Games

Terry Pratchett has announced that the next Discworld book, likely to be out at the end of this year, will be entitled Raising Steam . He made the announcement via a Skype webchat. Pratchett announced the book by holding up a card saying "RAISING", at which point the Skype connection cut out. Pratchett had previously announced that the next Moist von Lipwig novel would be called Raising Taxes , so fans immediately assumed it was going to be that. However, it was then clarified that the book would actually be called Raising Steam . It has no release date as yet, and no further details have been announced. Speculation: given Pratchett's way of announcing the book, which was clearly teasing fans curious about the long-MIA Raising Taxes , I'd guess this was indeed the new Moist von Lipwig book. Pratchett had previously said that he was having difficulty making the tax-based book interesting. This is understandable, given that Making Money - Moist takes over the Ankh-Mo...

A band of travellers from Ankh-Morpork have arrived in the town of Bad Blintz. The band consists of a boy with a flute named Keith, a tomcat called Maurice and a lot of rats. A lot of very smart rats. However, as the town suffers from a curiously well-timed rat infestation and Keith and Maurice prepare to enact 'the scam', it becomes clear that something else is at work in the sewers and tunnels under the town. Something that takes an interest in the curiously smart rodents... The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents was Terry Pratchett's first Discworld novel aimed at younger readers, released in 2001. It was, arguably, the novel that finally broke Pratchett in the USA, where it won the Carnegie Medal and won more notice than his previous books (which had been a cult success at best). Subsequent Discworld books began to hit the New York Times bestseller lists, finally giving Pratchett some Stateside success after almost two decades as Britain's biggest-selling...

Terry Pratchett reports that he is hard at work on the next Discworld novel, which will feature a new character and will not be part of any existing sub-series. It's been confirmed not to be Raising Taxes , the long-awaited third and final book in the 'Moist von Lipwig' sub-trilogy. Meanwhile, pre-production is continuing on the City Watch TV series. Terry and Rhianna Pratchett have also clarified previous comments suggesting that Rhianna would be taking over the Discworld books once her father (who is suffering from early-onset Alzheimer's) retired from writing the series. Apparently Rhianna Pratchett has now ruled out this possibility, feeling it would not be appropriate to continue the main series without her father's involvement. However, she will be involved in possible spin-offs and future adaptations of the series to other mediums.

In an interview with The New Statesman , Terry Pratchett has confirmed that his daughter Rhianna has received his blessing to work on additional Discworld projects after he passes away or is no longer capable (he is suffering from early-onset Alzheimer's). He has already made her a producer and writer on The Watch , a new TV series based on his City Watch Discworld novels, and has give her permission to write new Discworld books once he has hung up his pen. Rhianna Pratchett already has writing form. She has worked in the computer game industry for many years, originally as a writer for PC Zone magazine and The Guardian 's computer games section before penning the storyline for the Overlord series and Mirror's Edge . Most recently she has worked on the new Tomb Raider game. This is appropriate as Terry Pratchett is a noted fan of the original games, once even considering writing a game called Tomb Stocker which would centre on the hapless minions who stock those tomb...

News from a few weeks ago suggests that the TV series based on Terry Pratchett's City Watch Discworld novels has been greenlit to go into active production . A formal announcement doesn't seem to have been made, but attendees at the official Discworld Convention in Birmingham in late August seemed to be talking about the project as a done deal. The proposed project would be an ongoing series with a first season of 13 episodes, unlike the existing Discworld TV adaptations ( Hogfather , The Colour of Magic , Going Postal and the forthcoming Unseen Academicals ) which are two-part TV movies. The series has the current working title The Watch . The series will be produced by Pratchett's own production company, Narritiva, in association with BBC Enterprises. The only announced writer so far is Guy Burt, who has worked on The Borgias and The Bletchley Circle . The series will comprise adaptations of the existing City Watch novels (presumably starting with the first, Guards! Gu...

Some upcoming new cover art. First up is the British cover for Adrian Tchaikovsky's The Air War , the eighth book in the Shadows of the Apt series. The book is due out on 2 August 2012. Secondly, the American cover art for Terry Pratchett's new, non- Discworld novel, Dodger , due on 13 September.

Terry Pratchett's new book has a title . It's called Dodger and is not a Discworld novel, instead being set in the same alterno-Victorian world as Nation . The book will be published in September this year. Pratchett is also working on his autobiography and is planning the next Discworld novel, which will possibly be Raising Taxes , the conclusion to the Moist von Lipwig trilogy. Pratchett's next-released book will The Long Earth , a collaboration with SF author Stephen Baxter, due on 21 June this year.