#178 in Children’s books
Only You Can Save Mankind
- 221
- Pages
- about 4 h
- Reading time
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Our view
“Only You Can Save Mankind” is a thoughtful children’s novel that treats war with a light hand. When the aliens in Johnny Maxwell’s computer game surrender, he sets out to get them safely home, and the book takes a hard look at real conflict along the way. Some readers find its gaming talk dated, and others rank it below Terry Pratchett’s later stand-alone novels. It suits readers around the hero’s age of twelve.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
Only You Can Save Mankind (1992) is the first novel in the Johnny Maxwell trilogy of children's books and fifth young adult novel by Terry Pratchett, author of the Discworld sequence of books. The following novels in the Johnny Maxwell Trilogy are Johnny and the Dead (1993) and Johnny and the Bomb (1996). The setting of the novels in the modern world was a departure for Pratchett, who wrote more regularly in fantasy world settings.
Reading order · Johnny Maxwell trilogy
Full order & progress →- Only You Can Save MankindThis book
7.57.5 / 10 - Johnny and the Dead
7.87.8 / 10 - Johnny and the Bomb
7.67.6 / 10
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.1 across 101 ratings — not yet many, so the reader vote carries 41% of the weight and the rest pulls toward the Children’s books average of 7.9. That is how 7.5 comes out.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 6.9 | 9 | 9% |
| Hardcover | 7.2 | 92 | 91% |
Frequently asked
What age is Only You Can Save Mankind for?
Only You Can Save Mankind sits on the Children shelf in the sources we use, which by convention means roughly ages 5–10. This is a guide from the book’s category, not a publisher’s age rating. It has 221 pages — shorter than 91% of the ranked books in Children’s books.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
Same shelf — Children’s books — with scores between 7.5 and 8.1, closest to this book.
