Towards the consternation of the patrician, Lord Vetinari, a fresh invention is here in Ankh-Morpork – an excellent clanging monster of the machine that harnesses the power of all of the elements: earth, air, open fire and drinking water. This becoming Ankh-Morpork, it’s quickly drawing astonished crowds, some of whom caught the zeitgeist early and arrive equipped with notepads and very sensible rainwear.

Moist von Lipwig is not a guy who enjoys effort – as master of the POSTOFFICE, the Mint as well as the Royal Standard bank his insight about Raising Vapor: (Discworld book 40) is, obviously, vital . but generally dependent on phrases, which are thankfully not very weighty and don’t always need greasing. However, he does enjoy being alive, which makes a new job offer from Vetinari hard to refuse . . .

Steam is rising over Discworld, powered by Mister Simnel, the man wi’ t’flat cap and sliding guideline who has an interesting agreement with the sine and cosine. Moist will have to grapple with gallons of grease, goblins, a fat controller with a history of throwing employees down the stairs and some extremely furious dwarfs if he’ll stop it all going off the rails . . .