Since defeating a dragon (see Guards! Guards!) the Night Watch has enjoyed extra popularity. To try and combat this, the Patrician tells Vimes that they must represent the ethnic make-up of the city - which leads to the recruitment of Cuddy, Detritus and Angua. Only a few days after they join the Watch, three people are murdered - Mr Hammerhock, a dwarf weapons manufacturer, Lettice Knibbs, a beggar, and Beano, a clown. The Patrician orders the Watch not to investigate, so they do, and find that the Assassins Guild may hold some responsibility. Vimes is almost murdered, and discovers that someone has built a new kind of weapon, a 'gonne', that fires pellets of lead at high velocity. Their aim is to put a king on the throne - and the rightful king turns out to be Corporal Carrot. The same someone kills Edward d'Eath, an assassin, and Lance-Constable Cuddy. The President of the Assassin's Guild is found to be the murderer on the day of Vimes' wedding to Lady Ramkin, the gonne is destroyed, and all the evidence that Carrot is king mysteriously disappears......

But it's a lot more complicated than that, of course.

Men at Arms is my favourite Discworld book, and the first to feature Angua, Detritus and Cuddy. Like all the Discworld books, it's very funny, and for some reason all my favourite scenes (for example, the iron-ball-with-spikes-on bit) are all together. The W jokes are also very good.