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Ray_Otus
About
- Username
- Ray_Otus
- Joined
- Visits
- 482
- Last Active
- Roles
- Member, Moderator
- Games I like
- Old School Essentials, Troika, Dungeon World
- Books I like
- The Hobbit, Dune, Roadside Picnic, All Creatures Great and Small, Nero Wolfe...
Comments
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Anyone else notice this? “In the generally accepted version of the story both girls are described as entirely normal, but there is evidence that they suffered from learning difficulties. The older of the two had been lame since birth; the younger h…
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COLLAGO Sounds like collagen. Athanasia sounds like anesthesia. VISKER DELOINNE has to be an anagram. Risker (v) Leonine (d)? LOL. Seriously, these names are both great and annoying. I feel like I'm missing inside jokes. Anyway, this one finally t…
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CHEONER What was the point? Stories like this happen all the time in real life. Why put out one that is fictional in an abstract setting where there are no characters to really care about? Did anyone feel a surge of injustice? I didn't. I suspected …
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RE: PURPOSE OF THE LONG READ I sort of "invented" the slow read. My point was to echo the slow food movement. Eating slowly and rally paying attention to the food - the look, the smell, the texture, the first taste and the lingering notes…
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Catching up. • I feel like the names of islands and sometimes of people in this book are anagrams. I keep trying to work them out. Annadac looks a lot like Canada. LOL. And Jaem Aubrec? That has to be an anagram, doesn't it? :) • Tunnel under the …
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(Quote) That's a great observation. Kammeston = incomplete, muddled, and wants to be liked. LOL. Perfect projection.
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(Quote) > I suspect that is definitely a common question among readers after the first chapter. I asked it of myself for sure. It was a lot of prose telling me nothing much that I could hold onto or that felt worth holding onto. (Quote) This. Y…
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Criminy. I'm late to the party. My impressions of the first two chapters. General: this book has a lot of "aboutness" mixed with a lot of intentional abstraction. * I do not in any way find the world described here believable, but neithe…
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It's a pretty fun game. And yeah, it kind of fits the vibe. Not sure if you could literally play the world of Sleep Donation with it, but you could get into the same space. It was a first gen story game (maybe second if you want to get super granula…
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I definitely didn't feel that Sleep Donation was very gameable. But then I don't particularly care for playing "modern" settings. And I have rarely felt that magical realism type fiction works all that well in RPGs. I'm trying to think thr…
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I was commenting to a friend this week that COVID is the ultimate test of selfishness. Masks work such that it matters more what masks the people around you are wearing that the one you wear. They keep you from breathing a fine spray of moisture out…
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On this line of thought, and I realize I'm straying away from the text some. I remember making everyone "read" Horse Mastery - an interactive fiction game in which you are a person raising a "horse" (hint, it's totally not a hors…
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I definitely people who fault this word on its believability are missing the point. Oddly, the more fantastical a world is (say, Star Wars) the less people are likely to complain that it's unrealistic. I guess that is a result of its hitting you ove…
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Nah. You give blood in the US out of goodwill. But they have to beg a lot. I think there are plasma donation centers that will pay you though. I've never been offered $ for my blood anyway. And I do love this question. In some ways it's a Sleep Obl…
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Yeah, surprisingly I didn't find anything to say about that. For me it's a funny little joke on Bilbo that works well every time you read it. I mean, he's been dreaming about his home for the whole book and getting back to it ... and when he gets ba…
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Chapter XIX: The Last Stage Gandalf's Story YES! I was so excited to read this passage the first time I completed The Hobbit! I really wanted to know more about that Necromancer business. “It was in this way that he learned where Gandalf had been…
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XVIII: The Return Journey The Passing of Thorin Yes, he was kind of a dick at times. But he was also a real leader at times and this bit of closure ... it's so great. If it doesn't choke you up a bit when your read it after having been on the long…
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(Same chapter) Bolg Is Awesome “The Goblins are upon you! Bolg of the North is coming, O Dain! whose father you slew in Moria. Behold! the bats are above his army like a sea of locusts. They ride upon wolves and Wargs are in their train!" &q…
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Chapter XVII: The Clouds Burst The Fourteenth Share When Bilbo goes back and fesses up to the Dwarves that he was the one who took the Arkenstone, and that he ... gave. it. away. THAT feels to me like the bravest thing he does in the book; not goi…
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Chapter XV: The Gathering of the Clouds From here on, there are no changes of note from the 1937 to modern editions in this chapter. In fact, there have been very few changes and almost none of note since the Riddling Chapter. Thorin's Goldlust E…
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Yes, I recently saw an article that year old ravens test above dogs in intelligence or some such. Which explains why dogs are great and ravens are a pain in the ass. :)
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“Who else reads books about submarines?” “My dad” I love that commercial.
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Sweet I guess I’m a week ahead for once.
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That’s me being excited about a sub book I reckon.
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Dive dive dive!
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When did you plan to start the discussion? Or have you already?
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Chapter XIV: Fire and Water This chapter is pretty much unchanged in the revised edition. The Thrush and The Moon There are two things I want to comment on in this pivotal passage. “Suddenly out of the dark something fluttered to his shoulder. H…
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Chapter XIII: Not at Home Dwarves and Their Mountain of Gold “The mere fleeting glimpses of treasure which they had caught as they went along had rekindled all the fire of their dwarvish hearts; and when the heart of a dwarf, even the most respect…
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Thanks @WildCard. No huge rush. We have all month. :)
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Thanks @RichardAbbott, I knew someone would come through for me so that I didn't have to make that long walk to the bookshelf! LOL. I'm so lazy. I really appreciate it though and I love that image. In my own naïveté I presumed that the hoard was fr…