This time though there’s been a murder, which is of official interest but who wants to get in the middle of a dwarf/troll argument? Step forth the author’s favourite character, Commander Sam Vimes of the City Watch, a kind of grizzled detective, balancing his own light and darkness of the soul. They get drunk and re-enact their prejudices, which isn’t against the law. The dwarves and trolls have their own opposing theories, in which they are both the respective victims and that’s why they can never get along, why the feud will never be settled. The plot concerns an ancient battleground about which it’s not known for sure whether the dwarves ambushed the trolls or perhaps it was the trolls who ambushed the dwarves.

In other words, it’s another piece of the convoluted and self-referencing Discworld series. A children’s book called Where’s My Cow? appears to be a secondary spin-off commercialisation of this same novel.

Is Koom Valley, the core of the story, a geographical place or has it become a concept in the mind? What is Koom Valley is a question along the same lines as What is Calvary, a basic hill or a fate or the concept of a stage before redemption that anyone can go through? I can’t be sure whether the Discworld board game (dwarves against trolls) inspired this book or if the book inspired the board game but the game is in parody (not tactical simplification) of the ancient battle described in the book and the book describes the game as if it exists already and which side usually wins, so vice versa. Thud is unusual but also only an averagely good Terry Pratchett book by his standards, complimented by a spin-off board game.

Thud the discworld board game