Lean and Mean: Vorbis is tall, lean and ascetic, in contrast to the good-hearted and fleshy Brutha. Jerkass Gods: Again, all of them. Things like mercy, fairness and justice are too human for most of them to get their heads around, and that's the smarter ones. Ones like the Sea Goddess will kill anyone who's nearby, just because they're in a bad mood. Several characters throughout the book, when they're killed and find themselves in the spectral desert of the afterlife which they must journey through, ask Death "what awaits at the end of the desert?", to which Death replies Judgement. At the end, there's a twist when Brutha does the same, considers for a moment, then asks: "Which end?"

Photographic Memory: Brutha, to the point that he has No Infantile Amnesia. He remembers everything ever since, to the extent that he can copy out books he's only seen once despite not being able to read them himself. He doesn't forget a thing until he's about to die, 100 years later the main plot.Chekhov's Gun: One chapter has Urn casting metal for the Moving turtle and commenting "S’not ’n important cast anyway, ... Jus’ the control levers." Later on, the Moving Turtle fails when the lever to start it breaks. It’s a popular fact that 90 percent of the brain is not used and, like most popular facts, it is wrong. . . . It is used. One of its functions is to make the miraculous seem ordinary, to turn the unusual into the usual. Otherwise, human beings, faced with the daily wondrousness of everything, would go around wearing a stupid grin, saying “Wow,” a lot. Part of the brain exists to stop this from happening.”

Not Quite the Almighty: A major trope for the work given that Brutha has long conversations with the monotheistic god of his god within a world that is explicitly polytheistic while also being a major example of Gods Need Prayer Badly. Coming to terms with this trope is a central part of Om and Brutha's character arcs. Sturgeon's Law: Om says that ninety-nine percent of the Ephebian philosophers' ideas are useless but they are tolerated because that last one percent is a "humdinger". Saying Too Much: Initially, Om keeps reining himself in during conversation with Brutha, since he doesn't want to give away some of the major details about his chenolialism. Evil Overlord: Subverted: The ruler of Ephebe is called the "Tyrant"... because, as with the original definition of the word, he didn't inherit his title. Rather, he was democratically elected.

Synopsis

The Great God Om tries to manifest himself once more in the world, as the time of his Eighth Prophet is nigh. He is surprised, however, when he finds himself in the body of a tortoise, stripped of his divine powers, except for the ability to singe eyebrows with tiny thunderbolts. Om had met a small god who had memories of prior greatness, but couldn't even remember its own name now that the worshippers were all gone. The temple may well have been to that same god. The Easy Way or the Hard Way: At the end of the book, Brutha tells Sergeant Simony to stop the Exquisition the hard way—that is, with as few casualties as possible. The people who really run organizations are usually found several levels down, where it is still possible to get things done.”

Lu Tze, one of the Monks of History, who decides to improve Omnian history so it is less bloody. He spends time working in the gardens of the Omnian Temple observing Brutha while sweeping and keeping the soil beds. He may have arranged the compost heap for Om to fall on, thus allowing him to survive.

Contains examples of:

Culture Police: One of the many duties of the Exquisition, because so many things are outlawed in Omnia. Books, for example.

Spectacular inventiveness make the Discworld series one of the perennial joys of modern fiction Mail on SundayA few Ephebian philosophers mention that it's not a good idea to start pondering whether the gods exist or not, because the poor bugger who does gets hit with one that has a note tied to it saying "yes, we do". Tank Goodness: Urn invents what is possibly the Disc's first one in the Moving Turtle, though see also Eric. That on the whole, and by and large, if a man lived properly, not according to what any priests said, but according to what seemed decent and honest inside, then it would, at the end, more or less, turn out all right.”