Terry Pratchett was a highly-acclaimed English fantasy novelist who left a mark on the literary world with his Discworld series. His writing style combined satire, a deep understanding of human nature, and extensive usage of footnotes attracted a dedicated fan base and critical acclaim. His bookRead mores have sold over 85 million copies worldwide and translated into several languages, making him one of the best-selling authors of all time.

Terry Pratchett was born in 1948 in Buckinghamshire, England. From a young age, he displayed a deep passion for reading and writing and began an apprenticeship at the Bucks Free Press when he was 17. While there, Terry wrote several short stories under the pseudonym “Uncle Jim,” and several of his characters would later appear in his first book The Carpet People, a children's novel published in 1971.

In 1983, he published The Colour of Magic, the first novel set in Discworld. After an abridged version was broadcast on BBC Radio in 1984, Pratchett's popularity surged, and by 1987 he pursued his writing career full-time. From then, Terry published an average of two books each year to become the UK's bestselling author through the 1990s. His relationship with BBC Radio carried on through his career, with the broadcaster producing several full-cast versions of Pratchett's novels.

Pratchett's Discworld novels are unique as readers can start anywhere because the books are non-serial, though ardent fans will be able to trace short story arcs between books. But they share a fantastical setting: a disc-shaped world balanced on the backs of four giant elephants, standing on the back of a gigantic turtle swimming through space. While the Discworld books began as comic parodies of “sword & sorcery” fantasy tropes that were popular in the 1970s and explored a range of themes including politics, religion, and technology. The final Discworld novel, The Shepherd's Crown, was published shortly after Pratchett's death in 2015.

In 1990 Pratchett published Good Omens, a comic novel about an angel and demon coming together to avert the apocalypse, which Pratchett co-authored with Neil Gaiman. Pratchett's other notable works include the Johnny Maxwell Trilogy, which includes Only You Can Save Mankind, Johnny and the Dead, and Johnny and the Bomb.

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