It's almost impossible to catalogue the sheer number of rock 'n roll references in this particular tour de pratchett - from a leopard that doesn't quite hear properly, to a stone that goes rolling past on a mountainside, to really, really odd mottoes inscribed on the Dean's full-length black leather coat (he's seventy going on seventeen).

Wizard : from the Old wys-ars, lit.: one who, at bottom, is very smart.

It's amazing, really, what rock 'n roll can do to the fabric of reality - not to mention the atrophied brains of Ankh-Morporkians. In a place where adulthood begins at the age of about . . . four, teenage rebellion just doesn't happen, at least until a bunch of seventy-year-old wizards hear the golden strains of Music with Rocks In. It reaches into the brain and flips a switch marked Mid-Life Crisis. And yes, there is a Harley Davidson a la Bat out of Hell. I really wish there weren't. . .

Susan is introduced in this book. She's still a schoolgirl with no idea as to her real antecedents - until the horse shows up, of course. And the Rat. The Death of Rats. And Quoth the Raven. Haha. Oh yes. Her Grandfather has decided to go on the biggest bender in the history of the universe (trying to forget is far more difficult when your memory works in both directions). And her grandfather is Death. Big, bony, glowy blue eyes in white skull sockets, etc etc. Sometimes anthropomopomorphic personifinications are anthro - people. Terry insists that shape determines nature; after a while Death gets some decided foibles. And when you see humankind's atrocities every single millenium of your life, because really it's your thankless task to clean the metaphorical entrails off the rug, it gets to you.

    "Look . . . Albert," said Susan, trying sweet reason in case it worked any better this time round, "maybe there is . . . someone . . . sort of . . . in charge of things, but I'm really no one special . . . I mean . . . "
    "Yeah? How come the horse knows you?"
    "Yes, but I really am just a normal girl---"
    "Normal girls didn't get a My Little Binky set on their third birthday! snapped Albert. "Your dad took it away. The master was very upset about that. He was trying."
    "I mean I'm an ordinary kid!"
    "Listen, ordinary kids get a xylophone. They don't just ask their grandad to take his shirt off!"

A young harpist from Llamedos (the disc equivalent of Wales - read it backwards) comes to the big city to find his niche. What he finds is a vicious Musicians' Guild and a troll and a dwarf with talent but no money, as well as a Kingsian mystical pawn shop on the edge of reality which lets him have a very ugly old guitar. Everyone keeps asking him if he's Elvish but he ends up calling himself Buddy. With the Librarian on keyboards and CMOT Dibbler as their agent, creatures from the Dungeon Dimensions can't be far away. . . And Susan in a fancy black dress taking over as Death while her Grandfather frequents the Mended Drum.