Inheritance Spork: Chapter Thirty Two: Black-Shrike-Thorn-Cave

[pangolin20]

Pixen wrote in Antishurtugal, 2012-05-07 19:59:00

CURRENT LOCATION: Syndey, Australia
MOOD: tired

Inheritance Spork: Chapter Thirty Two: Black-Shrike-Thorn-Cave
Sorry this is late! I have been wracking my brains as to how to best rip this chapter to shreds and figured as this is the third Saphira-perspective chapter in the Inheritance series (the first two being in Brisingr) it needed a little intro and explanation. Plus, I actually didn't read Brisingr myself so I was wanting to go through and pick apart all of the dragon-specific vocab which just fails on so many levels - continuity being the most apparent fail.

For a bit of light reading (read: reference material) I've gone through painstakingly and listed all the dragon-specific vocab in a separate text file which I've put on my writing/sporking wikispace site HERE. This I'll probably refer back to at times.

Otherwise, let's get into the chapter!



The cool, moist, morning-air-off-water whistled past Saphira’s head as she dove toward the rat-nest-city half lit by the rising sun. The low rays of light made the smelly-wood-eggshell-buildings stand out in high relief, their western sides black with shadow.

Hoooooo boy. Wanna know how the first Saphira-POV chapter in Brisingr (A Matter of Perspective) starts?

The wind-of-morning-heat-above-flat-land, which was different from the wind-of-morning-heat-above-hills, shifted.

Personally, I think Paolini's just getting lazy now.

Anyway, Saphira's on the move, readying herself to attack. This attack is the distraction Eragon and his party needs in order to escape from the cathedral. Saphira has the Na'vi elf Blodhgarm on her back, in the shape of Eragon.

Wanna know what was said in Brisingr?

They had even insisted that black-blue-wolf-hair-Blödhgarm fly with her in the guise of Eragon, which of course she had refused to allow. It was one thing to permit the elf to place a water-shadow-ghost of Eragon on her back every time she took off from or landed among the Varden, but she was not about to let anyone other than Eragon ride her unless a battle was imminent, and perhaps not even then.


CONTINUITY. IT IS YOUR FRIEND.

So Blodhgarm is yelling things at her but the wind makes it impossible to hear him. So he speaks to her mentally but she cuts him off and lets him know Eragon's in trouble and to pass that message on to Nasuada.

She then bitches to herself about how the Eragon illusion shouldn't be fooling anybody because he doesn't smell like him and doesn't mentally feel like him. Thanks, Paolini, for this bit. It's comforting to know at least that you realise Saphira's sense of smell would be a far more important one to her than to a human.

Saphira calls Dras-Leona a rat-nest-city. She spots Thorn sunning himself upon the southern gate.

Her feelings toward Thorn were too complicated to sum up in a few brief impressions.
Inheritance, ch. 32, p315

Hmm. Pretty sure her feeling toward Thorn aren't all that complicated. In Brisingr she goes so far as to call him stunted-thoughts-red-scales-Thorn. That's a few brief impressions as far as I'm concerned. That since his mind and body were meddled with magically to grow much faster than normal she's decided he's below her.

Every time she thought of him, she became confused and uncertain, something she was unaccustomed to.
Inheritance, ch. 32, p315

Bullshit. Saphira (and Glaedr) have never been confused about what they thought about Thorn. Have a look at the Brisingr reference linked above and I've listed all the different things they refer to him as.

She zones in on the roofs of Dras-Leona.

As the dark chimneys and sharp-edged roofs grew larger, she spread her wings a bit more, feeling the increased strain in her chest, shoulders, and wing muscles as she began to slow their descent... The effort required to stop her fall was immense; for a moment, it felt as if the wind might tear her wings free of their sockets.

As a non-flying creature, I don't know, but hey this just sounds way too dramatic. Pretty sure wings (and instincts to go alongside) are evolved to catch just the right amount of air...? I could never imaging a hawk flaring its wings to slow only to dislocate a shoulder or something. Thing is, Saphira is an adult dragon by now. She should know how to properly fly.

