GENRE: BIOGRAPHY

I was devastated to read that Book Face, an amazing bookshop at Springfield (A suburb of Ipswich, Qld just down the road aways) had closed —- almost as devastated as I was in 2015 to hear of the final ’embuggerance’ of the irrepressible mind of Terry Pratchett OBE. Having read this artfully written biography, which I bought at Book Face a few months before it closed, I just know that Terry Pratchett and I would have been friends, had our paths crossed, and I felt a sadness to come to the end of this biography last night.

The book follows the shape of Wilkins’s relationship with Pratchett. For those who don’t read fantasy, Pratchett created an absurd setting called ‘Discworld’ which is absolutely jam-packed with parodies and thought experiments on everything from social class and transport policy to the nature of time and death. Discworld, like Middle-earth, Star Trek and Harry Potter, is immersive in a way that tempts people to dress up, draw street maps, tabulate its rules and pretend they live there. The death—Alzheimers— that got Terry Pratchett in the end, was not such a kindly soul as the Death who stalks Pratchett’s Discworld. He is a lonely, bewildered figure, unable to understand why he’s possibly not the ideal person to adopt a little girl, or why people are unsettled by the idea of him dressing up as Santa.

Pratchett heard fellow author, Jilly Cooper, talk about her invaluable Personal Assistant and was filled with staff envy so hired Wilkins as his own assistant. Over the years, the role grew into that of amanuensis and “keeper of the anecdotes”.

As Pratchett needed more and more assistance, his personal assistant became more important to him. To start with, his job was “tidying up” pages covered in clashing layouts and fonts (Pratchett was very font-fickle). Later, the author took to dictating to him. Towards the end, Wilkins had to hold Pratchett’s hand and guide him through his last explorations of the Discworld. Outside family, Wilkins probably knew Pratchett better than anyone else and it is wonderful to have this closeup picture of the writer’s working life, with its arguments and doubts, humour, naps and negotiations.

This is not a hagiography. The Pratchett who emerges can be curmudgeonly, vain, and infuriated and puzzled by the way the world has underestimated him. He’s good at many things – beekeeping, mead-making, gardening, negotiating, pissing people off – but most of all, he seems to have been good at love.