Terry Pratchett: BBC Radio Drama Collection

Seven BBC Radio 4 Full-Cast Dramatisations

By: Terry Pratchett

Narrated by: Martin Jarvis, Sheila Hancock, Anton Lesser, Alex Jennings, Philip Jackson, Mark Heap, full cast

Length: 13 hrs and 13 mins

Publisher's summary

A collection of the full-cast BBC Radio dramatisations of novels by Terry Pratchett.

Somewhere on the frontier between thought and reality exists the Discworld, a parallel time and place which might sound and smell very much like our own, but which looks completely different....

Published for the very first time are seven full-cast BBC Radio dramatisations of Terry Pratchett’s novels, with star-studded casts including Martin Jarvis, Sheila Hancock, Anton Lesser, Philip Jackson, Alex Jennings and Mark Heap.

Mort

Hopeless young peasant Mort is hired as an apprentice to Death. He'll have free board, use of the company horse and being dead isn’t even compulsory. In fact, it's a dream job - until he discovers that it can be killer for his love life....

Wyrd Sisters

Three witches meet on a blasted heath. A king is cruelly murdered. A child heir and the kingdom’s crown are both missing. But Granny Weatherwax finds that meddling in royal politics is a lot more complicated than certain playwrights would have you believe....

Guards! Guards!

In Ankh-Morpork, the Haves and the Have-Nots are about fall out. Again. The Night Watch’s Captain Vimes is used to this but when the Have-Nots find the key to a lethal, dormant weapon that even they don’t understand, he knows it’s time so sober up.

Eric

When precocious young Eric Thursley summons a demon from the loathsome pit to fulfil his every wish, he wants what everyone wants – immortality, to rule the world and have the most beautiful woman love him. Instead he gets Rincewind, the Disc’s most incompetent wizard.

Small Gods

On the Discworld, Gods are as numerous as herring roe, all elbowing for space at the top. In such a competitive environment, you need an acolyte and fast. For the Great God Om, Brutha is the Chosen One, or at least the only One available....

Night Watch

Living in the past is hard. Dying in the past is incredibly easy, especially when there is a serial killer on the loose who targets coppers. Commander Sam Vimes of the City Watch is back in his own rough, tough past and he has a job to do.

Bonus Story

In addition to these Discworld novels, this collection also includes a full-cast dramatisation of Only You Can Save Mankind, from the Johnny Maxwell series. As an alien fleet crosses his computer screen, Johnny prepares to blow the ScreeWee into a million pieces....

©2018 Terry Pratchett (P)2018 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd

Critic reviews

"The voice cast is fantastic." (Starburst)

Cut too much, and most of the jokes.

Each story is about 2 hours, and to get a 11 hour book to fit in a 2 hour story, much of the extraneous stuff has to be removed. Extraneous is all the interpersonal stuff that makes Terry Pratchett books so much fun. If you knew the story to begin with the radio plays are a nice reminder (allowing that you did not look forward to, and miss the parts that were removed), I think you would be happier to get the entire book and enjoy it.

Several Terry Pratchett BBC audio plays

This set of #RadioPlays is one I plan to listen to multiple times. BBC makes some of the best #AudioDrama and I love listening to these radio plays based on Terry Pratchett's Disc World and re-listening to the couple I caught when streaming on BBC iPlayer. The worst I can say about this collection is I personally found the version of Guards! Guards! that Atlanta Radio Theatre Company recorded at a convention (that Mr Terry Pratchett gave permission to be podcast) was slightly funnier and this collection isn't also available in a CD set.
As usually #BBC has very good production quality and they scripts and acting are pretty good. #tagsgiving #sweepstakes

Great books, accept last one.

Most books were great and greatly adapted, accept last one which was terrible in my opinion.

Radio drama + Terry Pratchett = MAGIC

Yes, it is not the complete text of the books, but I still enjoyed revisiting some of the best Discworld stories through this collection of BBC Radio 4's dramatisations. You will meet the Weird Sisters, Mort, get acquainted once again with the Small Gods, feel the Ankh Morpork cobbles under your feet while patrolling with Captain Vimes of the Night Watch dealing with dragons. "Guards! Guards!" and suddenly you travel back in time becoming the impeccable Sgt Keel. But just for the fun of it, the collection has one non-Discword story in it... helping you to remember WHY you love the disc world.

I really enjoyed these dramatisations. It is an excellent tribute to the work of Sir Terry Pratchett whose whit and unexpected take on things we miss so dearly. Buy this if you want to go on a trip through memory lane. Enjoy the radio dramas for what it is, radio dramas. Then I can guarantee you, you won't be disappointed.

The Good, Bad, and Overall...

The Good: Nice dramatization of the stories we know and love.

The Bad: This comes across more as Fan Fiction due to the changes in the stories. More than just abridged, the stories have been changed. Sadly, some of the changes were what made the originals so great so it was disappointing to see 2 dragons in love flying off into the sunset.

Overall: Treat it as Fan Fiction dramatized and you can still enjoy it. Highly anticipated this release but was left a bit disappointed in the final product. Overall rating 3 Ankh Morpork Sausages... and I'm cutting me own throat.

Discworld-ish

If you are looking for some good BBC Radio Plays this is a good deal. Hardcore Pratchett fans may want to pass this one by. The stories are adapted for broadcast and therefore shorter and rather bare bones in detail.

A well done series of plays and an entertaining listen if leaving something to be desired.

Bought it for the diskworld, stayed till the end.

I am a huge fan of Terry Pratchett, and a reasonably large fan of bbc radio dramas. this collection did not dissapoint!

Disappointing. Go for the unabridged books instead

I've loved Terry Pratchett's works ever since I discovered Good Omens, which he co-authored with Neil Gaiman. I've read just about ever Discworld book Sir Pratchett wrote, and I highly recommend them all.

I was excited to get this set of performances, My expectations were too high.

In addition to the stories being deeply abridged, making it hard to understand what's going on unless you've read the book, most of Sir Pratchett's humor was excised, making the stories less complex and interesting.

I know, I know. This is a different medium, and the time constraints meant that something had to go. But listening to these is like listening to an outline of a story rather than the full story.

It doesn't help that sometimes the voice actors' accents are incomprehensible.

I recommend giving these a pass and getting the unabridged books.

Poor quality sound production distracts from story

Sound production is very poor. Volume is up and down and all over the place.

Left me begging for more unabridged Disc World!

Having driven my wife batty with my random belly laughs while reading Terry Pratchett books, I had some reservations about listening to abridged versions of his Disc World books. Thankfully the BBC managed to have me in stitches again though with some fantastic voice acting. Only real critique is that I wanted more!