I think Carrot's a waste of space, but the Watch wouldn't 'function' without him so well as he provides most of the boy-scout attitude that make Colon & Nobby (and the rest) work whilst Vimes and Angua do the real work... I think Moist is a closet drip and mummy's boy but if he wasn't so devious then his unfolding series wouldn't have the necessary bite. Vetinari is never the star but if he wasn't there then A-M wouldn't work at all despite the fact that he has the potential to be a bigger bastard than all Terry's 'baddies' rolled into one
Nanny Ogg gives great comedy which supports Granny's ascerbic hostility, Magrat's wet hen-ness and so on, but I would
not want to share a carriage with her for more than 10 mins, nor have her as my mother-in-law (in fact my late mother-in-law did bear a remarkable resemblance in the looks and bed dept so this is not me being silly but based on 'experience' - but that's another story
) but I
do admire her management approach to housework very much. She's funny as a 'stereotype 'mother' witch but she's not my favourite witch character and what's wrong with Tony not liking her so much anyway
Characterisation is a funny old thing and this is why Terry does 'stand-alone' books where seemingly off-central characters go on to great things... The Witches deservedly have their own serial books where the coven (with deputies) have a fairly workable and sensibly hierarchical relationship (based mainly on age/experience I believe...); ditto the Watch (where Carrot is no longer a central character and is now usually relegated to plot steering status); The Wizards presented enormous problems - even Rincewind - until Ridcully showed up, but Terry sorted it and off they went into hyper-drive with the Bursar and Ponder etc etc.
What criteria are we applying here? That best book has to be one of the serial ones? How tedious would a series about the Omnian faith be? Or the Holy Wood? or Music with Rocks in? But in these little jewelled isolated vignettes that Terry gives us occasionally are themes that continue to lace through the other more 'mainstream' books and take a place in the Discworld milieu. So we have the wonderful Lu Tse as Tony points out who's featured in at least 3 books since I think and as a featured character and in other ones as support? And Omism crops up a few times - isn't there a Lance Constable does something with Pampletts in his spare time in the Watch?
So don't diss the stand-alones because they're important and they may not get another 'outing' but they damn well play a crucial role in Terry's modus operandi and add untold texture to the Disc.
And while we're getting in the habit of jumping on throwaway comments what about poobcarrot's? My emphases in blue...
poohbcarrot wrote:"I don't actually like Nanny Ogg. She's too much like some people I know and don't find a bit funny." - Tonyblack
I was trying to be impartial and uncontroversial here, but having a go at Nanny Ogg?!
How about all those right-on, born again, I've-seen-the- light, I'm right and everyone else will go to hell, I'm not going to drive the atheist bus Christians? Surely everyone knows somebody like that, don't they? I don't find those people funny.
I think Small Gods justifies those people's beliefs.
(sorry for any offence to any fundies)
Excuse me? Have we read the same book? The 'right-on, born again, I've-seen-the-light, I'm right and everyone else will go to hell, I'm not going to drive the atheist bus' =
Vorbis not
Brutha I believe?
Vorbis is the one who fits that little brief and the reason for that is because
he doesn't believe at all - he follows it 'just because' and because it happens to be the way that he gets the power. The believer - Brutha - is the one who's just not sure and doesn't recognise the god he really believes in because that god doesn't and never had existed - and so he and Om work out a better way as they go along, influenced by those they meet on the way. Brutha is on the side of common sense and tolerance and show how vile and inhumane Inquisitions and absolutism of any kind is
This book is an anti-dogmatic, anti-bigotism, anti-fundamentalist wonder in the same way as
Jingo is anti-war. It is in fact not funny in any way at all in its subject matter and certainly could not sustain a whole series of 'hilarious' adventures about jihads in general - thanks be to Om...
It's a wonder it's so funny in fact but it is and does work within Terry's genius and that is why I love it and Terry for writing it. I don't blame people for liking WA more - that's up to you and your own personal taste. It was 'hard' for me to choose between these two as they're my favourite books by quite a long way but SG gets my vote as it is so well written and so thought-provoking - WA is as well but for Terry it's not exactly a difficult book for him to write is it ?
And in the same way I don't mind that Tony doesn't think much of Nanny Ogg - or why he thinks that way come to that. Plenty of other people do like her in the same way that I like Lu Tse or Om in his tortoise incarnation...
Now can we get back to the voting please - I want to see who comes out on top in the end!
I'm not getting into that thanks! 
