Keep calm

Calm blood (original title: Carpe Jugulum ) is the twenty-third discworld novel by Terry Pratchett from 1998. It belongs to the witch stories, which is why the Lancresche witch circle are the protagonists. It is up to them to get rid of the modern vampires invited by the king to be baptized .

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Verence, the King of Lancre, wants to cultivate international relations in order to be considered a modern monarch. He invites all possible neighbors to his daughter's baptism, including the Elstyr family, vampires from Überwald . They have already tried out a new, modern feudal concept in their homeland in which people are kept as cattle. They now see the invitation as an opportunity to expand their own domain to include a magnificent kingdom. You are aware that Lancre has an extremely effective protection: the coven of witches. However, the modern vampires see themselves as superior to the witches, since they have the traditional tremendous psychic abilities, but have lost their conditioned weaknesses against garlic and sacred symbols.

With the three witches, however, there is something wrong. Elstyr had the invitation stolen for Grandma Weatherwax , so that she believes she has not been invited. She falls into a crisis of meaning and withdraws into a cave. Nanny Ogg is too good-natured for this kind of vampire and Magrat has given up the job as a witch for the job as queen. So it is up to Agnes Nitt to organize the resistance. Since she has a split personality, namely Agnes and Perdita, the manipulations of the vampires run nowhere with her. Once one personality is hypnotized, the other drifts to the surface. Quite unexpectedly, the Omnian priest Hilbert Himmelwärts also turns out to be uninfluenceable and thus ultimately helpful.

In the first confrontation, Grandma Weatherwax is defeated and bitten by the Elstyrs. They assume that as soon as she wakes up, Grandma will be a vampire herself and thus a loyal vassal. Nanny, Magrat and the baby use the confusion during the fight to flee Lancre with the help of the Igor of the Elstyrs. Because of a storm, however, they have to evade to Überwald and seek refuge in the home castle of the vampires.

With the help of Hilbert Himmelwärts, the severely weakened grandma Wetterwax dragged herself there. The vampires have to find out that it is not grandma who has been infected with vampirism, but, conversely, that the vampires are infected by her. They lose the ability to fly, cannot harm young children, and instead of thirst for blood, they have an irrepressible thirst for tea. Since the count killed Igor's dog, he wakes his old man up again. The old count still adheres to the old rules of the game and is embarrassed by the behavior of his descendants. He teaches his bad brood manners and restores the original condition in Überwald.

expenditure

• Paperback, Goldmann, 2000, ISBN 3-442-41652-3
• Abridged audio book, speaker: Katharina Thalbach

Web links

• Table of contents
• Entry in the German-language DiscWiki