Skip to content
Bookworm
All reading orders

Where to start with Discworld

Discworld is about forty comic fantasy novels that follow several groups of characters, and they do not have to be read in one fixed order. This guide picks six books, one to open each of the main strands.

Where to start

Pick the strand that appeals to you and begin with its book here: Rincewind the failed wizard, Death, the witches, the City Watch, the standalone novels, or the con man Moist von Lipwig.

Books within a strand are best read in the order they came out, because characters change and earlier events get mentioned later. The strands overlap only lightly, so moving between them is fine.

Six places to start

These six books are starting points, listed by year of publication, and not the whole series; the rest of the novels are left out. Each is a reasonable first book for its strand. Equal Rites, from 1987, also features the witch Granny Weatherwax, but Wyrd Sisters is a common place to start with the witches.

  1. The Color of Magic

    Terry Pratchett

    A failed wizard is hired to guide the Disc's first tourist through a world of gods, dragons and danger. It opens the Rincewind books.

    Starting point 1 of 6, published 1983.

  2. Mort

    Terry Pratchett

    Death takes on a young apprentice, in the first novel to put Death at the center and the start of that strand.

    Starting point 2 of 6, published 1987.

  3. Wyrd Sisters

    Terry Pratchett

    Three witches take a hand in a kingdom's succession, in the first book to bring Granny Weatherwax, Nanny Ogg and Magrat together.

    Starting point 3 of 6, published 1988.

  4. Guards! Guards!

    Terry Pratchett

    A secret society summons a dragon to Ankh-Morpork, and the city's underfunded Night Watch has to deal with it. It begins the City Watch books.

    Starting point 4 of 6, published 1989.

  5. Small Gods

    Terry Pratchett

    A novice in a powerful church discovers that the god he serves is a small tortoise, in a standalone novel about belief.

    Starting point 5 of 6, published 1992.

  6. Going Postal

    Terry Pratchett

    A con man given a choice between prison and a job takes on Ankh-Morpork's broken post office, in the first Moist von Lipwig novel.

    Starting point 6 of 6, published 2004.

Want something more personal?

Tell Bookworm what you liked and what you didn't, and get a short list chosen for you.

Get picks tailored to you
Link to this list

A plain link to this page. Nothing else is added except a tag in the address that shows which page it came from.

More reading orders