I seem to have a particular fondness for the history monks, because, as with "Small Gods", this is one of my favourite Discworld novels.

It's been a long time since I really laughed out loud while reading a book (which caused some strange looks on the train). But contrary to some previous books where the search for "the perfect joke" pushed the story to the back a bit, here the jokes seem to be there "by coincidence", because the story just went down that route.

The characters are strong and you always want to know more: is Lu-Tze a hack or is he really that good? Will Lady LeJean turn on "her people"? Who is Ronny really?

And of course: will everybody remember rule number one?