Announcing the Great Discworld Read-Along
All of my videos that have performed best have been Discworld videos! Well, apart from my recent video about the Chosen One trope, which actually did unexpectedly well. I mentioned this earlier in a post celebrating my one-year YouTube anniversary, but today I want to talk a little more about that. I’m absolutely ecstatic that Discworld seems to be the topic people most want to engage with me on here on this channel. That means a lot to me because Terry Pratchett has been my favorite author for nearly twenty years now. These videos performing well means that I can grow on this platform just by talking about something I love. Who’d have thought?
On that note, it’s my pleasure to announce my first read-along: The Great Discworld Read-Along! This will be a lot of fun, but I’m going to try to pace it out so that people who don’t have a lot of time to read can remain caught up. Today’s post will be an introduction to the read-along, so get ready to take some notes if you’re interested in participating.
What is the Read-Along?
If you somehow haven’t heard of a Booktube/YouTube read-along before, it’s pretty straightforward! This is the opportunity for us to read through a series as a group. We’ll get to discuss the books over time, and by the end, we’ll all have read through every book in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series. The structure of a read-along is also meant to incentivize reading for those of us who may struggle to make time for such things. Maybe that isn’t helpful for everyone, but it’s absolutely helpful for me!
How Do I Participate?
Participating is easy! You just have to read. I’m going to provide a deadline for finishing the next book in the series, and you just need to finish reading the book before that deadline. Once you’ve finished reading, you’ll be able to participate in discussions about the book. Those can be found on my Twitter and Instagram accounts (both of which are @TLBainter), and then a later discussion will be available in the comments of the related YouTube video. I look forward to chatting about my favorite series of all time with you!j
If you’d like reminders, you can sign up for my newsletter! You'll get periodic reminders about the read-along, including deadlines, the next book, and links to buy that book.
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Scheduling and Structure
There are forty-one books in the Discworld series. That’s a lot! Some are short and some are long, though even the longest one is shy of 150,000 words, so it isn’t too hard to finish a Discworld novel. I’m still going to be generous with how much time I allot for each novel, though. On average, you will have one month to finish each novel in the series. I'll likely allow for two months for the longer ones (anything north of 100,000 words). In addition, I’m going to have my scheduled YouTube breaks in December and July, so you’ll have extra time for reading during those periods, too!
The real question that is likely looming in your mind is where do we start? I released a video a few months back addressing this question and offering different starting points for people who have never read Discworld before. My lowest recommendation is reading chronologically because I don’t personally believe Colour of Magic is the best example of Discworld’s awesomeness. However, that’s exactly how we’re going to be reading Discworld, together: chronological order.
My main reason for doing this is that I’ve never read through the series in chronological order, before. I’ve always read through a collection or just plucked a book at random to start reading. While I know this isn’t the best way for newcomers to dive into the series, I am hopeful that new people to Discworld will stick through the earlier books in the series as we read through this collection together!
Ways to Support the Read-Along
Creating content is a lot more challenging than some people may realize—it can also be expensive. If you’d like to support me as I work through this read-along, there are a couple of easy ways to do it. The first one—and I’m serious—is just subscribing to my YouTube channel, commenting on discussion threads (whether they be on YouTube, Twitter, or Instagram), or liking the discussion videos when they’re posted. For monetary support, I’d love it if you would use my affiliate links to purchase the next Discworld book we’ll be reading! You’re already buying the book anyway, and this will help me get a few cents for my time and effort. It goes a long way!
Of course, you don’t have to do any of that. If you’re just a silent lurker who wants to read through Discworld with a bunch of strangers from a shadowy corner, by all means, feel free to do so! We love a good gloomstalker in this house.
Let’s Read!
So without further ado, it’s my absolute honor to announce that the Great Discworld Readalong is now beginning! We’ll kick things off with the first book in the Discworld series: Terry Pratchett’s The Colour of Magic. You can buy the book through the affiliate link below if you do not already own it. The deadline to finish this first book is October 5th if you want to participate in the pre-video discussion, so mark your calendars! Colour of Magic pretty short—if you’ve got the time, you can probably knock it out over a weekend. On October 5th, I'll put the discussion posts across my social media accounts. Then, on October 12th, I'll release the discussion video on YouTube and provide the deadline for the next book.
Conclusion
There isn’t a way to thank everyone enough for getting me to a point at which I feel like I can do a Discworld Read-Along and get some participation. I’m really looking forward to reading some of my favorite books in the world with a bunch of new folks. I hope that you’ll consider taking part in this read-along, whether you’ve read the books before or have never touched a Terry Pratchett book in your life! I’m sure this will be an awesome experience for all of us.