This is a stand-alone novel in the Discworld series, set in a country called Borogravia. In it a teenage girl, Polly, cuts her hair short and joins the army in an attempt to find out what has happened to her elder brother who enlisted the year before. The country is ruled by a Duchess that no one has seen for many years, and who would be extremely old by now. They have been attacking their neighbours and starting wars for as long as people can remember, and now it seems like it is catching up to them.
The main character who goes by Oliver over the course of the book realises that every other member of her troop is also female. She also finds herself pretending to be a boy, pretending to be a girl, pretending to be a boy. She begins to get quite confused and quite comfortable with herself and the ridiculousness of gender roles. This is the most feminist Discworld book, although almost every book in the series has the perspective that people are people regardless of how others choose to categorise them. There is at least one character in this story that if it was written today would be explicitly trans I think, as always they are nuanced and thoughtfully handled.
I didn’t remember much of this book, reading it however many years later I think it might be one of my favourites. I sped through the book much faster than I normally read, captivated to find out what happens next.