Terry Pratchett: A Life With Footnotes: The Official Biography

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I'll admit that I wept when I heard Terry Pratchett had died. I didn't know him. I'd never met him. I had little knowledge of his wellbeing since the announcement that he had a rare form of Alzheimer's had been announced. But I had read almost everything he wrote and I loved him for it. So I wept because I knew there'd be no more.

It was fun reading about the Discworld Conventions. At one in Liverpool, “the available food included what was widely agreed to have been one of the last servings of that dying culinary phenomenon, the Great British Curry, complete with obligatory sultanas, and there was something jelly-based for pudding.” It is therefore no surprise that it was around that time (December 2007) when the idea of writing an autobiography actually took shape (he had always dismissed it before). Sir Terry even started jutting down quite a bit from which Rob Wilkins was taking cues here and there for this book. The joy of this biography . . . is that it spins magic from mundanity in precisely the way Pratchett himself did. The Telegraph Pratchett fans will no doubt be thrilled to learn more about his early days as a journalist and his groundbreaking work in the world of comic fantasy, as well as his later struggles with Alzheimer's disease and his tireless advocacy for assisted dying. But even readers who are less familiar with Pratchett's oeuvre will find much to appreciate in this book, which offers a touching and nuanced portrait of a man who made a profound impact on the world around him.After taking a walk with Death in 2015 due to a rare form of Alzheimer’s disease, the mantle of completing Terry’s memoir was passed to Rob Wilkins, his former assistant, close companion and now head guardian of Terry Pratchett’s literary estate. Terry often talked about “doing” his autobiography. In the years before he was ill, he talked about it almost exclusively to dismiss the idea. He didn’t seem persuaded that there was anything in the story of the journey that took a kid from a council house in Beaconsfield to a knighthood and a mansion near Salisbury by the sheer power of his imagination alone; or in the tale of how a boy with, as Terry put it, “a mouthful of speech impediments” became one of his generation’s most popular communicators; or how someone who left school with five O-levels could also go on to have an honorary professorship at Trinity College Dublin. And besides, there were always other things waiting to be written – bigger stories in which far more outlandish and arresting things were free to happen. I got the audio version of the book partly because I knew I'd never be able to get through it without crying (and it's hard to read with tears all over your tablet) but also because it was read (very beautifully) by the author, Rob Wilkins (Terry's personal assistant). At six years old, our friend and favourite writer of books Terry Pratchett was told by his headteacher that he would never amount to anything. He spent the rest of his life proving that teacher wrong. At sixty-six, Terry had lived a life full of achievements: becoming one of the UK’s bestselling writers, winning the Carnegie Medal and being awarded a knighthood for services to literature.

Why is he so underestimated? The world he created was brilliantly absurd – elephants all the way down – and strangely convincing. I remember arriving by car in Palermo, in Sicily, one day and one of my children saying “we’re on holiday in Ankh-Morpork”. Unlike any other fantasy world, Discworld constantly responds to our own. You’ve only got to look at the titles of the books ( Reaper Man, The Fifth Elephant) – parodies of films. Discworld is the laboratory where Pratchett carried out thought experiments on everything from social class and transport policy to the nature of time and death. Discworld, like Middle-earth, is immersive in a way that tempts people to dress up, draw street maps, tabulate its rules and pretend they live there Monday, 24th January , 2022 A LIFE WITH FOOTNOTES – ANNOUNCING THE OFFICIAL BIOGRAPHY OF TERRY PRATCHETT Transworld Publishers are thrilled to announce the publication of Terry Pratchett: A Life with Footnotes, the official biography of Sir Terry Pratchett, written by Rob Wilkins, his former assistant, friend and now head of the author’s literary estate. At the time of his death in 2015, Terry was working on his finest story yet – his own.And I listened to some music that was new to me after reading that Neil Gaiman was singing “the first lines of ‘Shoehorn with Teeth’ – his and Terry’s favourite They Might Be Giants song.” Terry's life was much like anyone else's, with humble beginnings that drifted into anecdotal rich midlife that didn't so much as crash as it sort of free-wheeled with a few minor stalls. There are no startling revelations or cryptic clues as to how to become as successful as he was. Ordinarily, Terry was a man who worked incredibly hard and whinged sometimes and the holy grail of how to be a writer is simply to write.

Transworld managing director Larry Finlay says: ‘ A Life with Footnotes captures the genius that was Terry Pratchett, with warmth, poignancy, and great good humour - and with no small amount of love. It's an intimate, engaging and revealing portrait of one of the UK’s most loved and most missed authors, that only Rob Wilkins could have written. It is a masterclass in great biographical writing.’ Then, I grinned at how then British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, served Terry tea and biscuits in the Cabinet Office after he had submitted a petition on behalf of the Alzheimer’s Research Trust for more funding for research into dementia. At the time of his death in 2015, award-winning and bestselling author Sir Terry Pratchett was working on his finest story yet - his own. Terry Pratchett: A Life with Footnotes is a moving and informative tribute to one of the most beloved and innovative authors of our time. Written by his close friend and colleague Rob Wilkins, this book offers a comprehensive and intimate look at the life and career of Terry Pratchett, from his humble beginnings in the small town of Beaconsfield to his rise as one of the most successful and influential fantasy writers of all time. Rob Wilkins, Terry Pratchett’s former assistant and friend, is writing the official biography of the late Discworld author, which will move from his childhood to the “embuggerance” of the Alzheimer’s disease he was diagnosed with in 2007.It’s a great biography, but be prepared to feel some raw pain if you care about Terry Pratchett at all, because by the end of it you’ll care about Terry as a person and not just an absolutely brilliant writer. It paints the picture of a writer who loved what he did. Adored it, was bewildered by it sometimes, often doubted it and his own success, but never once took it for granted. A writer who worked incredibly hard and got his just desserts, until sadly his imagination was so diminished by a cruel disease that ultimately killed him. Of all the dead authors in the world,’ John said fervently, ‘Terry Pratchett is the most alive.’ It felt entirely true to me at that moment, and it feels entirely true to me now. Who would want to read a book that is suitable for you? Not me, for one. I wanted the unsuitable books.” - Terry Pratchett

With the familiarity of deep friendship, and obvious respect, Rob Wilkins shares with us Sir Terry's irascible views, easily kindled curiosity, and unfailing satisfaction with tinkering. the biography is told with a deft hand, never hiding the fact that this is *not* being written as an unbiased account of a literary figure. It is instead a loving reminiscence of a life lived large.

Most of all, though, it was as lovely as it was sometimes surprising to take such an intimate look at Sir Terry and his loved ones, how they experienced certain milestones and forged a good life together. Surprising because one has a certain idea about a person that is never complete and the truth is sometimes, well, surprising. *lol*