So Saphira, once dropping to a very low height over the city, flies towards the cathedral.

She shifted her tail to maintain balance, then wheeled over the city until she located the black-shrike-thorn-cave where the blood-mad-priests worshipped. Tucking in her wings again, she dropped the last number of feet and, with a thunderous crash, landed on the middle of the cathedral’s roof.

Oh hey, it's the chapter namedrop. Saphira knows the cathedral as the black-shrike-thorn-cave, apparently. Why then does she call it the cathedral not a sentence later?

She grips tightly to the tiles and roars, then flames the bell tower. The bell falls down.

That pleased her, as did the two-legs-round-ears who ran screaming from the area. She was a dragon, after all. It was only right that they should fear her.

One of the two-legs paused by the edge of the square in front of the black-shrike-thorn-cave, and she heard him shout a spell at her, his voice like the squeaking of a frightened mouse. Whatever the spell was, Eragon’s wards shielded her from it—at least she assumed they did, for she noticed no difference in how she felt or in the appearance of the world around her.

THEN WHY EVEN BOTHER TO FUCKING MENTION IT?!

Blodhgarm kills the magician:

She could feel how Blödhgarm grasped hold of the spellcaster’s mind and wrestled the two-legs-round-ears’ thoughts into submission, whereupon Blödhgarm uttered a single word in the ancient-elf-magic-language, and the two-legs-round-ears fell to the ground, blood seeping from his open mouth.

Um... why are these the good guys again?

Then Thorn and Murtagh approach them. Saphira takes the time to mention that he sparkles like a red Edward Cullen (Redward?) but not quite as brightly as her own blue scales since she'd taken the time to groom for the occasion.

She could not imagine going into battle looking anything but her best.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Also, she was the last female of her kind, and she wanted those who saw her to marvel at her appearance and to remember her well, so if dragons were to vanish forevermore, two-legs would continue to speak of them with the proper respect, awe, and wonder.

Alternatively, as the last female, you could just pop some fertile eggs, darl. It'd be paedophilia on your part but at least Thorn's an early bloomer. Unless it's possible to somehow mate with an Eldunari? </sarcasm>

Thorn rises further into the sky and Saphira looks around to make sure Eragon's not near the cathedral.

She did not want to hurt him by accident in the fight that was about to take place. He was a fierce hunter, but he was small and easily squished.

I can't take a book that uses 'squished' all that seriously, honestly. This just completely destroys the tone Paolini's been going for - you know, the whole 'I strive for a lyrical beauty' crap? Squished is not lyrical beauty. As an alternative, I think the very similar 'squashed' could have done.

She was still working to unravel the dark-echoing-painful-memories Eragon had shared with her, but she understood enough of them to know that events had once again proved what she had long believed: that whenever she and her partner-of-heart-and-mind were apart, he ended up in trouble of one form or another. Eragon, she knew, would disagree, but his latest misadventure had done nothing to convince her otherwise, and she felt a perverse satisfaction in having been right.

Er-hem. This has nothing to to do with anything right now. Thorn's in the air already with Murtagh. Stop halting the flow of action or this is going to be the most boring fight scene ever.

SPOILERS!

It is.

Thorn turns around in the sky and dives toward Saphira, breathing fire as he does so.

You know, have a think about this one for a second. If a dragon firebreathing is anything like I imagine, wouldn't Thorn be directly flying into the inferno he's creating? Like at the end of this?

http://youtu.be/KW32gAHpv2E

(Sorry, embedding was disabled for this vid, it's the first Toothless/Hiccup flight scene of HTTYD when Toothless celebrates the flight with his version of firebreath and then flies right into it with Hiccup saying 'Oh come on!')

