A collection of lost stories from early in Pratchett's career.Commissioned to find episodes of a serial story called "The Quest for the Keys," enterprising Pratchett scholars Pat and Jan Harkin unearthed this cache of early stories, written for newspapers under the pseudonym Patrick Kearns. "How It All Began…" shows a young caveman inventing fire and troubling the older cavemen with his newfangled ways. Father Christmas quits in "Wanted: A Fat, Jolly Man With a Red Woolly Hat" and can't seem to find another job where his talents are appreciated. "The New Father Christmas" decides to " ‘modernize and streamline' the toyshop," which means sacking almost all his employees, including the reindeer. In "Mr. Brown's Holiday Accident," a man drives through what turns out to be the scenery of his life and discovers the scriptwriters and props managers who make things work behind the scenes. As Neil Gaiman writes in his foreword to the volume, these stories are briskly written: "He has a certain amount of space on the newspaper page…and he's going to start, build and finish his story to the word-count." There's not much space for character development or worldbuilding; these short fictions are essentially jokes, setups, and punchlines delivered efficiently, but with glimmers of the Pratchett charm. Several stories set in the fictional town of Blackbury have a genial, tall-tale feel, and the "proto-Discworld" in "The Quest for the Keys" is a true treat.Like any collection of juvenilia, for committed fans only, but there's plenty here for them to enjoy.

The late, great Sir Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) famously had his hard drive crushed by a steamroller after his death to prevent the posthumous publication of any unfinished work. Now, however, “uber-fans” Pat and Jan Harkin have unearthed a treasure trove of Pratchett’s early writing published in the 1970s under the pseudonym Patrick Kearns. The result: a collection of 20 excellent, often laugh-out-loud early works. Pratchett’s fans will be particularly delighted with “The Quest for the Keys,” which contains the first mention of the Discworld series’ Morpork, as well as the set of short stories focusing on Father Christmas leaving a job vacancy—“Wanted: A Fat, Jolly Man with a Red Woolly Hat” and “The New Father Christmas”—which will remind readers of Pratchett’s Hogfather. The collection also includes a touching foreword from Pratchett’s good friend and Good Omens collaborator Neil Gaiman, and a concludng essay from the Harkins explaining their methodology and their discoveries. Pratchett devotees will be moved and gratified by this unexpected gift and even casual readers will be utterly charmed. There isn’t a bad story in the bunch. (Oct.)