The diplomatic thing for me to say is that if publishers are dressing up other authors as Terry Pratchett clones then they are doing a disservice to those authors. If they didn't dress them as clones but did something different, then those authors could be pioneering in a different sense.

If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.

The Four Horsemen whose Ride presages the end of the world are known to be Death, War, Famine, and Pestilence. But even less significant events have their own Horsemen. For example, the Four Horsemen of the Common Cold are Sniffles, Chesty, Nostril, and Lack of Tissues; the Four Horsemen whose appearance foreshadows any public holiday are Storm, Gales, Sleet, and Contra-flow.

I am certain no one sets out to be cruel, but our treatment of the elderly ill seems to have no philosophy to it. As a society, we should establish whether we have a policy of life at any cost.

Got to be worth a try, I suppose," said Crowley. "It's not as if I haven't got lots of other work to do, God knows." His forehead creased for a moment, and then he slapped the steering wheel triumphantly. "Ducks!" he shouted. "What?" "That's what water slides off!" Aziraphale took a deep breath. "Just drive the car, please," he said wearily.

The English were notoriously unenthusiastic about burning witches. I suppose ours were too soggy.

Witches were a bit like cats. They didn’t much like one another’s company, but they did like to know where all the other witches were, just in case they needed them.