Quick Fire Questions (A Place to Ask and Answer)

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If you lost your little finger (pinkie) you would lose some of the strength in your hand - which might make it harder to use a bow, considering they already take a great deal of strength, especially old fashioned longbows.

Loosing your pinkie weakens your grip.



Some interesting reading material:

Benefits of a strong pinkie

Get along without the pinkie?

Do you really need your pinkie finger

I'm trying to find a link for the medical studies that showed this. brb.
 
Warren_Paul said:
If you lost your little finger (pinkie) you would lose some of the strength in your hand - which might make it harder to use a bow, considering they already take a great deal of strength, especially old fashioned longbows.

Loosing your pinkie weakens your grip.
Click to expand...

I did remember reading long, long ago that the pinky was about 40% of the hand strength. And since my character uses a longbow, well, she's just going to have to get along without it somehow...
 
allmywires said:
I did remember reading long, long ago that the pinky was about 40% of the hand strength. And since my character uses a longbow, well, she's just going to have to get along without it somehow...
Click to expand...

Archery articles maybe try reading here it has some of the physics behind archery. The real need for strength should be in the draw. Gripping not so much.
 
So stuck on this one. it's the old every sentence counts..

"The old walls emanated their cold, dank.... "

The path being described leads to torture chambers, and are part of an ancient ruin. I want that sense you get when you walk into an old castle and walk down a passage and just know it's seen more than you have, if that makes sense. The best I've come up with, after an hour with a thesauras, is

The old walls emanated their cold, dank invidious secrets,
But still not quite there. Any wordsmiths?
 
As a quick starting point, I don't think you need "old".

The dank walls emanated their cold, invidious secrets.
 
Hey, Springs. Might be helpful to have a quick paragraph to go by, not just the sentence.

HB beat me to it, that the description is starting to sound like a list, don't need every word.

Is it actually the walls emanating the secrets? Hinting at signs of torture and blood?


hmm... thinking, will be back...
 
Or how about a little light gothic?

The walls seeped a cold stone-sweat exudation, as though their very substance were overburdened by the weight of millennial secret horrors witnessèd.
 
So, this is the paragraph. I have HB's version in this, cos it's much better than what I had :).

She closed the door and he walked towards the main palace. When he got to the entrance hall, he stopped at the archway to Omendegon. The dank walls emanated their cold, invidious secrets. Sam walked down, taking no notice of the twists in the path, familiar with them

@HB, personally, I love it, but this way through the book I think my reader might faint at the change from my sparse style.... :D
 
Fainting readers is what gothic is all about!

Take it to the max:

Dear God! -- it seemed the very stones did weep with what they had witnessed, and would have cried out, had they but voices, to purge from themselves the burdensome, invidious secret of that place’s ancient horror.

(OK, I should probably be thinking about bed.)
 
luci2also said:
Archery articles maybe try reading here it has some of the physics behind archery. The real need for strength should be in the draw. Gripping not so much.
Click to expand...

Exactly and even the drawing hand only hooks the fingers; the real work is initially in the arms and then the back. Take my word for it, if I've not been shooting for a long time (as now for example) then I go shoot a round, it's not my fingers or hand that aches afterwards!

HB I love that Gothic version!!!! :D
 
I remember reading somewhere that the French, after the humiliation of their huge host of knights getting slaughtered by a small force of English longbowmen at Agincourt, started cutting the first two fingers off English right hands. This meant the victim could no longer draw a bow.

Apparently, the English rude gesture of a "two fingered salute" evolved from this -- they liked to show the enemy they were still fully equipped with all the fingers needed to draw a bow.

I also believe the finger-chopping practice continues in some of the never-ending African civil wars, since an enemy with no trigger finger can't fight very well.

If the other woman knows your MC is an archer, perhaps it's not her pinky she would aim for.
 
Warren_Paul said:
If you lost your little finger (pinkie) you would lose some of the strength in your hand - which might make it harder to use a bow, considering they already take a great deal of strength, especially old fashioned longbows.
Click to expand...
Old fashioned fighting longbows' draw weights ranged from around 100-180 lbs, hunting bows more like 50-60 lbs, modern longbows around 60lbs. My modern recurve draws around 45 lbs and modern compound bows (with pulleys and stuff, like Rambo used!). Only draw about 25 lbs. The reduction in draw weight reflects the improved efficiency of the bow limbs. For accuracy you want a low draw weight that can be held steadier. But still the hand does very little.

luci2also said:
Archery articles maybe try reading here it has some of the physics behind archery. The real need for strength should be in the draw. Gripping not so much.
Click to expand...
Exactly right! Some strength is required in the drawing hand but actually not much. The fingers are locked and the strain passes (or should pass) straight through your hand into your arms. Once at full draw all that strain should shift onto your back. When I tried a 100lb longbow once I struggled to draw it but even at full draw it was no problem at all holding the weight on my fingers.

HareBrain said:
Dear God! -- it seemed the very stones did weep with what they had witnessed, and would have cried out, had they but voices, to purge from themselves the burdensome, invidious secret of that place’s ancient horror.
Click to expand...
That is just brilliant HB, I love it! :D
 
HareBrain said:
Fainting readers is what gothic is all about!

Take it to the max:

Dear God! -- it seemed the very stones did weep with what they had witnessed, and would have cried out, had they but voices, to purge from themselves the burdensome, invidious secret of that place’s ancient horror.

(OK, I should probably be thinking about bed.)
Click to expand...

That's brilliant, HB. You should write plays! :D
 
@HB; don't go there! I can't bear another rewrite. Not yet. In six months I will do the origninal Victorian melodramatic, space opera, Star Wars-fan chick, stage play (with stage directions, directors prompts, and an entire cast)
First, I need to get over this one....
 
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