Title:

Diggers

Author:

Terry Pratchett

Category:

Science Fiction / Fantasy

Rating:

Date Reviewed:

May 12, 2024

iggers is the second book in Terry Pratchett's Bromeliad Trilogy. The reader learns that a bromeliad is a large flower in Latin America. These big blossoms trap water. Tiny frogs lay their eggs in the water, when they hatch, the frogs spend their entire life in the flower, unaware that there is a larger world. Clearly Pratchett is indicating that the nomes are just like those frogs - ensconced in the Arnold Bros. department store, they were completely oblivious that an much larger world existed beyond the store walls. (Though it must have occurred to even the densest of nomes that all the humans who disappeared at night must be going somewhere.)

Diggers is the second book in the trilogy, and I think it suffers from "middle book" syndrome. Pratchett is obviously keeping the most exciting part of the tale for the finale. More disappointing, the main hero of the series, Masklin, disappears for almost the entire book. It is his personality and spirit that carried the first book, and his absence is keenly missed. Which means that the main figures of Diggers are Grimma and Dorcas. Because it is Pratchett who composed this book, it isn't dull. Sprinkled within are observations that Pratchett is so found of: "The trouble with having an open mind is that there is always someone coming along determined to put something into it."

The nomes escaped the destruction of the Arnold Bros store at the end of book one, and now reside in an abandoned quarry. Life in the quarry isn't as comfortable as the department store, but they are making a go of it. Masklin often ponders their difficult existence. The magic Thing, a tiny black box with incredible knowledge and insight, has told him that the nomes came from the stars, that they flew here to Earth before disaster stranded them here. Somewhere up in the sky is the nome starship, and Masklin wonders how it might be retrieved and rescue all the nomes. A newspaper article (the nomes have learned to read human text) describes that the grandson of Arnold Bros is going to some distant place called Florida to watch a launch. Masklin resolves to go Florida and find him, though he truly knows nothing about the magnitude of such a journey.

With Masklin off the stage, a rabble rouser named Nisodemus makes convincing speeches reminding the nomes how good they used to have it back in the department store. He blames their current difficult circumstances on their lack of faith in Arnold Bros. If the nomes would just believe in Arnold Bros again, then their previous lives would be restored to them.

Alarmingly, a notice goes up that the abandoned quarry is going to be reopened. The humans are planning to return - the nomes are going to be chased out again. Unless a different solution can be found?

Pratchett has some clever remarks and his words always contain some humor and wit, but I thought Diggers suffered from a weak plot. The nomes and Pratchett are really just waiting for Masklin to return, and that doesn't happen until book three.