So anyway Saphira has magical wards around her but doesn't want them to wear off too quickly, so she dodges his attack and snaps back at him. He flames her in retaliation and she closes her inner eyelid (she has two, apparently). Thorn continues trying to get Saphira to take flight again but when she doesn't, he also lands heavily on the cathedral, on the other side; making the stained glass shatter and the building shake. Turns out Thorn's body is actually bigger than Saphira's now because of the magic growth. Saphira isn't intimidated by this though because she's got more experience than him.

Also, Thorn dared not kill her … nor did she think he wanted to.

How on earth is she meant to know that?

Thorn steps forward and Saphira backwards. She's backed up against the spire and so she flames him.

Her task now was to keep Thorn and Murtagh from realizing that it was not Eragon who was sitting on her. To that end, she could either stay far enough away from Thorn that Murtagh would be unable to read the thoughts of the wolf-elf-in-Eragon’s-shape, or she could attack often and ferociously enough that Murtagh would not have the opportunity—which would be difficult, as Murtagh was used to fighting from Thorn’s back even while Thorn turned and twisted through the air.

“Is that the best you can do?” Murtagh shouted with a magically enhanced voice from within the ever-shifting cocoon of fire.

"Is that the most cliched line you can come up with?" I shouted at Paolini.

Saphira stops flaming Thorn and pounces at him. They have a bit of a struggle and Thorn gets bumped off the roof. As they're clinging to each other, so is Saphira. The pair of them hit the ground and Thorn lands on Murtagh (who thankfully is protected with physical wards and doesn't get 'squished'.) Saphira jumps away to avoid getting hit by a spell and kicks Thorn in the process. She takes flight and lands on a house.

The building was too weak to support her, so she took flight again and, just for good measure, set the row of buildings on fire.

Just for good measure, you know. Not like there's going to be anyone IN THOSE HOUSES AT THE TIME!

Saphira lands on the cathedral again and starts ripping the roof apart.

The blood-mad-priests who worshipped within had hurt the partner-of-her-heart-and-mind, had hurt dragon-blood-elf-Arya, young-face-old-mind-Angela, and the werecat Solembum—he of the many names—and they had killed Wyrden. For that, Saphira was determined to destroy the black-shrike-thorn-cave in revenge.

No idea why Saphira's started calling Arya dragon-blood-elf.

She filled the interior with a burst of flame, then hooked her claws into the ends of the brass pipes of the wind organ and pulled them free of the rear wall of the cathedral. They fell clanging and crashing onto the pews below.

As a professional pipe organist, can I just say that I really resent this. I know Paolini's a big atheist and all but what the hell does he have against musical instruments? Sure, pipe organs are mostly found in Christian churches, but really! I'm feeling sad about the destruction of the above organ - and it doesn't even exist!

That being said - does Paolini even know what he's writing any longer? Organs need air - a lot of it. Who's pumping the bellows? Who's playing the thing? Who built it? What instruments came beforehand? Are magic/spells involved? What kind of music is actually played? ("All things black and horrible, all Ra'zac great and small...") I sure hope the Helgrind priests don't require the organist to follow suit in the common way of worship and chop off a finger! (What about organists simply doing it for the money?) Why do I get the feeling none of this would ever occur to Paolini? Why do I get the feeling the only reason an organ is in this chapter because of Rule of Cool?

Thorn roars and takes to the air, where he hovers for a bit.

He appeared as a featureless black silhouette against the wall of flames rising from the houses behind him, save for his translucent wings, which glowed orange and crimson.

The purple prose... it burns us, precious!

Then Thorn attacks with his claws. Saphira dodges at the last second, making Thorn headbutt the cathedral's spire. The top bit falls down. Oh, wait - no, it doesn't just fall down:

The tall-hole-ridden-stone-spike shuddered under the impact, and the very top of it—an ornate golden rod—toppled over and plunged more than four hundred feet to the square below.

Thorn roars again and struggles to right himself. Saphira flies to the other side and swipes at the spire. With her right 'forepaw'.

