Kobold King

Explanation for people who haven't read Warbreaker: Tarachin is a ball game from the novel Warbreaker. One of the main characters is particularly good at it, so I guess that would make him a superstar. Explanation for people who have read Warbreaker: Tarachin is the ball game Lightsong the Bold plays with the Returned Weatherlove, Lifeblesser, and Truthcall. You might remember it as the game which he doesn't understand, but somehow excels at.

So... what precisely is the Spikocracy? It's a menacing, shadowy term which is used as a warning across the forum, but I'm not sure precisely what it is. Is it the staff? Just the admins? Is it the people who inhabit a certain upvote range on the reputation board?

Awesome! I'm in full support of this.

Why is King Kalakaua of Hawaii a symbol for interesting fanfiction? He just is, somehow.

Hah!

Are you selling something, partner?

Oh look, I confused Quiver.

I almost edited it once, but I would have had to create an account there. And frankly, who has the time for that sort of thing? I'm a busy man. * runs off to post memes on other faction threads *

Rest assured I am neither scamming you or accusing anyone. I upvoted him earlier, than I came back later and saw the post's rep at 0. The post was also listed on his reputation tab when I checked it, despite being at 0. I can state with a high degree of certainty that someone downvoted him--though now that I think about it, an accidental vote is also pretty likely.

Come now, people. Don't downvote the fellow. His introduction topic is late--unorthodox, but surely downvoting is an extreme response.

Thanks for the warning. I actually think I've seen this guy before. We'll be extra cautious... though in all honesty, he's mixed in with so many other lunatics, I don't know how we'll pick him out of the crowd.

That is made of buy. I love it, both yours and Swimmingly's! We will eventually see a sympathetic voidspren. Or if not sympathetic, than at least hilarious.

Rust and ruin. I can never read the initials "BS" again. Welcome to the forum! Have a great time, and keep an eye out for spikes. Stay away from Swimmingly, he knows more about Hemalurgy than is healthy.

I rarely read the acknowledgements. Except when the acknowledgements make up the entirety of an e-book sample.

Thanks for all the suggestions, people! I'll take a look at Zones of Thought, Pellucidar, The Book Thief, etc. I've read Ender's Game through Xenocide--I haven't read Children of the Mind or any of the Shadow books. Part of this is because of a spoiler I heard about the latest book which completely put me off the series. Spoilers for Shadows in Flight, if what I heard is true: One of my favorite series for favorable depictions of nonhumans is James White's Sector General series. It's about an enormous hospital space station at the edge of the galaxy, where medical practitioners of a thousand species work together. The species range from teddy bear-esque mammals to enormous shark like predators. Their behaviors are depicted as non-human and utterly bizarre, but the series constantly stresses their unifying desire to help others who are in pain and distress. I love the species shown in the stories, and the Educator tapes they use for administering medicine to alien patients are my favorite fictional technologies of all time. It is extremely idealistic, but that's one of the reasons I love it so much.

Clearly you have to read everything all over again. Amateur EDIT: Er, welcome the forum by the way.

Inhuman. Funny word, isn't it? In an age in which the concept of animal rights is quickly gaining traction and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence slowly gets off the ground, it seems odd that we still use the word "inhuman" as a synonym for "cruel" or "evil". One of my favorite concepts in speculative fiction is the idea of inhuman life--and by that I mean, intelligent lifeforms which are just as precious and remarkable as human beings, but are also different in fundamental ways. However, many works of speculative fiction attempt to do this, but fall victim to the strong temptation of anthropomorphism. Vampires, for instance, are often portrayed as something alien and mysterious, but are anthropomorphized with more human traits such as romantic love. The recent Star Trek movies aim towards making Spock more sympathetic by emphasizing his more human traits, in contrast to the classic series which appears to embrace the character's alien nature. There are comparatively few works of fiction which portray other sapient lifeforms as beings very different from humanity, but nonetheless valuable and precious creatures in their own right. There are few works which seem to say "this creature isn't human at all, and doesn't even act like it, but he's a pretty cool guy anyway." What few there are take their rightful places as my favorite stories. Brandon Sanderson (you may have heard of him, his name's on our logo) has written what are in my opinion genius representations of this concept. The kandra of Mistborn come across as brilliantly alien and difficult to understand, but somehow still manage to be sympathetic. The spren and Parshendi of the Stormlight Archive similarly display very little in common with humans, but are still intriguing enough to be just as sympathetic as the human characters they share the novels with. The question I pose to 17th Sharders is as follows: what works of fiction have made you sympathize with something that is completely inhuman? I speak not of anthropomorphized animals from cartoons, or similar "non-humans" that act like the guy down the street. This variety of fictional nonhuman can be easily identified when you realize that replacing them with human characters would make no difference towards the general plot or their characterization. I speak specifically of characters whose thoughts and behaviors could never be mistaken for those of human beings, yet are not depicted as monstrous or as somehow less than Homo sapiens. I know 17th Sharders are a fictionally literate lot, so I expect a lot of answers. At least, I hope for a lot of answers--I'm always looking for more stories about inhuman creatures.

I'll buy that. Maybe even a colony world in the space trilogy. I wouldn't mind living on the planet Ahlstrom IV. What to sell, what to sell... Ooh. Chasmfiend-farming will become a thing in the second set of Stormlight books.

* Ironpulls onto Kredik Shaw * "Rebels! You will always remember this as the day that you almost overthrew the Sliver of Infinity!"

The Sphodel, I believe, are the third sapient species native to Yolen, Hoid's homeworld. The other two races are humans and Dragons. I confess I'm a little confused as to what's on sale right now.

Hey Mailliw... Nothing personal, Leftinch. This is just a business opportunity.