My First Terry Pratchett

The Bromeliad Trilogy by Terry Pratchett.

Hardcover: 512 pages
Publisher: HarperCollins; 1 edition (September 30, 2003)
ISBN-10: 0060094931

Product Description

In a world whose seasons are defined by Christmas sales and Spring Fashions, hundreds of tiny nomes live in the corners and crannies of a human-run department store. They have made their homes beneath the floorboards for generations and no longer remember -- or even believe in -- life beyond the Store walls.

Until the day a small band of nomes arrives at the Store from the Outside. Led by a young nome named Masklin, the Outsiders carry a mysterious black box (called the Thing), and they deliver devastating news: In twenty-one days, the Store will be destroyed.

Now all the nomes must learn to work together, and they must learn to think -- and to think BIG.

Part satire, part parable, and part adventure story par excellence, master storyteller Terry Pratchett’s engaging trilogy traces the nomes’ flight and search for safety, a search that leads them to discover their own astonishing origins and takes them beyond their wildest dreams.

First off, this book was given to me by my "sis" in England! (Thank you again Cath!)  And it's my introduction to Terry Pratchett!

The book held all three books:  Truckers, Diggers and Wings.

I can honestly say I've never read one book let alone three where all the main characters were Nomes! And not only were they Nomes but they sounded quite like "hillbilly" Nomes!

The book was filled with very clever wording and even more clever were how the Nomes deciphered words that they never heard of before.  It was also filled with Nome sayings such as:  "It's a small step for a man, but a giant leap for Nomekind". (sound vaguely familiar?)

A clever piece of writing went like this: (from the book of Diggers)

The Nomes had not got the railway fully worked out yet.  But it was obviously dangerous, because they could see a lane that crossed it, and whenever the railway moving thing was coming, two gates came down over the road.

The Nomes knew what gates were for.  You saw them on fields, to stop things getting out.  It stood to reason, therefore that the gates were to stop the railway from escaping from its rails and rushing around on the roads.

And still another bit from the books..

Nomes live 10 times faster than humans.  They're harder to see than a high-speed mouse.

That's one reason why most humans hardly ever see them.  The other is that humans are very good at not seeing things they know aren't there.  And since sensible humans  know that there are no such things as people four inches high, a nome who doesn't want to be seen probably won't be seen!

I really enjoyed these books!  They were easy reading, and made me smile alot, especially the nomes interpretations of things. 

It was a journey for the nomes.  A journey to get home.. when they  really didn't know that they weren't home already.  It's not easy moving forward when you don't know that there is anyplace to go.

Terry Pratchett is certainly a very clever writer... and somewhere along my travels I will probably read more Terry Pratchett!

(thanks again Cath!!!)

ps never let a nome drive you anywhere!