Rhianna Pratchett tells fans: ‘I don’t intend on writing more Discworld novels, or giving anyone else permission to do so. They are sacred to dad’

Cover designs for Terry Pratchett's final Discworld novel The Shepherd's Crown revealed Read more

Terry Pratchett’s daughter Rhianna has brought down the curtain on her father’s Discworld novels, declaring that she will not write any more herself, nor give anyone else permission to do so. The comic novels set in a world balanced on the backs of four elephants standing on a giant turtle are “sacred to dad”, she said.

The author, videogame and comics writer told a fan last week that her late father’s forthcoming novel, The Shepherd’s Crown, featuring teenage witch Tiffany Aching, would be the final Discworld book. And asked by a fan if she would be continuing the series herself, she ruled out the possibility.

“No. I’ll work on adaptations, spin-offs, maybe tie-ins, but the books are sacred to dad,” she wrote on Twitter. “That’s it. Discworld is his legacy. I shall make my own.”

She added: “To reiterate – no I don’t intend on writing more Discworld novels, or giving anyone else permission to do so.”

Responding to a Twitter user who praised her decision, saying “bravo @rhipratchett Heartily sick of reboots from lesser writers – no one can replace the original & greatest”, Pratchett tweeted that “the comment about ‘lesser writers’ … seemed rather pointed”, adding: “Although in fairness most writers are lesser compared to dad.”

She later said that Pratchett’s assistant, Rob Wilkins, would also not write any Discworld novels, and that the chance of an “unfinished writings compilation” suggested by a fan was “unlikely, sorry”.

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The Shepherd’s Crown, which will be published on 27 August, is the 41st Discworld novel. The cover shows that it will feature Tiffany and the six-inch fairies the Nac Mac Feegles, but little else is known about the book.

The Long Utopia, the fourth novel in the science fiction series Pratchett co-authored with Stephen Baxter, will be published on 18 June. The final novel in the five-book series was completed by Pratchett, who died in March.

Larry Finlay, the managing director of Pratchett’s publisher Transworld, told the Bookseller: “We are proud to preserve and curate Terry Pratchett’s legacy according to his family’s wishes, and we are thrilled that there is still one more Discworld novel by Terry, The Shepherd’s Crown, to come.”