Some of the people you believe are dead are actually alive, but no matter how hard they try to get other people to notice them, their actions are immediately forgotten and any changes caused by those actions are rationalized away.
This seems to be one of the many examples of cross-fertilization between Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, since this is a major aspect of Gaiman’s “Neverwhere”.
There’s a character in Worm that has this power. People don’t think of her as dead, but her power allows her to be immediately forgotten, and exude a SEP field while it’s active. Some people are immune to it, but it’s kinda awesome.
There’s a semi-famous short story “Nobody Bothers Gus” by Algis Budrys that runs on this premise. The main character of the old Piers Anthony novel Mute also makes people forget him as soon as they leave his presence.
It was actually an occasional fantasy of mine to be able to switch to such a state and then figure out how much fun I could have. The ultimate freedom—have your meals by stealing a king’s plate, enjoy sports matches from the middle of the field, go listen to what they really talk about in the UN backroom deals, slap [insert disliked celebrity] ten times a day, joyride a fighter jet...
Fabulous story idea.
Actually, it was used in Terry Pratchett’s ``Mort″.
This seems to be one of the many examples of cross-fertilization between Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, since this is a major aspect of Gaiman’s “Neverwhere”.
There’s a character in Worm that has this power. People don’t think of her as dead, but her power allows her to be immediately forgotten, and exude a SEP field while it’s active. Some people are immune to it, but it’s kinda awesome.
I was going to write something about a certain character from Luminosity, but it’s not important.
What’s that?
Never mind, it doesn’t matter.
I know who you meant, man, I was setting up an Airplane! joke...
Yeah, OK. Sorry, I’ve never seen Airplane!.
Now I am going to stop chattering about unimportant nonsense and go off and do something actually interesting.
Magical unnoticeabilty is common in fantasy. Allirea’s power in Alicorn’s Radiance is very similar to Imp’s.
There’s a semi-famous short story “Nobody Bothers Gus” by Algis Budrys that runs on this premise. The main character of the old Piers Anthony novel Mute also makes people forget him as soon as they leave his presence.
It is a power of the witches in Lyra’s world in Philip Pullman’s “His Dark Materials”.
It was actually an occasional fantasy of mine to be able to switch to such a state and then figure out how much fun I could have. The ultimate freedom—have your meals by stealing a king’s plate, enjoy sports matches from the middle of the field, go listen to what they really talk about in the UN backroom deals, slap [insert disliked celebrity] ten times a day, joyride a fighter jet...