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The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > His third chybut sack swelled - Let's Read The Furlites of Aroriel
 
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Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
Please tell me one of these books explains what the hell shartball is.

* # ¿ Sep 21, 2017 19:29
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# ¿ May 16, 2024 02:25
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Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Samizdata posted:

No, not really. She really seems to be making an effort to worldbuild and establish a coherent, consistent universe.

(Assuming the aliens have 4 digits on each "hand", right?)

For poo poo like that, it would be way more tolerable if the third-person narration used actual, normal units. Imperial or metric, I don't care, but when you're supposed to be able to picture this in your head, sticking with the familiar is better. Go apeshit in your dialogue, that's fine, but unless your omniscient narrator is a character in the book, or there's some kind of well-executed gimmick, it's so much smoother and less ridiculous sounding to write what your readers know.

* # ¿ Sep 22, 2017 14:19
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Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Malachite_Dragon posted:

It was probably a deliberate attempt to preemptively cut off the inevitable "oh so the aliens from another planet just happen to call their measurements feet/meters/whatever too" :jerkbag:ery that always follows attempts at sci-fi. Damned if she did and damned if she didn't.

That's why I was saying I don't have a problem with people going while hog with it in dialogue, but when you're trying to vividly describe something, sticking to a bunch of made up gibberish is like trying to run a marathon on crutches/play shartball with your octapants on

* # ¿ Sep 22, 2017 14:58
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Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Ibblebibble posted:

I've noticed that the author doesn't actually know what base 8 is. In her example a couple of updates back, she doesn't replace 16 with 20 as you'd expect. Instead she replaces 18 with 20.

:psyduck:

Well, yeah. It's got an 8 in it. Can't you read?

* # ¿ Sep 30, 2017 16:33
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Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
Yeah, I was just being sarcastic ugh the author's understanding of the math system she based half the words in the book around, you had it right

* # ¿ Sep 30, 2017 18:14
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# ¿ May 16, 2024 02:25
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Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Pesky Splinter posted:



It is it ever explained why none of the hideous things ever use contractions?

God I hate when authors do that, it's always more off-putting than giving a unique voice to things. The only book I haven't minded it in has been the Longmire mysteries, and that's because it's one character, commented on as being odd, and it actually makes his dialogue feel different because it contrasts with everyone else. They kept it for the TV adaptation and it works the same way there.

* # ¿ Oct 10, 2017 21:33
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The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > His third chybut sack swelled - Let's Read The Furlites of Aroriel