Earth's Children Series

[dwanollah]

OMG SCORE!! Thank you! It's... kinda sad how excited I am by this, you know.

[Karen]

Jan 27, 2011 19:45:31 GMT -4 wprock said:

I'm almost halfway through and NOTHING has happened so far. She repeats and repeats and repeats. It's crap we already know, not just repeating from previous novels to remind us, but, literally, she mentioned this several pages ago, oh, here, let me tell you again, this tree is good for blah blah blah, these people like to live in groups because whatever.

That sounds unfortunate, but after the last book it's not surprising.

The news about the sixth book inspired me to do a reread (kinda like the Wheel of Time series, even if it sucks now I still want to find out the official word on what happens to the characters). The writing in the first book could have used an editor in places to make the sentences flow better, but it told a compelling story and all the archaeological information was presented in an interesting enough way. In the second book, I would actually have been happy to have it be all about Ayla in the valley with no other human characters. But the brothers screwing their way through various tribes was annoying as hell - and goodness, Jondalar has one active forehead. It feels like there's not a chapter in which it doesn't knot or furrow or whatever. The third book had the hideous love triangle, but it improved on the second by presenting one tribe in detail. Though Ayla had become a Mary Sue, she still had to deal with some actual conflict and those who opposed her weren't totally demonised. However, the fourth book went downhill by returning to the second book's travel structure and brief visits to meaningless tribes, this time with Ayla's Sueness added to Jondalar's Stueness. And the fifth book, ugh. Absolutely no trace left of the storytelling ability Auel had in the first book, when she made it interesting enough that it was possible to not mind the simple prose and Ayla's skill at just about everything.

In Clan of the Cave Bear Ayla wasn't always praised for what she did and there were consequences to her choices to defy tradition, which made her victories feel like they were worth something. But in the fifth book, it turns out Jondalar's people don't actually have a big problem with Ayla's supposedly taboo Clan upbringing. This after three books of buildup suggesting they were extremely prejudiced. All gone, and Ayla's perfection is only opposed by Snidely Whiplashes.

[angelaudie]

I've always been amused that part of Ayla's Mary Sueness is her vagina is the only one in the world that can hold Jondalar's big old schlong (could his penis being that big make in a Gary Sue). This tidbit must be mention every single time Jondalar and Ayla get it on. Which basically means this gets mentioned every 25 pages or so.

Speaking of which, wprock is this latest book as sex crazed as the others have been?

[wprock]

angelaudie, I would have to say no, not as sex crazed. There are a few instances, but, not the pages and pages of loin-tightening loving that was going on in the last few books.

[dwanollah]

Thanks to wprock, I am about 200 pages in right now. And like I told her, I'm waiting for the plot to start.

Zzzzzz....

ETA:

Okay, I'm back, all finished, and really, 700 of the 750-something pages were a complete waste of time. It also had all sorts of continuation problems, like she (or someone) started writing one part, skipped back, and included the same essential information in both parts. Does no one edit this shit anymore?! It was redundant as fuck, from the descriptions, to the essential "plot" when it finally happened. It would have been nice if, instead of fifty pages of descriptions of this cave and that cave, she maybe developed a couple of the characters, like Ayla's daughter, perhaps. It also ended really stupidly, with so much stuff hanging that I can't imagine she's not planning yet ANOTHER EC book in fifteen years.

[wprock]

THANK YOU!

I kept telling my girlfriend, "She keeps repeating stuff. Like, a lot."
My gf thought I meant from other books to either remind long-time readers or catch-up new ones. I said, "No, literally, ten pages ago, she said this same stuff, exactly."

I think she thought I was exaggerating. Whoever edited that, I want their job. Apparently, I would just have to barely run the thing through spell-check and not worry about anything else.

I thought the author was really sick awhile back, I would be astounded if she had it in her for another book. Now, some ghost-writing family member or lawyer? Maybe.

[dwanollah]

By the way, did you know Ayla had an accent? Just the way she says certain words. It reminds people she's from far away. And it sounds exotic, not unpleas-



Yeah, I think Auel had breast cancer. But really, hand off the outlines and research, because this was crap, and really, how many loose threads did she gotta leave?!

I'm so pissed that instead of doing anything interesting or meaningful, she banged on for 700 pages about nothing, nothing, nothing, and then it was like "Oh! There's supposed to be conflict and resolution. Hm. *cut and paste from a previous book, change a few names* There! Done." Something that I thought would happen (and if done right, would make a good book) would be Ayla and Jondalar starting their own cave. I thought with all the mentions of how they were forming apprentice-like and parental-ish bonds with other, younger members of the community, and how they don't always like being around so many people, that that was where she was going.

The repetition of the "Mother Song" bugged me, too. Even though in the end, you saw what she used it for, it still felt like most of the book was a NaNo-like cut-and-paste/repeat = moar wordz yay!1!

[Auroranorth]

Mar 15, 2011 22:19:54 GMT -4 @dwanollah said:

By the way, did you know Ayla had an accent? Just the way she says certain words. It reminds people she's from far away. And it sounds exotic, not unpleas-

Gee, now that you remind me, I believe it was mentioned.


EVERY OTHER PAGE.

[dwanollah]

The good news is, at least the recent installment only mentioned Jondalar's giant penis a handful of times. His piercing, vivid, otherworldly glaciar-blue eyes, on the other hand....

[dwanollah]

In light of that, Checkmate, I'm actually interested in discussing the conclusion. Especially if that's how she's really ending the whole fucking thing. But we should prolly wait until the dumb book is actually released, huh?