Where's My Cow?

Commander Sam Vimes of the City Watch always returns home at 6 o'clock to read his son Young Sam's favorite book, Where's My Cow? This book-within-a-book is a bit like the "That's Not My..." board book series. Sam does all the animal impressions, delighting his son, but the logic of the book begins to annoy him ("If you lose your cow you should report this to the Watch under the Domestic & Farmyard Animals (Lost) Act of 1809..."), so he begins to invent his own stories set in the city where they live instead of the farm ("It goes, 'Haaaak! Gack! Ptui!' It is Coffin' Henry!") This leads to such hilarity that Lady Sybil (Sam's wife and Young Sam's mother) comes to investigate ("You're not getting him over-excited, are you, dear?")

The show more illustrations only ratchet up the uncanny valley effect: hyper-realistic elements for the "real" characters and simple pastel colors and linework for the book-within-a-book flow together without borders; there's a dragon lurking on many pages.

See also: Inside the Slidy Diner show less

There’s a large part of me that feels like I shouldn’t be reviewing this or counting it towards my “read in 2018″ total. After all, it’s a picture book and one I basically “read” on the Mark Reads Youtube channel, so I didn’t even get the full benefit of the illustrations. But I’ve counted the other “first time on Mark Reads” books so in full honesty….

This was a very charming story and a nice bit of metafiction, though I was expecting it to be the story read in Thud! and nothing more. It was fun seeing Vimes and Sybil and the other Discworld characters, and getting another peek into Vimes’ family time was lovely, but I feel like non-Discworld fans would get less enjoyment out of it because the emotional show more connection with the characters isn’t there. I’m honestly not sure if this would be the childhood favourite Where’s My Cow? is in canon.

As for writing quality itself, it’s fun. Very much a children’s book. Not that great of a read-aloud as far as I can tell, or at least, I’ve seen better. The metafictional bits lend themselves nicely to multiple voices and general parental silliness, but they also don’t stretch themselves outside a fairly narrow range. Again, I think this is because it’s written for Disc fans more than it is for kids.

What I’ve seen the pictures look great, though, and intricate enough to entertain fans and parents on rereads as they notice things they missed before.

Warnings: Errant livestock.

5/10 show less

This is to accompany Thud! and in it's own right is a wonderfully funny, almost children's tale as told by Vimes to his child. It starts off as a story about someone who had lost his cow, half way through vimes thinks "why is young Sam's nursery full of farmyard animals anyway? Why are his books full of moo-cows and baa-lambs? He's growing up in a city. He will only seem them on a plate! They go sizzle!
"I can think of a more useful book. A book with streets in it, not fields. A book about the place where he'll grow up."
And then several staple characters show up.
I laughed until I nearly cried.
The illustrations are wonderful and quite apt.

"Where's My Cow" is central to the plot of Thud - it must be read to young Sam every day at six o'clock sharp, because some things are just THAT important. Fun to see the most memorable characters of Ankh-Morpork depicted, as well as Vimes making faces. The message, however, is that if you lost your cow, you probably don't live in Ankh-Morpork, and that if you mistake a sheep for a cow, you do.

I love this cover. The almost lifelike rendition of the cow and the painting like quality of the background...then that little cartoon image in the two corners...brilliant. And the stamp - approved by the librarian of Unseen University. If you've read the discworld books, you'll get it, but you haven't...see there's this series of books. In some of the books there's this University, the Unseen University. It's quite magical, because it houses not only all the wizards and sorcerers in Ankh-Morpork (or almost all of them) keeping them from harming the innocent - and giving them a place to practice their arts, but it also holds all the magical books. Some of the books have to be chained down, or they'll escape. In charge of the library at show more Unseen University is an orangutang. He's very capable - he actually used to be a human, but he's pretty happy as an orangutang, in charge of the library. Those prehensile feet and hands, with the thumbs and all, turned out to be very handy - after all....So - he approves this book.
OOK!
I approve this book also. LOL, doesn't that sound vain? I do though. I've wanted this book for a long time, since it ties in so nicely with the other discworld novels...it's great because it's really three books in one. You'll have to read it to understand what I'm saying...

Commander Vimes, a frequent character of the discworld novels is one of the characters in this book. He's reading a book to his son....and the book he's reading...you get to read that while reading about Vimes reading to his son...see? There's another aspect to this, but at the moment I can't really explain it.

So Commander Vimes is reading this book and he is making all these animal sounds, because it's a book called Where's My Cow? So the book within this book has all these animals and animal sounds and someone is obviously looking for his cow....Vimes is reading this, and making the noises for his son - which his son loves - when he suddenly decides the book is a bit lame, in fact that it has nothing to do with real life. After all they live in a huge city, where all the animals are...cooked.

So he begins changing the book while reading, to something HE can relate to. Criminals. He starts naming the usual suspects that he has to deal with on a daily basis...and they all have some quirk, great names, and the pics - oh man, the pics are great. These aren't your normal tame children's book pics - so beware of this if you plan to read it to your kids or grandkids. They will have to have a good sense of the absurd and humor.

I Loved This Book.

I read it to both of my grandkids, and they know it's Granma's SPECIAL BOOK that they have to have ME bring down for them, so we can read it together. And like Vimes, I love making the animal sounds, and I even try to make the rather gross usual Suspects's sounds. like Hrrumph, etc. The kids laugh and laugh. I laugh and laugh. A good time is had by all. Grandma loves these type of childrens books.

Twisted, snarky, edgy slightly off children's books. show less

This is a clever story about Commander Sam Vimes of the City Watch, a dad who comes home every night at 6:00 to read the book, “Where’s My Cow,” to his son. However, as both he and his son are city-dwellers, and feeling that his son doesn’t need to know about cows or chickens, he one day changes the story to “Who’s My Daddy.” Instead of pointing out chickens and sheep, he describes lowlife after lowlife until his Lady Wife comes in to see what all the ruckus is about. Chagrined, he quickly finishes his story with himself arresting a baddie in the name of the law.

This book, rightly touted as a “Discworld picture books for people of all sizes” is written on two levels at once. The children will enjoy the repetition and show more funny-scary pictures and adults will delight in the mischievous father.

Amazon reviewer E.M. Van Court stated, “Any parent has suffered through the sixtieth reading of a book written on a two year old level, and many of us have succumb to the desire to make those dreadful children's books a little more interesting. Many of us have also been intensely browbeaten by our wives for this. (Informal research indicates that the desire to take liberties with kids' books is a dad thing, hence the gender specific language).”

This is the first Pratchett book I have read, and it leaves me wondering about the world he has created. It’s cute, but as I am not familiar with Discworld , much of it is unfamiliar and I am left wondering what I am missing. For all ages. show less

Though called generally found in the children's picture books, this is actually an illustrated book for adult fans of the Discworld--particularly those familiar with Thud! "Where's My Cow" is the picture book Sam Vimes reads to young Sam in Thud! and Pratchett has, with his usual genius, taken it and given it the ol' Discworld flavor and turned it into a hilarious romp through Ankh-Morpork. Grant's illustrations are wonderful, capturing some of the characters perfectly (Vetinari, in particular) and his fanciful book within a book drawings add a wonderful other-world feel. While not recommended as a children's picture book in general, this is wonderful addition for Discworld fans.