Monstrous Regiment

A Discworld Novel

By: Terry Pratchett

Narrated by: Katherine Parkinson, Bill Nighy, Peter Serafinowicz

Length: 11 hrs and 26 mins

Publisher's summary

"Wickedly satirical . . . nothing short of brilliant.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review)

The 31st entry in Sir Terry Pratchett’s internationally bestselling Discworld series about the art of war and the brave women who wage it. This new audiobook recording is narrated by Katherine Parkinson (The IT Crowd and Here We Go), with Golden Globe award-winning actor Bill Nighy (Love Actually; Pirates of the Caribbean; Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows) reading the footnotes, and Peter Serafinowicz (Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace) starring as the voice of Death.

War has come to Discworld. The homes and businesses throughout the duchy of Borogravia limp along, doing the best they can without their men, sent to fight their age-old enemy. Polly has taken over the lion’s share of responsibility for the running of her family’s humble inn, The Duchess. Her beloved brother Paul marched off to war almost a year ago, but it has been more than two months since his last letter home, and the news from the front is bad: the fighting has reached the border, supplies are dwindling, and the brave Borogravians are losing precious ground. So the resourceful Polly cuts off her hair and joins the army as a young man named Oliver. As Polly closely guards her secret, she notices that her fellow recruits seem to be guarding secrets of their own.

A novel that explores the inanity of war, the ins and outs of sexual politics, and why often the best man for the job is a woman, Monstrous Regiment is vintage Pratchett in top form.

The Discworld novels can be listened to in any order but Monstrous Regiment is a standalone.

©2003 Terry Pratchett (P)2023 HarperCollins Publishers

Legendary Pratchett

Love the twist and resolution. Also the glaring social commentary. This is Terry through and through.

Disappointing narration

I love this book. It’s one of my favorites, and I recommend it to everyone looking to get a foot into Pratchett. I was so excited to see that this was going to get a fresh recording, but… it just wasn’t very good. I wanted to love this, but I just couldn’t. The voices for each character were distractingly bad and difficult to differentiate, or just… didn’t at all fit for the characters. Such a shame.

Another excellent reproduction!

Great narration, each character was easily distinguishable and colorful. One of my favorites both of Pratchett's Discworld and overall, this book explores gender and identity, politics, pride, war and religion. And all starting with a young girl who disguises herself as a boy to join the failing army of her country in search of her brother along with a troll, a vampire, and a handful of young "men" all joining for their own reasons. I'm so glad Pratchett managed to write so much over his lifetime because his style of writing is unmatched still.

great beyond measure

Loved it all, silly smart and more than the sum of its parts. irreverent and touching but most of all witty.

Fun story but narrator commits a cardinal sin-

Narrator does a good job but frequently sacrifices intelligibility for accents and voices and also varies volume so much that it made listening a chore at times. Also really disliked her take on Vimes' voice. Very dearly missed Stephen Briggs there.

As always, Pratchett tackles social issues without sanctimony and self-righteous bs and with tremendous heart and humor. Very entertaining throughout, especially when it starts to sink in, before the reveal, of who everyone is.

If i had my way, i'd just like the narrator to do a hint of accent and make sure voices and volume never compromised our ability to understand what was said and this would be an amazing experience.

Love the book, but the narration wasn’t good.

Everyone sounds like they have a cold. Didn’t work nearly as well as the prior version.

Great Story, incoherent narration.

There are so many entertaining lines in this story, I wish I had read it. Unfortunately, the narration sounds like incoherent rambling. It is the worst book I have listened to in years but the story was good so I pushed through it. In an effort to do character voices, the narrator forgets that I don’t have the book in front of me to understand what she is saying. Anyway… another good Discworld standalone book.

My favorite audiobook adaptation of this book

In 2020, I borrowed Stephen Briggs' excellent audiobook adaptation of this book from the library, which I enjoyed very much. As good as it was, I enjoy this version even more. This book overflows with lines of dialogue from amazing female characters, and Katherine Parkinson gives a unique voice to each of them. She does a good job voicing the male characters as well. She beautifully portrays the suave vampire Maladict, the protective Sergeant Jack Jackrum, the inexperienced Lieutenant Blouse and our hero, the pragmatic Polly Perks.

I won't spoil the many surprises in this book, but I highly recommend it for fans of thoughtful, side-splitting comedy.

Upon my oath...

As a veteran that happens to be female, this book has always been one of my favorites. Terry Pratchett was one of few fantasy writers who could truly capture the female voice. The narration was lovely.

A Nice Surprise

I really enjoyed this story with the mostly female cast. It was a little crazy but I believe that is just the authors sick sense.
This is my second book by this author and won't be the last.