While Wyrd Sisters (1988) is famous for introducing Nanny Ogg and Magrat Garlick alongside a soft reboot of Granny Weatherwax, it’s also a book that leans into themes of masculinity, particularly fatherhood, legacy and the question of what makes a good or bad king.

The most significant male characters in the story are all some form of king: King Verence I (deceased), his Macbeth-style murderer and usurper cousin Duke Felmet, and the two young men who will be revealed at various points in the story to be Verence’s rightful and “rightful” heirs to the kingdom, though it is likely that neither of them are his sons. While several scenes show us the POV of these four male characters, this is the Discworld and POV does not a protagonist make. This is called a witch book for a reason. The four kings might be vital to the plot, but this is not their story.