Terry Pratchett

Terry Pratchett was an English author whose Discworld series became one of the most beloved and best-selling comic fantasy works in the language, running to forty-one novels published between 1983 and his death in 2015. Set on a flat world balanced on the backs of four elephants standing on a giant turtle swimming through space, Discworld used absurdist fantasy as a vehicle for sharp satire of real-world institutions — the press, the military, religion, bureaucracy, policing, and academia are all sent up through recurring character groups like the City Watch, the witches of Lancre, and the wizards of Unseen University.

Because Discworld has several loosely connected story threads rather than one strict order, new readers are usually pointed toward one of its stronger entry sub-series rather than book one: Guards! Guards! for the City Watch novels, or Wyrd Sisters for the witches, are both commonly recommended starting points, while the very first novel, The Colour of Magic, is considered rougher and less representative of the series at its best. Pratchett also wrote extensively outside Discworld, including Good Omens, co-written with Neil Gaiman, later adapted into a television series, and the Long Earth sequence with Stephen Baxter.

Pratchett was diagnosed with a rare form of early-onset Alzheimer's disease in 2007 and became a prominent public advocate for dementia research and assisted dying awareness before his death in March 2015. His daughter, Rhianna Pratchett, has continued to oversee the Discworld literary estate, including its television adaptations.