This review was originally posted at Goodreads and imported here later with next to no spell/grammar checking.

5/5 stars

Newspapers come to Ankh-Morpork. And just in time for some investigative journalism! And reporting of funny-shaped vegetables.

This is an excellent book about journalism, reporting, truth, power; and almost twenty years after its publication it feels more relevant than ever.

I didn’t come to it with high expectations, because the synopsis just didn’t sound that exciting, but it is brilliant. It goes over an accelerated (fake-ish) history of the printing press and journalism while the Patrician is implicated in a crime that makes no sense and the City Watch is proceeding with inquiries (i.e. having no clue).

I could not stop reading it. It flows naturally, it’s super funny and the all journalism stuff just lands so well! Pratchett started his career as a journalist and it shows. He focuses on the good and bad, the relation between reporting and truth, of what is and isn’t news and manages to both highlight the importance as well as mount deserved criticism at the whole practice.

Plus: you get a special side dish of Samuel Vimes and the Patrician, always a welcome sight.

It is no secret that I hold the City Watch novels in the highest regard and honestly, I didn’t expect any of the other Discworld books to come close. The Truth is an honorary City Watch novel.

by Tomas Sedovic on 24th December, 2019