DRAGONS DON'T HAVE FOREPAWS. THEY DON'T HAVE ANY PAWS WHATSOEVER. I know Paolini has said in the past that he bases Saphira on his cat but really this is just getting ridiculous.

Eventually, after a few more blows, the spire falls right over Thorn, which knocks him down into the interior through the hole Saphira had made earlier and buries him in rubble.

The sound of the spire smashing to pieces echoed across the whole of the rat-nest-city, like a clap of rolling thunder.

No it didn't, because a falling building sounds nothing like a clap of thunder.

Saphira continues destroying the cathedral until it's pretty much all rubble with Thorn still trapped underneath it all.

Saphira crowed with triumph; then she landed on her hind legs next to the mound of debris and proceeded to paint the blocks of stone with the hottest stream of fire she could summon forth. Flames were easy to deflect with magic, but deflecting actual heat required greater effort and energy. By forcing Murtagh to expend even more of his strength to keep Thorn and himself from being cooked alive, as well as whatever energy he was using to avoid being squished, she hoped to deplete his reserves enough that Eragon and the two-legs-pointed-ears might have a chance of defeating him.

1. 'Paint' is completely the wrong word.
2. Stop using squished!
3. I thought this was meant to be a distraction, not a fight to the death. I mean, how else is Saphira meant to 'defeat' them?

Whilst she's breathing fire, Blodhgarm is spellcasting but Saphira doesn't know what he's doing and doesn't really care anyway. Then Thorn bursts out of the rubble VERY DRAMATICALLY and Saphira can see that his wings are crumpled and broken and he is bleeding from a few places.

He glared at her and snarled, his ruby eyes dark with battle rage. For the first time, she had truly angered him, and she could see that he was eager to tear at her flesh and taste her blood.

Again, how does she know this?!

Anyway this gives Saphira satisfaction, rather than trepidation (given that he DID kill Glaedr - a much more experienced and battle hardened dragon than the pair of them) and she watches as Murtagh brings out an orb from his belt. She figures it's a healing orb (guess Saphira's been reading pulp fantasy novels) for Thorn and takes flight again.

She glanced down after a few wing beats and saw him rising toward her at a furious speed, a large-red-sharp-claw-sparrowhawk.

All through Brisingr and Inheritance, dragons have been calling things after bird species. Back in Brisingr, Saphira snaps at a 'sparrow' (not a small-chirpy-feather-bird) and Glaedr calls Thorn little-red-shrike-dragon during their battle (for those curious, a shrike is another name for a butcher bird). In this chapter, here we have black-shrike-thorn-cave. Is 'shrike' meant to indicate there are shrikes actually flying around or did Saphira know of Glaedr's names for Thorn? (of which there are six, for some obscure reason) Why does Saphira call them shrikes, anyway? Why compare a hugeass dragon to a little bird? Why does Saphira care about the differences between birds given that she does at times use 'two-legs' when she refers to every single bipedal species in Alagaesia?

Saphira turns in the air and goes to attack Thorn again when she hears Eragon shout into her mind. She abandons Thorn and aims towards the source of the mental voice. Thorn follows close behind her.

And so the two of them raced toward the thin wall of the rat-nest-city, and the cool morning-air-off-water howled like a wounded wolf in Saphira’s ears.

CHAPTER END. THANK GOD.

35 comments

[1]

Anonymous
May 7 2012, 15:22:25 UTC
Don't miss my upcoming book *Guide to the Cathedrals, Mosques, Synagogues, and Wee Country Baptist Churches of Alagaesia.* It's a must-read.

Anyway . . . how does one become a professional organist? That's quite impressive!


pipedreamno20
May 8 2012, 00:31:58 UTC
A must-read, and probably one far more interesting than 'Eragon's Guide to Alagaesia'!

>>>>>how does one become a professional organist?

