Reaper Man

First published in May 1991 by Victor Gollancz. It is the eleventh Discworld novel and the second in the Death sub-series.

'Bill' is an archaic word for a type of scythe — Death's traditional tool. 'Door' evokes a threshold between life and death. The name is a quiet joke that Miss Flitworth never unpacks.

As the uncollected life-force of the recently dead accumulates with nowhere to go, it begins animating objects — starting with shopping trolleys that move on their own and breed. This escalates into something far more threatening that the city's wizards must address.

Many readers find it the most moving Discworld novel. The Bill Door sections are written with unusual tenderness; Pratchett depicts Death discovering what it means to value a finite life. The ending is genuinely affecting for readers who have followed Death as a character since Mort.

Recurring Discworld antagonists — cosmic bureaucratic entities who maintain the universe's physical laws and find individual consciousness deeply irritating. They appear in Reaper Man, Soul Music, Hogfather, and Thief of Time.