Feet of Clay (novel)

Feet of Clay is the nineteenth Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett, published in 1996. The story follows the members of the City Watch, as they attempt to solve murders apparently committed by a golem, as well as the unusual poisoning of the Patrician, Lord Vetinari.

The title is a figure of speech from Hebrew scripture (see feet of clay) and the script used in the book to represent Morporkian being written by a golem resembles the Hebrew alphabet,^[1] a reference to golems' origins in Jewish mythology.

Plot

A cabal of Ankh-Morpork's guild leaders seek to gradually depose of the Patrician, replace him with Nobby Nobbs as the new king and rule the city through him.

The cabal order Meshugah, a golem newly-made by other golems in the hope he would be a king and leader for them, to fabricate poisoned candles and have them delivered to the palace. But the golems used an oven rather than a proper kiln to bake Meshugah, which leaves him literally "half-baked". He goes mad, its mind overloaded with all the wishes and propositions of the golem community, and starts killing people.

At this point the City Watch steps in trying to solve the murders and Lord Vetinari's poisoning. With the assistance of their new forensics dwarf Cheery Littlebottom, Commander Vimes and Captain Carrot unravel the mystery. Carrot and Dorfl, one of the golems, fight and defeat the golem king at the candlestick factory. Afterwards, Vimes confronts the city's chief herald, a vampire, who instigated the whole affair. Dorfl arrests him despite tenuous evidence and Vimes burns down all the heralds' records of the nobility as a sort of punishment.

In the end, Vetinari has recovered completely, Dorfl is sworn in as a watchman, Vimes gets a pay raise, and the watch house gets a new dart board.

References

External links

• Annotations for Feet of Clay
• Quotes from Feet of Clay
• Synopsis of Feet of Clay