UNSEEN ACADEMICALS by Terry Pratchett

The British love rugby.  To them, that version of "football" can inspire intense fandom, violence, and a mixture of the two.  Terry Pratchettputs a goofy spin on this love in Unseen Academicals, a Discworld novel about politics, athletics, romance, and hapless academics.

In the city of Ankh-Morpork, football is played in the streets to great enthusiasm and violence, with few rules and lots of competition.  This all changes when Lord Vetinari, the city's beloved ruling tyrant, makes the very strong suggestion to Archchancellor Mustrum Ridcully that the wizards of Unseen University form a football team and play against others -- without using any magic -- or risk losing the funding for their nine meals a day.  And the wizards are not accustomed to any sort of physical activity, so their team -- the Unseen Academicals -- needs a lot of help.

The real focus, however, are some low-level workers at the Unseen University.  Trev makes candles for them, but he's the son of a famous football player who died playing -- and Trev promises his mum he'd never play football, despite being great at kicking a can around.  Nutt is a goblin who's well versed on just about everything -- and who harbors a dark secret.  Glenda Sugarbean makes delicious pies, reads romance novels, and watches out for the dim Juliet -- who's caught the romantic interest of Trev and the fashion world of dwarves.  And the four of them try to navigate this world where politics and football seem to be intertwined, dangerous thugs have their own agendas, and everyone in town is ready for the big match.

I liked Unseen Academicals, though I suspect I would have gotten a bigger kick out of it if I were a rugby fan.  There's a nice contrast between the out-of-touch professors of magic, the ever-scheming Vetinati, and the street-level quartet who are the main characters even though they're pretty low when it comes to status and authority.  The big game takes up surprisingly little of the novel, but Terry Pratchett's humorous turns-of-phrase and comic situations make getting there fun.  Unseen Academicals isn't my favorite Pratchett novel, but it is a nice one.

Overall grade: B-
Reviewed by James Lynch