SQUIRREL!!

[kippurbird]

Over Hill Land and Mountain pt. 3

We continue now with the running. It reads a bit like an itinerary for seeing the Beor mountains. These mountains are ten miles high, on average. That's about twice as high as Mount Everest. There are mountain peaks even higher than that. The Troposphere is about eleven miles high, on Earth. That's the boundary between us and space. So, if these mountains are ten miles high on average, they're sticking out of the atmosphere, ifEragon's world has any relationship to the "real world" then these mountains are poking out of the atmosphere. I'm not sure if that works or not. I don't think it does... but I'm not completely sure. But ten mile mountains sure sound cool, don't they? Though, now that I'm thinking about it, how do they know they're ten miles high?

*ponders*

The Elves did it? Cause, I mean, the elves do EVERYTHING, don't they? .

I suppose so.

I bet they've got some magic dildos.

What?!

I'm just saying... you know... if they were really inventive.... they've got all the time in the world... surely some elf came up with some interesting things. I wonder what their porn is like.

Why are we discussing this?

Phfffst, I should know? I'm part of your head, remember?

I hate you.

Does that mean you hate yourself? I mean, if I'm part of you...

Shut up.

Oh, fine.

Right. Really Big Mountains.

REEEAAALLLY Big mountains. They're really big. I mean, really really big. And it takes forever for the sun to come out.

And they're RUUUUNING. And they're RUUUUNING. And after a few days they stop to EAT a DEER. And a WOLF shows up which they don't KILL and instead they invite it to DINNNER.

And they're RUUUUNNIIIING.

And the mountains are REEEAAAALLLLY BIG.

And they're in a FOOOOREEESSSTTT.

And there are black SQUUIIIIRREEEELLLLSSS

Quick squirrel tangent. One of the first times I went up to visit Canada we stopped off at a park with these beautiful black squirrels. They were completely unafraid of humans and would come up to people and beg for nuts and food. They would even climb up people to get the proffered treats. One person gave us some nuts to offer them. It was neat having the squirrels take the food from our hands. This one squirrel almost climbed up my brother, but he got scared and dropped the nut. That got me interested in squirrels and I took out a book on squirrels from the library when we got back home. I ended up tracing them and drawing them and then using my new found knowledge for a report. I got an A+ on it. I still have it somewhere.

I really like squirrels.

In fact I used to think I might be part squirrel because of the way I held my hands, which was rather squirrel like. That was before I knew about autism, of course.

And they are RUUUUUNNNNNIIIIING.

And they see a CAAAAVEEEE BEAR and it is SCAAAARRRRRY.

And the the Orc... I mean Urgal leaves because they've spotted little dwarf children playing. And Eragon goes over and says Hi, I'm Eragon the dragon rider. And the kids are all YAYAY DRAGON RIDER!! but in dwarf so he doesn't understand him. And they go off.

The End.

Comments

[the-norseman.livejournal.com]

So did is something like a fantasy version of Sex In the City and a Travelogue? While doing LSD?

[thelittlebudgie.livejournal.com]

Cave Bear? Is this going to turn into an Eragon/Clan of the Cave Bear crossover?

[the-norseman.livejournal.com]

Why do I get mental images of horrible things involving Ayla, Jondalar, Eragon and Arya? I mean Jean M. Auel has a serious case of Laurell K. Hamilton syndrome; both writers are churning out more and more sex scenes. Then you have Paolini's suggestive prose about naked crotches...

Disturbing...

Heck if the Elves don't have dildoes already I'm sure that Ayla will be the one to invent the first magical ... nevermind.

[easol.livejournal.com]

Naked bruised hairless crotches.

And no no no, Ayla couldn't invent the first one! It would have to be our awesome self-insert Stu who did, and Ayla would then swoon with amazement because he's Just That Awesome.

[graycalls.livejournal.com]

Great. Not only did you make me have odd mental pictures on just what form elf porn would take (recorded telepathic self-insertations?), you also linked me to TVTropes. Thanks. I'm just going to go waste 5 hours of my life now. *Tab explosion*

[elementwizard.livejournal.com]

MWAHAHAHAAAAA... my work here is DONE. =D

[graycalls.livejournal.com]

The question is, how did I get to the sex tropes this early? It usually takes me a minimum of 1.5 hours to get there.

[elementwizard.livejournal.com]

The Elves did it.

[subieko.livejournal.com]

That's interesting about the mountains. I think this is a case of Paolini failing to do research. Because, for example, ten miles high didn't sound weird to me until you pointed out the height of Mt. Everest and the height of the troposphere. I didn't know those things, and it wouldn't have occurred to me to check whether ten miles high makes sense, because it didn't sound odd. I think it's because I'm so used to hearing horizontal distances that are many, many times bigger than ten miles. Ten miles sounds small in comparison to, say, the distance across America or something. My dad's car has like 100,000 miles on it or something (we've had it four years). So ten just sounds so...small. Not weird. Except that vertical distances are very different from horizontal distances--as you've pointed out, the highest mountain in the world is shorter than ten miles. But because I'm used to hearing large distances in miles, as a reader I just skimmed over that detail without really noticing or caring about it.

