Final Terry Pratchett stories to be published in September

Many stories in The Time-travelling Caveman – written by Pratchett when he was a journalist in the 60s and 70s – have never been published in a book

• Scroll down to read one of the short stories

The final collection of early stories from the late Terry Pratchett, written while the Discworld creator was a young reporter, will be published in September. The tales in The Time-travelling Caveman, many of them never released in book form before, range from a steam-powered rocket’s flight to Mars to a Welsh shepherd’s discovery of the resting place of King Arthur. “Bedwyr was the handsomest of all the shepherds, and his dog, Bedwetter, the finest sheepdog in all Wales,” writes the young Pratchett, with typical flourish. The stories appeared in the Bucks Free Press and Western Daily Press in the 60s and early 70s.

Pratchett left school at 17, in 1965, to work at the Bucks Free Press, writing a weekly Children’s Circle story column as part of his new job. He published his first novel, The Carpet People, in 1971, when he was only 23. Editions of the newspapers containing the stories sell for hundreds of pounds online. Dragons at Crumbling Castle, a first collection of the stories, was published in 2014.

Related: The art of Terry Pratchett's Discworld – in pictures

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