Trailer Tuesday: Nation
After ten years of Discworld, Terry Pratchett (Sir Terence Pratchett) has created a very different world in Nation (2008). Set in n a parallel universe rather like our 19th century South Pacific this is a multi-faceted disaster-survival / coming-of-age story that explores many themes. There is no book trailer as such for this title, so here is Terry Pratchett talking about how Nation came to be (the US cover is featured):
Dig deeper
The author
- Book website
- UK website
- Entry on Contemporary Writers site with bibliography and list of awards and prizes
- Biography (from L-Space web, an excellent Discworld resource)
- Wikipedia entry
- Terry Pratchett on twitter
The text
- Read an extract online (better for glimpsing the maps than reading the text, however)
- Read an extract – Chapter One
- Terry Pratchett reads from Nation (video)
- Terry Pratchett on the writing of Nation
- The US cover
- Nation book discussion wiki
- The Telegraph’s Book of the Month (October 2009) – summary and reading notes
- As part of a UK competition, readers are being asked to make a three-minute film for YouTube. Here, Terry Pratchett shares his favourite piece from the book as inspiration.
- Adaptation for the National Theatre
- Advice on adapations for the theatre from Michael Morpurgo and Philip Pullman
- Wikipedia entry – with an urgent plea from the editors to improve it!
Reviews
- Fiction Focus
- The Guardian
- Times Online
- The Independent
- The New York Times
- Washington Post
- Boing Boing
- SF Signal
- Read Plus
Articles and interviews
- Meeting Mr Pratchett – The Age (15 February 2007) in which he anticipates Nation
- Interview about Nation in School Library Journal (24/8/2009)
- Terry Pratchett and Mark Ravenhill on the stage adaptation Nation (video)
- Mark Ravenhill on why Nation is being adapted for the stage
- An interview with Terry Pratchett about Nation (video)
- Q & A with Terry Pratchett in Publishers Weekly (4/9/2008)
- Terry Pratchett speaks in The Times about living with Alzheimer’s Disease (25/1/2009)
- And in The Independent: Nation – the one that’s just come out – that’s a book for kids. And people will say: ‘Well it covers very adult subjects …’ Yeah, that’s why it’s a book for kids. Because you want kids to grow up to be adults, not just bigger kids.”
Awards
- Boston Globe Horn Book Award 2009 – Fiction and Poetry.
- Terry Pratchett’s acceptance speech for winning the Boston Globe Horn Book Award, Part One and Part Two, read by his US editor Anne Hoppe (videos).
- Shortlist Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize 2009
- Honor Book Michael L. Printz Award 2009 (video acceptance speech here)
- Los Angeles Times Book Award 2008 – Young Adult Fiction
- School Library Journal Best Books of 2008 list
- Kirkus Review Best YA Books 2008 List
- Publishers Weekly Best Books 2008 (Children’s Fiction) List
- Horn Book Fanfare Best Books of 2008 (Fiction)
- Bulletin Blue Ribbon – Best Books of 2008 (The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books)
Read more disaster fiction
- A list from the CMIS database
