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    The Globe: The Science of Discworld II | A Novel
    Unavailable
    The Globe: The Science of Discworld II | A Novel
    Unavailable
    The Globe: The Science of Discworld II | A Novel
    Audiobook12 hours

    The Globe: The Science of Discworld II | A Novel

    Written by Terry Pratchett and Ian Stewart

    4/5

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    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    Roundworld, aka Earth, is under siege. Are three wizards and an orangutan Librarian enough to thwart the Elvish threat?

    When the wizards of Unseen University first created Roundworld, they were so concerned with discovering the rules of this new universe that they overlooked its inhabitants entirely. Now, they have noticed humanity. And humanity has company. Arriving in Roundworld, the wizards find the situation is even worse than they'd expected. Under the elves' influence, humans are superstitious, fearful, and fruitlessly trying to work magic in a world ruled by logic. Ridcully, Rincewind, Ponder Stibbons, and the orangutan Librarian must travel through time to get humanity back on track and out of the dark ages.

    The Globe goes beyond science to explore the development of the human mind. Terry Pratchett and his acclaimed co-authors Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen combine the tale of the wizards rewriting human history with discussions of the origins and evolution of culture, language, art, and science, offering a fascinating and brilliantly original view of the world we live in.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateJan 20, 2015
    ISBN9780804193610
    Unavailable
    The Globe: The Science of Discworld II | A Novel
    Author

    Terry Pratchett

    Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) was the acclaimed creator of the globally revered Discworld series. In all, he authored more than fifty bestselling books, which have sold more than one hundred million copies worldwide. His novels have been widely adapted for stage and screen, and he was the winner of multiple prizes, including the Carnegie Medal. He was awarded a knighthood by Queen Elizabeth II for his services to literature in 2009, although he always wryly maintained that his greatest service to literature was to avoid writing any.

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    Reviews for The Globe

    4/5

    303 ratings11 reviews

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    • 4/5
      The wizards are at it again. Will Roundworld ever be free of Discworldian influence? Probably not. This book has the same pop science alternating with story as the first Science of Discworld book. And it was still enjoyable. Sometimes I thought the real science parts kinda dragged on because some of the facts were, not outdated, but no longer mind blowing since they have been a part of the science-minded crowd's knowledge base for so long. Also, I may have found Rincewind annoying in The Colour of Magic, but he's growing on me. He was a pretty good character in this story, and seemed actually competent compared to some of his fellow wizards.
    • 1/5
      I have a catagory here on library thing, which is the opposite of my library, which is called "read but not owned" these are books that Have passed trough my hands but I have not actually aquired, Many of these are listed in seperate catagoties to show where I borrowed them from, but most importantly I have read them cover to cover. this book is the exception to that rule. It has been several years since I last had to admit that I have not actually managed to complete a book.There is a bit of a story - some of which assumes that you have read a precious book (which I had not). This story appeared to consist of a couple of paragraophs interspered amound musings on the functioning of the Disc world, history of this world and some other frankly bazar theories. As normal the wizards of the disc world are interfearing, this time it is with our world (this is apparently contained in a paperweight or something and might just have been created by them in the previous book.The two parts of this book simply did not melt for me, I would just be getting into the story line when it would transform in to a discussion on the definition of science and who in history was a scientist, (even though the word scientist is quite a new one)bang the plot flies from my head as this topic begins to interest me. When the story continues, I have forgotten what was happening, and would like more information on the subject they were discussing.It feels like badly written psudo science (though the science is actually disc world science not this world, I think)mixed with bady executed narrative.I will not be seeing out any more of these
    • 3/5
      I do enjoy the Discworld books... especially stories pertaining to the wizards so that was a thumbs-up for this book. The other half of the book... the sciency stuff was hard going at times. I can deal with topics involving biology, evolution & human ideology, however, quantum physics & other similar topics leave my head reeling a bit. Because of this I did tend to skim over the more physics-based chapters.

      Apart from the occasional lapses into dreaded physics this 2nd book gets to grips with human "narrativium" & the development of stories within our species pretty well & is, overall, an enjoyable read.
    • 2/5
      I read 80% of the book, for some reason I didn't finish it.It is full of trivia and data, and the bits on "Narrative Reality" and Narrativium are worth their weight in gold, to me.
    • 3/5
      Sequel to the FIrst Science of the Discworld book.
    • 4/5
      I just reread this (because the fourth science of Discworld book should be released in the U.S. next month). While I found this second book a bit more of a slog than the first, it is an insightful commentary on how fiction can help create an environment where science can take hold.
    • 3/5
      This book alternates between a storyline on Roundworld, with Discworld characters, and chapters discussing quantum physics, evolution, psychology, religion, time, multiverses, culture, and philosophy. Since I haven't read any of the other books about Discworld, this was probably not the smartest place start. Nor did I think the storyline was developed enough. I would just get into it when we would switch back to the science behind the world. Of course, I love science so that was the best part of the book for me. Okay, and the footnotes--they were hilarious! Cohen and Stewart wrote the science sections, while Sir Terry Pratchett carried out the storyline. I will have to give Discworld one more chance and find one of the first books...
    • 5/5
      See review of Science of Discworld 1... it only got better.. Looking forward to buying number three.
    • 5/5
      A better text on theory of science than most academic books.
    • 4/5
      The wizards are at it again. Will Roundworld ever be free of Discworldian influence? Probably not. This book has the same pop science alternating with story as the first Science of Discworld book. And it was still enjoyable. Sometimes I thought the real science parts kinda dragged on because some of the facts were, not outdated, but no longer mind blowing since they have been a part of the science-minded crowd's knowledge base for so long. Also, I may have found Rincewind annoying in The Colour of Magic, but he's growing on me. He was a pretty good character in this story, and seemed actually competent compared to some of his fellow wizards.
    • 4/5
      What a sad thing to review this book right after Sir Terry has passed away; sadder still that I have to say that I didn’t really like the book. It was okay; I read the whole thing without finding it a chore, but it wasn’t what I expected. I thought it might be a humorous book on how *Discworld* works, rather than our own. There are four books in the Science of Discworld series; this is the only one I’ve read. The books are written in an alternating chapter format: Sir Terry writes the short, fiction, chapters and Stewart and Cohen write the longer, nonfiction, ones. The fiction portion tells a tale of the wizards of Discworld and a misadventure while doing a team building exercise in the forest. They find themselves interacting with Roundworld, a globular world where magic doesn’t exist, but elves do. Thinking this situation is unfair to the humans, they first eliminate the elves from Roundworld. Then they discover that this was a horrible mistake, as humans need to believe in magic in order to thrive and progress- even though the magic is imaginary. They have to go through great effort to correct their meddling. The science part of the book covers a lot of different subjects; quantum physics, evolution, psychology, religion, time, multiverses, culture, and philosophy. It’s all in terms that most will find accessible, but there is some repetition. It’s an attempt to get lovers of fantasy to read science-y stuff and sneak some education down our throats, sort of like a grown up version of Mickey Mouse teaching kids about math or something. It works, but not terribly well. The wizard story is just barely held together; the wizards do something, and then they stop and what just happened is explained to us. By the end of the book, I remembered a lot of the science but little of the story. While Cohen and Stewart wrote the science sections, I swear I see Sir Terry’s hand in that; the footnotes are some of the funniest stuff in the book. Final verdict? Certainly not my favorite Pratchett, but if I see the other three in the series I’ll probably read them. Just not that eagerly.