Terry Pratchett shuffles off this mortal coil.

Link.

The reports say he died of natural causes, but at only 66? This is a sad day indeed.

He was a great man and a great author; but I'm glad he was spared the indignity of slowly turning into a pathetic parody of himself.

As you probably know, Pratchett was afflicted with Alzheimer's disease, which he had famously called "the embuggerance" and in July 2014 his condition prevented him, from the first time, to go attend conventions. He also lobbied for assisted suicide, even creating a short movie about it.

It was surreal... I was checking on Fallen London at work and saw the devs trying to hack in a tribute and fucking up the code pretty badly. I didn't know what was going on and didn't realize it was a tribute until they managed to untangle the HTML and then it hit me. I'm very sad that he's gone but like Gez I suppose he's been spared a much worse fate, something I wouldn't really understand until after seeing my grandfather at Alzheimer's ultimate end. Terry Pratchett was one of the authors that inspired me to choose writing in college, and while that isn't what I ended up doing after graduating, if I ever sat down and finally hammered something out, I could only hope to have an ounce of his skills in writing dialogue, characters, plot, or pretty much anything that goes into crafting a story. I will miss him.

Oh such a shame, I hope he died painlessly. RIP

He was a massive influence on me as young sperg. He will be missed.

WE MEET AT LAST, SIR TERENCE. I DO BELIEVE YOU AND I HAVE MUCH TO DISCUSS.