Terry Pratchett dies after long illness, aged 66

Terry Pratchett, author of the Discworld comic fantasy series of novels, died on Thursday aged 66.

Pratchett's publisher, Transworld, announced the news "with immeasurable sadness". Managing director Larry Finlay said that "the world has lost one of its brightest, sharpest minds".

The author of more than 70 books died at his home “with his cat sleeping on his bed, surrounded by his family”, earlier on Thursday.

Pratchett, who had early onset Alzheimer’s, is survived by his wife, Lyn, and their daughter Rhianna.

He had, said Mr Finlay, “enriched the planet like few before him”.

He added: "All who read him know Discworld was his vehicle to satirise this world: he did so brilliantly, with great skill, enormous humour and constant invention."

“Terry faced his Alzheimer’s disease – an ‘embuggerance’, as he called it – publicly and bravely. Over the last few years, it was his writing that sustained him. His legacy will endure for decades to come.”

Pratchett's official Twitter account carried the news with a reference to the Discworld novels: "AT LAST, SIR TERRY, WE MUST WALK TOGETHER."

In 2007, Pratchett was diagnosed with PCA (posterior cortical atrophy), a progressive, degenerative condition involving the loss and dysfunction of brain cells. He spoke openly about his condition and campaigned for greater awareness, battling it “with his trademark determination and creativity”, said Mr Finlay.

He continued to write and completed his last book, a new Discworld novel, last summer before succumbing to the final stages of the disease.

85m books sold

Pratchett was the UK’s bestselling author in the 1990s and sold more than 85 million books worldwide.

He was knighted for services to literature in the 2009 new year’s honours. He received the World Fantasy award for life achievement in 2010. In 1996, he was both the top-selling and highest-earning author.

In 2010, Pratchett joined the staff of Trinity College Dublin as an adjunct professor in the School of English.

He made a substantial public donation to the Alzheimer’s Research Trust and filmed a BBC television programme chronicling his experiences with the disease.

Four years ago he featured in a documentary about suicide, in which he followed a man with motor neurone disease to the Dignitas clinic in Switzerland.

Asked why he wanted to make the film, Pratchett said he was appalled at the state of the law.

“The government here has always turned its back on it and I was ashamed that British people had to drag themselves to Switzerland, at considerable cost, in order to get the services that they were hoping for.”

After his diagnosis, Pratchett urged people to “keep things cheerful”, adding: “We are taking it fairly philosophically down here” and predicting he had time for “at least a few more books yet”.

Born in Beaconsfield in Buckinghamshire, Pratchett published his first short story at the age of 13, and later began work as a journalist for the Bucks Free Press newspaper. In 1983 he became a press officer for the Central Electricity Generation Board.

Pratchett's first novel, The Carpet People, was published in 1971. His first Discworld novel, The Colour of Magic, was published in 1983.

– (Guardian service)