How it happened to me was Dad asked me if I'd like lessons in it. I was already doing piano and whatnot, but loved the idea of doing something really different. I started lessons - coincidentally - at a cathedral in Sydney and as luck would have it later on when I was a bit more confident my teacher got a call from someone working close to my home needing an assistant for those much required Sundays off. In 2005 he moved to Orange and I started off as a 'full timer' - 8am service there, 10am service at another church close by, weddings, funerals, etc. Plus as time went on, recitals and other stuff for uni.

[1A1]

torylltales
May 8 2012, 12:59:23 UTC
re. the pipe organs: Because Catholicism. That's why Paolini's cathedral had them. Better people that I have pointed out the many glaring similarities between Helgrind-religion and Catholicism, and how Paolini used the Helgrind priests as a criticism of catholic priests, so I can't go into too much detail. But that's definitely the reason for the pipe organs.

[1A1A]

mage_apprentice
May 8 2012, 14:08:58 UTC
Criticism against Catholicism? Twilight criticized Catholicism more than this. This is just straight up mindless bashing. And doing something because of Rule of Cool.

[2]

mage_apprentice
May 7 2012, 17:15:33 UTC
Don't tease us with How to Train Your Dragon . . .

She filled the interior with a burst of flame, then hooked her claws into the ends of the brass pipes of the wind organ and pulled them free of the rear wall of the cathedral. They fell clanging and crashing onto the pews below.
No appreciation for fine architecture at all . . .

[2A]

pipedreamno20
May 8 2012, 00:32:50 UTC
>>>>>Don't tease us with How to Train Your Dragon . . .

Oops!

>>>>>No appreciation for fine architecture at all . . .

*nodnod*

[3]

likelolwhat
May 7 2012, 19:21:22 UTC
Saphira chapters make my head hurt. All the inconsistencies... and the dashes! Ick.

I'm happy I don't have to cut out precious snarkage for my spork (Chapter 34! *pimps*) anymore. I think I've got it down to a manageable level, comparable to the length of yours. Maybe I'm weird, but I like long chapter sporks. *shrug*

Also, that shout of Eragon's at the end of the chapter? Yeah, it'll open up a whole 'nother can of fail. X(

[3A]

pipedreamno20
May 8 2012, 00:34:32 UTC
I really ranted and used a lot of examples in this chapter, so it really stretched it out. I didn't really realise how long it was until I posted it!

I forget what happens about the shout, so it'll be interesting to 'reread' whilst reading a spork :3

[3A1]

likelolwhat
May 10 2012, 21:19:13 UTC
Hey, long sporks are my favorites. With something like Inheritance, there's just so much to facepalm over. I feel like I'm missing something with short sporks, y'know?

Ooooh, I'll get there, no worries. :D

[4]

feistyfitz
May 7 2012, 19:26:45 UTC
Excellent spork :)

[4A]

pipedreamno20
May 8 2012, 00:34:42 UTC
Thanks! :D

[5]

swankivy
May 7 2012, 20:57:54 UTC
It bothers me that Saphira would identify humans as "round-ears" or whatever. That is such a tiny frigging detail. Just because humans and elves seem to find the shapes of their ears to be significant differences does not mean dragons would even bother to notice. (Especially since it's really inconsistent since sometimes elves are elves while sometimes they are pointed-earseses, and humans are usually round-earseses but it's just silly.) Of course, Paolini has a lot of trouble conceptualizing how non-humans might think. He just slaps a little "music" into elf thoughts to make them non-human in their thoughts, which is silly and makes no sense without context, and he seemed to think he was being clever by suggesting the werecats call regular cats "one-shapes" when, you know, EVERY creature that doesn't shapeshift should seem "one-shape" to them.

[6]

emrlddragon
May 7 2012, 21:19:27 UTC
Alternatively, as the last female, you could just pop some fertile eggs, darl.

