You will be as disappointed as I am that just putting very interesting and amazing stuff in the surroundings of a story doesn’t always persuade characters to take advantage.\u00a0 Things you will not be seeing in the book, despite my earnest endeavors and a lot of research and backstory work:\u00a0 a mammoth hunt, harnessing caribou\/reindeer for transportation of anything,\u00a0 Irish elk shaking those tremendous antlers, or the terrifying attack of a pack of dire wolves.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Sorry.\u00a0\u00a0 Blame the characters, not me.\u00a0 They kept looking back at me saying “Are you CRAZY?\u00a0 I’M not going out there with that thing.\u00a0\u00a0 Never seen anything like it; don’t know what it is or how fast it can go, but I can see it has TEETH.\u00a0 Big ones.\u00a0 And I don’t think this peashooter will deal with it.”<\/p>\n
Yes, but…it would be exciting and interesting to see how you postmodern spacefaring characters deal with creatures of legend, I said, framing it as a great adventure within an adventure.\u00a0 I continued in that line for awhile, and pretty soon the whole cast were standing around me like actors around a director who had just suggested dousing them all in a mysterious liquid and then throwing matches to see if it would burn.\u00a0\u00a0 Eyes rolled.\u00a0 Feet tapped.\u00a0 Their gazes went from incredulous to steely determination.\u00a0\u00a0 Ky, my reliable lightning rod character, adventurer, and so on, said “No.”\u00a0 But–\u00a0 “No.\u00a0 How I deal with things like that is by not doing something stupid.”\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 You’ve done stupid things before, I muttered.\u00a0 “Not that stupid.\u00a0 Enemies with space torpedoes, giant lasers, explosive mines, sure.\u00a0 Hand to hand in spacesuits, not the smartest thing I ever did, but it saved my people.\u00a0\u00a0 These things: no. ”\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 But it’s MY BOOK, I argued.\u00a0 “Fine.\u00a0 Get another cast.\u00a0 Get a cast of idiots.\u00a0 We.\u00a0 Are. Not. Doing. That.”\u00a0\u00a0 Grace added the postscript.\u00a0\u00a0 “It would be stupid, and we are not stupid people.\u00a0 You gave us brains; you can’t make us do stupid.”\u00a0 Then they all turned their backs on me.<\/p>\n
I looked over at the reserves, the lovely creatures waiting their turn to hold center stage.\u00a0\u00a0 The woolly mammoths shook their great heads at me, slowly, sadly, and lumbered around, letting their trunks draw lines in the snow as they trundled away.\u00a0\u00a0 The Irish elk made an un-elklike sound of disgust, stamped a hoof down hard and stalked off looking incensed.\u00a0 The caribou snorted and then took off at their slightly humorous high stepping gait.\u00a0 The dire wolves ran out their tongues\u00a0 and grinned, all those teeth showing.\u00a0 Then the alpha raised a leg and marked\u00a0 the spot, and trotted off.\u00a0 They all did.\u00a0\u00a0 The small things disappeared into the snow and the foxes (who had kept a careful distance from the dire wolves fled in the opposite direction.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The bears weren’t there, but they were hibernating.<\/p>\n
Another book, I thought.\u00a0 There would have to be another book.\u00a0 But these won’t be in it, because…well…they just won’t.\u00a0\u00a0 As they disappeared into a convenient fall of snow (the writer has to have some excuse to quit fighting the inevitable)\u00a0 other ideas appeared.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
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