
A Blink of the Screen
Collected Shorter Fiction
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Narrated by:
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Michael Fenton Stevens
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Stephen Briggs
About this listen
A collection of short fiction from Terry Pratchett, spanning the whole of his writing career from schooldays to Discworld and the present day.
In the four decades since his first book appeared in print, Terry Pratchett has become one of the world's best-selling and best-loved authors. Here for the first time are his short stories and other short-form fiction collected into one volume. A Blink of the Screen charts the course of Pratchett's long writing career: from his schooldays through to his first writing job on the Bucks Free Press and the origins of his debut novel, The Carpet People, and on again to the dizzy mastery of the phenomenally successful Discworld series.
Here are characters both familiar and yet to be discovered; abandoned worlds and others still expanding; and adventure, chickens, death, disco and, actually, some quite disturbing ideas about Christmas, all of it shot through with Terry's inimitable brand of humour. With an introduction by Booker Prize-winning author A.S. Byatt, this is an audiobook to treasure.
©2013 Terry Pratchett (P)2015 Random House AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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- Length: 8 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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- Narrated by: Stephen Briggs
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- Unabridged
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To the thousands of tiny nomes who live under the floorboards of a large department store, there is no outside. Things like day and night, sun and rain are just daft old legends. Then a devastating piece of news shatters their existence: the Store, their whole world, is to be demolished.
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Overall
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Performance
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In the beginning, there was nothing but endless flatness. Then came the Carpet.... Now, the Carpet is home to many different tribes and peoples, and a new story: the story of Fray, sweeping a trail of destruction across the Carpet; the story of power-hungry mouls - and of two Munrung brothers who set out on an adventure to end all adventures when their village is flattened. It's a story that will come to a terrible end if someone doesn't do something about it.
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Inheriting your uncle's supervillain business is more complicated than you might think. Particularly when you discover who's running the place. Charlie's life is going nowhere fast. A divorced substitute teacher living with his cat in a house his siblings want to sell, all he wants is to open a pub downtown, if only the bank will approve his loan. Then his long-lost uncle Jake dies and leaves his supervillain business (complete with island volcano lair) to Charlie. But becoming a supervillain isn't all giant laser death rays and lava pits.
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Volcanic Lairs, Death Rays & Cats… Oh My! 😼
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Terry Pratchett: BBC Radio Drama Collection
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- Original Recording
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
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. Collected together for the 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.
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Get the unabridged audiobooks, instead
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Dragons at Crumbling Castle
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A wonderful collection of short stories by master storyteller Sir Terry Pratchett, featuring dragons, dinosaurs, cavemen and car races! Dragons have invaded Crumbling Castle, and all of King Arthur's knights are either on holiday or visiting their grannies. It's a disaster! Luckily, there's a spare suit of armour and a very small boy called Ralph who's willing to fill it. Together with Fortnight the Friday knight and Fossfiddle the wizard, Ralph sets out to defeat the fearsome fire-breathers.
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Thanks and Farewell
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Only You Can Save Mankind
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- Unabridged
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Overall
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Story
As the mighty alien fleet from the very latest computer game thunders across the computer screen, Johnny prepares to blow them into the usual million pieces. And they send him a message: We surrender. They're not supposed to do that! They're supposed to die. And computer joysticks don't have 'Don't Fire' buttons. But it's only a game... isn't it?
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Another Terry Pratchett delight
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By: Terry Pratchett
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Terry Pratchett: A Life with Footnotes
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- Length: 16 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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At six years old, Terry was told by his headteacher that he would never amount to anything. He spent the rest of his life proving that teacher wrong. At 66, Terry had lived a life full of achievements: becoming one of the UK's best-selling writers, winning the Carnegie Medal and being awarded a knighthood for services to literature. Following his untimely death from Alzheimer's disease, the mantle of completing Terry's memoir was passed to Rob Wilkins, his former assistant, friend and now head of the author's literary estate.
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The honesty of someone who knew and loved him well
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Terry Pratchett in His Own Words
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- Length: 1 hr and 57 mins
- Original Recording
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Sir Terry Pratchett was a much-loved writer who gained international fame for his Discworld fantasy series. In this recording we hear—in his own words—about science-fantasy and comedy writing. He discusses his fans and followers, how he enjoys writing and the importance of the Discworld characters. We hear his thoughts on fame and isolation, his attitude to money and about his reaction to diagnosis with early-onset Alzheimer's disease.
