Quote:
Originally Posted by eschwartz
No the series was not written to be read in published order.  |
Yes, it is written to be read in published order which is also chronological order.
That chart is 100% crap for first time Discworld readers. I've seen way too many people say "go ahead, use that chart, it's OK to spoil/ruin the series and here is my recommendation on how to spoil what would otherwise be a very good read".
Yes, you get different main characters in different books. But what you don't get is that you get a progression of place and other characters that are not the main focus. Terry does not recap. And yes, some are newer book are spoilers for earlier books.
The best way to handle Discworld (for the first time) is to take that chart and ignore it. Don't even look at it. It's a bad idea. You don't want to find out something about say a recurrent background character that you are not supposed to know because you've read out of order. Also, some of the jokes are not so funny when you don't get them because you've not read the book you need to to get the jokes.
Terry has written Discworld to be read in published order. There is no other proper order unless it's a reread.
In this case, I will say that you are 100% wrong!