See this has always bothered me about Saphira and Glaedr. Yeah, they aren't "destined" for each other, but they could have still produced a few clutches of eggs and given them to the elves/Vardin. Because, you know, they could lose this war and having a couple dozen dragons and riders in reserve might not be a bad idea, you know, just in case.

[6A]

crimsanri
May 7 2012, 23:26:05 UTC
Yeah, Saphira getting together with Thorn/Glaedr could be kind of creepy, but Eragon and Arya certainly don't seem to be too fazed by their age difference...

[6A1]

pipedreamno20
May 8 2012, 00:39:35 UTC
>>>>>Yeah, they aren't "destined" for each other, but they could have still produced a few clutches of eggs and given them to the elves/Vardin.

Exactly. Yes, so it's not the best situation but hey, the future of the entire dragon race is at stake here, and Saphira's the last female. Until (SPOILERS!!!!!!!1eleven) it isn't, and she isn't, but nobody in Alagaesia knows that yet.

[6A2]

emrlddragon
May 8 2012, 22:19:25 UTC
I'm not sure why it's creepy, in nature males want young, fertile females who are most likely to bare strong healthy offspring, and females want older males who have proven they have the strength and brains to survive. Yes, in human terms it is kind of pedophilic, but they aren't human.

[6A2A]

predak123
May 8 2012, 23:17:46 UTC
I think the problem is that Saphira has always come across as a disgruntled, middle-aged shrew and never as a beast relying upon instincts.

[6A2A1]

charlottehywd
May 16 2012, 19:52:17 UTC
Pretty much, this. Even when she was a baby in the first book she was kind of a grumpy, arrogant jerk. Too bad- she was rather sweet before she could talk. ;-)

[6A2B]

crimsanri
May 9 2012, 01:18:07 UTC
That's true. It's been a while since I read the books. I just assumed Paolini gave the age excuse to explain why Saphira couldn't mate with Glaedr back in Eldest.

[7]

Anonymous
May 7 2012, 23:12:11 UTC
Hey, quick question. I'm working on a Wikispaces site, but mine refuses to center the thing, so it fills the width of the screen. I think this looks bad. How did you add the margins?

[7A]

pipedreamno20
May 8 2012, 00:46:25 UTC
Hmmm. Not sure - I'm just going with a default layout so all I have to do is click Edit up top and enter text - WYSIWYG style. That being said, the text menu doesn't have aligning options unless you stick a picture in (in which case you can choose whether it goes left right or center, and how it wraps).

I haven't fiddled at all with the CSS or anything. I haven't even been bothered to add a pretty logo. All I did was jump into:

Manage Wiki > Settings: Look and Feel > Themes and Colours > Flex, then I chose purple instead, then Apply.

[8]

predak123
May 8 2012, 00:14:34 UTC
"All things black and horrible, all Ra'zac great and small..."

I laughed, so hard. XD

[8A]

pipedreamno20
May 8 2012, 00:37:05 UTC
Yay! :D

[8B]

Anonymous
May 9 2012, 05:29:52 UTC
That was hilarious. That line made my evening. :)

[8C]

charlottehywd
May 16 2012, 19:54:01 UTC
I did too.

We ought to come up with a hymnal for this religion! We already seem to have put more thought into this than Paolini did.

[9]

torylltales
May 8 2012, 13:02:36 UTC
CONSISTENCY! *jazz-hands*

[10]

predak123
May 9 2012, 08:50:37 UTC
Also, I wanted to say "props" for making that dragon-dictionary. That shows a huge level of dedication. *double thumbs-up*

[11]

torylltales
May 9 2012, 12:20:12 UTC
Next chapters:

Chapter Thirty Three: Hammer and Helm - barrington42
Chapter Thirty Four: And the Walls Fell - 7th_y
Chapter Thirty Five: By the Banks of Lake Leona - scavokretlaw

[11A]

likelolwhat
May 10 2012, 21:23:57 UTC
Actually, it's "And the Walls Fell...", obnoxious ellipsis and all. I guess it adds to the DRAMAH or something. *shrug*

Yeah, 7th_y let me snag 34 and 39. :)

[12]
Deleted comment

[12A]

pipedreamno20
May 10 2012, 00:22:52 UTC
That's definitely the feeling I got when Paolini decided to make Saphira 'confused' about Thorn. Yeah right.

