SOURCE: Barsanti, Chris. “Terry Pratchett's Flat-Out Success.” Book (November-December 2002): 26.

In the following review of Night Watch, Barsanti compares Pratchett's writing style to that of British humorist G. K. Chesterton.

It shouldn't come as any real surprise who England's bestselling author is: J. K. Rowling. But unless you're either British or a fairly serious devotee of science fiction, you're probably not all that familiar with Number Two. His name is Terry Pratchett, he has dozens of books in print, and the foundation of his fan base goes just a bit deeper than Rowling's does. (The BBC recently determined, for example, that he was the bestselling English author of the 1990s.) And A. S. Byatt, the author of Possession and one of Pratchett's more ardent fans, has been quoted as saying that Pratchett is more important than either Rowling or Philip Pullman, the UK's other big-time fantasy writer.

Pratchett is...