It's still a bale of hay, it's just a bale of hay over there...

I'll have to check that one out, I'm not familiar with it, and it's not in either of the texts I have for class.. Struwwelpeter (aka shockheaded peter) is also incredibly disturbing. It's a collection of short stories, where the children frequently die in horrific ways - a girl plays with matches, so she is burned to…

Actually in the french movie version that I watched, the girl (played by Catherin Deneuve) repeatedly says to the fairy godmother "But why can't I marry my father? I love him, so I will marry him" and various other sickening things.

Yeah, I got irritated with that too a lot - being forced to read every book at a specific reading level to keep me at the same standard as the other kids, or being forced to do page after page after page of extra math exercises to prove the same thing - that I had picked it up in 5. Schools are not tailored to the…

WHY ARE THE PEOPLE BLUE?.. why are the horses painted? Why is there a helicopter?

Sometimes IO9 your timeliness is beyond compare. I'm currently taking a class called Genre Fiction, and our particular genre is fairytales. Juniper tree is indeed weird, but I have to recommend the collection of modern takes on fairytales - [www.amazon.com] title is a reference to the Juniper Tree story. My favorite…

I read that with an expression of horror on my face, and an "OW!" sentiment akin to when men read about getting kicked in the nadgers.

Steampunk by most people seems to be more aesthetic based than content based. If it has a certain look or descriptive feel, the actual elements are immaterial. Thus why some people put The Diamond Age in the steampunk genre - it has no steampower, no *actual* victorians, and no alternate history stuff, but what it…

Yeah, whatever you say. The purpose of all art schools is to turn out people who create crappy trite art, right?

Arthur C. Clarke references, surely?.. I mean, it was his idea...

Mine doesn't, which is one of the things I like about it. Having a classroom full of cintiqs available is pretty sexy.

I think that's part of why photoshop has such flexibility in terms of pretty much everything - lay it out how you want, set tools to act in a certain way, add plugins or brushes or color palettes, etc. There's also usually about 3 or more ways to access each tool, so how you work isn't dependent on what a programmer…

You get how the two things are not mutually exclusive, right?

Or of the later ones, I found Damia more interesting than the Rowan - given that she struggles with both her own issues *and* the Rowan's.

And being British is somehow bad?

I enjoyed this book immensely. From the comments here I think the main complaint for most people is that this book was not any of his other books. Most authors tend to stick to a specific style, a specific genre or time period, and I think a lot of people are thrown by the stark contrast between books like The Baroque…

I doubt you would find anathem appealing to be honest - I love Neal, would happily put him in my top 3 authors of all time, but Anathem was the toughest read for me. There are interesting ideas, sure, but the plot doesn't really get going until the second half of the book. I'd throw you in the direction of The Big U,…

You would never recommend a book just because it's long? It's shorter than the latest volume of G.R.R.M's a Song of Ice and Fire, and it's shorter than a lot of other fantastic books. Judging something by it's length is literally a matter of choosing less quantity over any kind of quality.. I read the book in less…

I would, but the likelyhood (a) of you fixing anything in my house, when I'm the one with all the power tools, and (b) you stopping complaining are close to 1/infinity. (Physics degree before the art degree)

not just you, I promise.