[13]

Anonymous
May 15 2012, 15:24:33 UTC
Hmm.
As I read these Saphira chapters, a thought occurs; why does she think in these odd, stunted ways at all?

Maybe if she were a wild dragon, or she'd been adopted a little bit after hatching, she might associate things the way 'wild dragons' presumably associate them, in reference to natural phenomena and birds and things of that nature. But she was raised by Eragon. He explicitly taught her things when she was still a whelp, and the vast majority of her world knowledge comes through him and through association with humans. She's been integrated in 'two-foot' society, of one form or another, for her entire life. I'm not saying she would specifically think exactly like a human -- there are too many variables about biology and perception and blah, blah, blah -- but she'd use human terminology. She'd recognize the difference between humans and elves. She'd instinctively refer to things in the human terms she learned about them in.

If there had been another dragon who used bird metaphors to explain what things were, and she'd learned from them? Sure! That would be kind of neat to try and disentangle what she means when she communicates with Eragon. But that's not the case. So why -- why -- WHY -- does Paolini do this?

I imagine he got a little brainstorm, thought 'hey that would be cool! Also the only way I have of making Saphira an individual in any way whatsoever!', and then just didn't think it through from there. Wouldn't be the first time, I guess, but... but still...

[13A]

pipedreamno20
May 17 2012, 07:41:42 UTC
I completely agree with you! It's a hopeless attempt at making her sound less human, I guess - but all we have to do is say, hey guess what? Saphira has NEVER used dashes in her dialogue during Eragon and Eldest, so why should her POV chapters do so? It's a stupid ring-in that breaks all kinds of continuity.

If there had been another dragon who used bird metaphors to explain what things were, and she'd learned from them? Sure! That would be kind of neat to try and disentangle what she means when she communicates with Eragon.

Admittedly, she did learn some things off Glaedr, and he uses 'shrike' as a metaphor too, BUT that's me defending a stupid idea anyway so moot point.

It's so frustrating to me because I love writing non-human characters to really try and stretch my own writing skills (or lack thereof) by making them view and live in their worlds in completely different ways than we would.

I imagine he got a little brainstorm, thought 'hey that would be cool! Also the only way I have of making Saphira an individual in any way whatsoever!', and then just didn't think it through from there. Wouldn't be the first time, I guess, but... but still...

I am of the opinion that if he had insisted on introducing different kinds of winds to start off Saphira's Brisingr POV chapters and THEN LEFT IT AT THERE, it would be awesome. Not something that she would necessarily chat about to Eragon, so he'd avoid the continuity errors in dialogue, and plus give readers the chance to really see that as a dragon, different types of winds and thermals and whatnot would be important to specify (since as Predak said earlier she comes across as a 'disgruntled, middle-aged shrew') But that's where it should have been left. No stupid blue-fur-wolf-Blodgharm or whatever the hell it is. There's no point for a dragon to specify that. It was a great idea that Paolini ran way too far with until it turned ridiculous, and for that I am 'much saddened'.

[14]

charlottehywd
May 16 2012, 19:55:30 UTC
I think I feel more sympathy for the poor organ than for any of the "good guys".

[14A]

pipedreamno20
May 17 2012, 07:46:58 UTC
Yeah, me too. :(

[14A1]

charlottehywd
May 17 2012, 17:28:11 UTC Edited: May 17 2012, 17:29:54 UTC
Especially when you consider how expensive and time consuming it is to make an organ in the first place. Pre-industrial era, doubly so.

Maybe we ought to form a Helgrind organ fan-club! ;-)