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The most wonderful of men.
- By SEV on 06-13-23
By: Terry Pratchett
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Schrodinger's Cottage
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- Length: 7 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Tinker's Cottage nestles in a forgotten corner of deepest Somerset. It also happens to sit on a weak point in the space time continuum...which is somewhat unfortunate for Ian Faulkener, a graphic novelist from London, who was hoping for some peace and quiet in which to recuperate following a very messy breakdown. It was the cats that first alerted Ian to the fact that something was not quite right with Tinker's Cottage...the cats and, of course, the Pope, disappearing literary agents, mislaid handymen and the insanity of Cherie Blair World.
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I'd listen to a sequel
- By Melisa on 03-28-21
By: David Luddington
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Rogues
- By: Neil Gaiman - contributor, George R. R. Martin - editor, Gillian Flynn - contributor, and others
- Narrated by: Janis Ian, Gwendoline Christie, Roy Dotrice, and others
- Length: 31 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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If you’re a fan of fiction that is more than just black and white, this latest story collection from number-one New York Times best-selling author George R. R. Martin and award-winning editor Gardner Dozois is filled with subtle shades of gray. Twenty-one all-original stories, by an all-star list of contributors, will delight and astonish you in equal measure with their cunning twists and dazzling reversals. And George R. R. Martin himself offers a brand-new A Game of Thrones tale chronicling one of the biggest rogues in the entire history of Ice and Fire.
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A fun way to sample Authors- More Rothfuss Please!
- By gc on 08-31-14
By: Neil Gaiman - contributor, and others
What listeners say about A Blink of the Screen
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- mkwhite30
- 03-22-18
really interesting
being a writer must be really interesting. Seeing how the writing changed and things like pacing which I didn't really know about was really interesting to me. I also like that he repeatedly said short stories are really difficult and I guess for some Riders it just depends on what they can do. just like anything else some things are more difficult for some people than other things. So that was really interesting to learn. it was also very nice to learn that I haven't read everything in Discworld. There's still some things out there that I haven't heard about or read about yet so that's really really nice it's not finished yet for me.
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3 people found this helpful
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- M. Lambert
- 07-24-18
Classic Pratchett
Loved it. Well worth a read. Some is not his best, bit some is wonderful. The classic Pratchett.
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- Master Alan
- 04-08-15
I still miss him
Many enjoyable short pieces and Pratchett's comments on those short pieces. He has a powerful imagination and it is fun to see it bent towards all his creativity.
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2 people found this helpful
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- MGaye
- 04-27-15
Another perfect offering from Sir Pratchett
An fascinating look into the beginnings of Terry Pratchett's writings, meeting Cohen the Barbarian, knobby Knobs, Vimes, Cpl. Carrot and DEATH for the first was a thrill. Will read / listen many times.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Julie
- 08-21-15
I kept busting out laughing.
This would be a great introduction to get someone hooked on Sir Terry. Random bits, some that have evolved into greater works and bits about beloved caracters.
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3 people found this helpful
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- lattetown
- 08-18-15
A nice way to remember Terry, but not his best
This screwball comedy crossed over from disc world to our world with some interesting insights. In the end, it probably for fans who love Terry's other Discworld novels already and want one last stroll down memory lane.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Abigail Williams
- 01-28-22
Sir Terry Pratchett is the best!
Every story is fun and interesting! Terry Pratchett is and was an amazing writer! And the voice acting nails the tone of his stories. I highly recommend
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- DonJon
- 01-03-19
Mostly good stories
The narration was very good.
Most of the stories were very good. Unfortunately the long earth story was very tedious, and took up too much of the audiobook.
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2 people found this helpful
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- D. Pavlou
- 11-27-19
The Best
Always the best and I will never be lonely in my declining years on earth
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- Merna M. Ward
- 05-14-15
A Blink, A Wink, A Nod
I really appreciated this compendium of every short story Terry Pratchett ever wrote, including his very first work at age 13, works perhaps not available anywhere else but in this book.
The reader did an excellent job.
I liked listening to this so much I bought the book in print as a birthday present for my grandson who is 13.
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6 people found this helpful