Eric by Terry Pratchett

Eric is a young demonology hacker who has discovered the spell he needs to summon a demon to fulfil his worldly desires. Unfortunately, due to a bit of a cock-up on the reality front, he summons the ostensible wizard Rincewind (who was banished to hell during the events of Sourcery). The always-reluctant Rincewind finds himself accompanying Eric on a prolonged road trip through time and space as he attempts to get back home.

Eric is a bit of an oddball Discworld novel, even by the series' elastic standards of tone, character and format. It's the shortest Discworld book of them all (barely cracking 150 pages) and feels almost bemusingly lightweight. After the previous several Discworld books featured much-improved and deeper characterisation and exploration of ideas, Eric is a bit of a throwback to the first couple of books by being more of a knockabout, travelogue adventure.

The explanation is that Eric isn't really a mainline Discworld novel, instead starting life as an illustrated side-project. The success of the Discworld novels in the UK was at least partially attributed to Josh Kirby's eye-catching cover art, which made up for in enthusiasm what it lacked in accuracy (such as Twoflower being depicted with literally four eyes rather than wearing glasses). Eric was conceived as a vehicle for Kirby's illustrations. However, the original, illustrated version of Eric fell out of print for many years, and it's the illustration-less version of the novel which has been most commonly encountered by readers. Fortunately, a new edition of the illustrated version of the book was issued a few years ago and is still commonly available.

Eric is a lightweight and disposable tale, though Discworld fans will enjoy it resolving Rincewind's cliffhanger fate from Sourcery and the mild worldbuilding work it does with setting up new locations (the Tezuman Empire). But there is a slight feeling of redundancy here. The Luggage rushes around and eats more people, the wizards of Unseen University fret futilely, Rincewind runs away from trouble, and the Tsortean-Ephebian War and its multiple not-Trojan horses which formed part of the subplot of Pyramids is here revisited without much effect. Eric feels distinctly half-assed in the writing stakes for a fair bit of its length.

Kirby's artwork is colourful and fun, and helps flesh out the relative sparseness of the narrative. Kirby's artwork is something of an acquired taste, though, much more stylised than it is accurate, and the continued rendition of Rincewind as an decrepit old man despite The Light Fantastic suggested he was only 32 years old (at the time of that book) remains odd. But it certainly makes the book work better than the unillustrated edition.

Eric (***) is a brief, mildly diverting tale which is a more successful showcase for the late Josh Kirby's artwork than it is for Pratchett's full writing powers. It is available now in the UK and USA.

I previously reviewed the unillustrated edition here.

Eric by Terry Pratchett

Eric is a demonology hacker who is trying to summon a demon to answer his worldly desires. Unfortunately, due to a slight malfunction, the demon he summons turns out to be a wizard called Rincewind. To Rincewind's own bemusement, he ends up helping Eric achieve his goals, but wasn't reckoning on the side-trips to a remote jungle kingdom, the greatest war in history, the dawn of time and hell...


Eric is a bit of an oddball Discworld novel. Although listed as the ninth book in the overall series, it's not published by Corgi but by Gollancz instead, with a different cover design as well. It's also the shortest book in the series by far, coming in at 150 pages. The explanation is rather straightforward: it was originally a large-format illustrated book written by Pratchett primarily as a vehicle for the late Josh Kirby's artwork. As a result the story had to be streamlined and more of a travelogue of various locations rather than having a deep and complex narrative. In fact, it's reminiscent of the later book, The Last Hero, with the difference that Last Hero has been kept in print as an illustrated book rather than becoming a 'proper' novel.

Shorn of its illustrations, Eric is a rather simplistic and lightweight tale. It does some good stuff, like resolving Rincewind's cliffhanger ending from Sourcery (although leaving him on another one here), and there are a few good laughs, but it's all rather shallow, to be honest. Pratchett's depiction of Hell here seems to be at odds with the rest of the Discworld multiverse and although it becoming a bureaucratic, middle-manager's paradise is a funny idea, he doesn't really have the space or time to go into it in much depth. Essentially the book is an excuse for a bunch of obvious gags and filling in a few more locations on the Discworld not previously seen.


For all that, it raises the odd smile and, more interestingly, I have been informed by Gollancz that they are planning to reprint the fully-illustrated edition in the future, which should be worth checking out.

For now, Eric (***) is a very fast, briefly entertaining diversion from the main Discworld sequence. It is available now in the UK and USA.