob family.

Sara 1:06:12

I mean, I think you could have both like you could you can have, there's the drama that's involved by having deaths have to deal with with these health and safety inspections, and then also having death have to juggle somewhat, you know, going out and doing his his actual job.

Lilly 1:06:27

I mean, I'd watch it. If there were cats in it, I'd watch it.

Sara 1:06:31

I mean, Sam

Lilly 1:06:37

This is kind of low hanging fruit, but February is a pretty weird word.

Sara 1:06:47

February is a weird word. Every time I spell it, I literally say February.

Lilly 1:06:52

Right. But if you're saying it, you see February. Yeah, no one says February.

Sara 1:06:57

No one says February. Although that would make for a really great pun, like a brewery related pun. Like where February becomes some sort of, you know, you go to all your local breweries and it's Feb brew. Airy.

Lilly 1:07:13

Ooh,

Sara 1:07:14

I like that. Yeah,

Lilly 1:07:17

I like that a lot. It's like it would be Tober fest but February from February. Yeah. You would have to start February. Support your local brewery in February.

Sara 1:07:32

February,

Lilly 1:07:33

it would at least justify that ridiculous word. It was. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of fiction fans.

Sara 1:07:46

don't disagree with us. We're on Twitter and Instagram at fiction fans pod or you can also email us at fiction fans pod@gmail.com

Lilly 1:07:55

If you enjoyed this episode, please rate and review on Apple podcasts and follow us wherever your podcasts live.

Sara 1:08:03

Thanks again for listening. And may Your villains always be defeated. i Bye