But as an author, Paolini really ought to have checked to make sure his mountains were a reasonable height. However, he, too, probably just thought 'this sounds tall, but not weirdly tall--that's probably fine', without thinking too deeply about it. Really, I think it's better not to mention something like the height of a mountain unless it's relevant to the story. Humans can't really estimate the height of a mountain by eye, so why wouldn't Eragon just think 'they were the tallest mountains he had ever seen; the tops rose above the clouds' or something? Why say ten miles?

This got a little tl;dr, but I think it's an excellent example of a larger problem with Inheritance, and a lot of fantasy writing: authors think a detail will be cool, put it in when it isn't necessary to the story, and since the story doesn't depend on it, don't think too deeply about it. It sounds okay, so readers might not notice, but the author really ought to make sure they aren't saying something ridiculous. I remember I once looked up about how far humans could walk in a day to make sure my characters weren't taking either too much or too little time to get to a certain place. The distance they could walk (I may have used a D&D manual, not sure...but I figured it was at least some kind of reference point) was larger than I would have guessed. I've walked more than two miles in maybe two hours or so, and I'm totally out of shape, so if I had really thought about it, my estimate for how far they could go in a day was way too low. But if I hadn't wanted to make sure it made sense, I probably wouldn't have thought about it. Part of Paolini's problem is that he stays at the 'it sounds right' stage and never bothers to check and make sure his estimate is right. Because what sounds right is sometimes totally wrong.

[kellicat.livejournal.com]

My guess is that it's a misguided effort on his part to make his fantasy world seem more realistic. However, that only works if you know what you're talking about and actually DO THE WORK to calculate a reasonable number. Otherwise, it just backfires and makes the author look like an idiot.

[easol.livejournal.com]

That's true. It wouldn't be a problem if he just described "the mountains rising toward the clouds, their peaks dusted with snow." It's nice and vague, and it gives more of a sense of description and atmosphere than cold hard numbers ever do.

[kippurbird.livejournal.com]

Ten miles high didn't sound weird to me either until he started talking about how you could be in space and stuff and I was all wait, whut?

He wouldn't have so much trouble if he didn't insist on giving numbers to everything.

D&D manuals are really useful for those sorts of things, aren't they? I keep some of them around just for reference. Like for making city populations and things like that.

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

Really, if you want to talk Elven Sex Toys then you really need to talk to sabledrake She did write the book on it.

Myself, I figured Immortality + Low Sex Drive = Need LOTS of Spices. Which is why my half-eleven leatherworking character tends to get quite quite a few interesting commissions over the years...

[torylltales.livejournal.com]

Will this chapter NEVER DIE?!

Seriously, this is the longest and most pointless chaper in the book!

I think he started writng this one with a particular word count in mind, but the actual plot only went for so long. Thence, he needed to pad it out as much as he could, by including chapters like this one.

Also, I always said those mountains were ridiculous. How were they formed? They don't seem to be led up to gradually, they just jut out of the ground like teeth. Bcause someone just lonked them there without considering causes, realism or logic.

[kippurbird.livejournal.com]

The chapter is done. Rejoice!

They are rather silly, aren't they? No foot hills or anything. Just BAM! mountains.

[torylltales.livejournal.com]

ay, gopod. Jut opne chapter closer to Dwarf Ninjas and Reweaving the Fabric of the World (into a pattern more pleasing to him).

[easol.livejournal.com]

And Matrix jumps!

[lemon-m.livejournal.com]

Hey, there are ten-miles+ high mountains. In, like, Jupiter or something. Does this mean that the planet Alagaewhatever exists in is ginormous, or just that Paolini has never watched the Discovery Channel, ever?

[fainimen.livejournal.com]

Both?

[torylltales.livejournal.com]

I want to believe that Alagaesia is actually several miles below sea-level, protected by a series of dams that stop the water flooding in. (That, or global warming {which reduced the temperate forest to arid desert quickly enough for it to be a suprise to the inhabitants} reduced the water level enough that they're all actually sitting on the bottom of the ocean, and the tops of the Beor mountains are -actually- the islands of Hawaii, or something).

[lemon-m.livejournal.com]

That would actually be pretty interesting, specially in a fantasy novel since it sounds very sci-fi, so doing an inversion and having it in a fantasy setting would be pretty bold). But that's really not Paolini's style; he just thinks bigger means cooler, and to hell with logic.

[the-norseman.livejournal.com]

Oddly enough the vastly increased air pressure, from being so far down, would allow for much larger and heavier birds than in our world.

[torylltales.livejournal.com]

But still not quite dragons, huh? I guess Alagaesia isn't Earth after all.

But if it were... Have we had that scene where Saphira and Eragon fly up from the top of the mountains, yet? Technically, they'd have flown into space.

[lemon-m.livejournal.com]

Bigger than a Condor bigger? Awesome.

[authoressarktos.livejournal.com]

Cave Bears?

...

Am I the only one having flashbacks to a certain touchable Spirit Bear? Also, I got caught up on your wonderful sporkings finally! XD