Quote:
Originally Posted by JSWolf
The thing is, these people saying not to start at the beginning, did they start at the beginning or are they just parroting what other have said? I don't think you can say how good or not the the first few books are if you have not read them yourself.
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I started with Lords and Ladies, which is in the middle of the Witches subseries, and had no problems understanding and enjoying the book. Sure, there were probably subtleties I didn't get then, which I got on later rereads when I knew Discworld better. I'm pretty sure there were also Shakespeare jokes I didn't get -- I had seen Macbeth, which is probably the most important one for that book
("When shall we... um, two meet again?" 
), but it would have been better if I also had more than a superficial knowledge of A Midsummer Night's Tale. There are also references to a Norwegian fairy tale, Schrödinger's cat, and probably a lot more I haven't recognised.
I read the first books later, and they are OK, but not as good as the later ones.
Quote:
Originally Posted by JSWolf
The problem of starting in a random place in the series is that you may be spoiling character arcs. Do you want to find out something you aren't supposed to know because you've not read some previous book or books?
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Most of the time, I don't mind spoilers. There are some exceptions: I've read a handful of books where there was some twist or surprise which I'm glad I got to unspoiled. Those have never been about character arcs, though. One was a secret the narrator was hiding from the reader, in another the protagonist made some scientific discoveries (in an alternate world with alternate science) which literally had me gasping out loud!
I started Bujold's Vorkosigan series at probably the worst point both spoilerwise and being dropped into the action at a place where context matters (Memory). That's what happens when you run out of reading material while staying for a couple of weeks in a tiny town where the only bookshop is a shelf in the grocery store. I enjoyed the book, and inhaled the rest of the series as soon as I got hold of them.
To be painfully obvious, people's tastes differ. Someone who strongly dislikes spoilers should - obviously - choose a different reading order than someone who doesn't mind them.