Sir Terence David John Pratchett, OBE, more commonly known as Terry Pratchett, was an English novelist, known for his frequently comical work in the fantasy genre. He is best known for his popular and long-running Discworld series of comic fantasy novels. Pratchett's first novel, The Carpet People, was published in 1971, and since his first Discworld novel (The Colour of Magic) was published in 1983, he wrote two books a year on average.

Pratchett was the UK's best-selling author of the 1990s, and had sold more than 55 million books worldwide by December 2007, with translations made into 36 languages. He is currently the second most-read writer in the UK, and seventh most-read non-US author in the US. In 2001, he won the Carnegie Medal for his young adult novel The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents.

Pratchett was knighted for services to literature in the 2009 New Year Honours and received the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement in 2010. In December 2007, Pratchett announced that he had been diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's disease. He later made a substantial public donation to the Alzheimer's Research Trust, filmed three television programmes chronicling his experiences with the condition for the BBC, and became a patron of ARUK.

Pratchett died on 12 March 2015, at the age of 66.