text | Header: URGENT QUESTION

[callsignhornet]

I have an important question for the sake of organizing information about the group.

Feel free to message me directly if you don't feel comfortable sharing publicly.

In the world you are from, what year is it?

Edit: record of death for me should be 2186. Or 2187, though it would be very early in the year.

Comments

[blindluck]

I read a lot. [Need might actually already know this if she's in the habit of keeping an eye on what the others are up to; Nagito can often be found on his own reading the books he scrounges up.] Though I have to admit I prefer fiction, I'll read anything that seems interesting or like it might come in handy.

[hasapoint]

Mass-produced books seem to be so common. I think I'm jealous.

We've developed the technology a number of times and always lost it again. An Artificer was re-inventing moveable type in Valdemar last I was able to check but with everything going on it's not like she could capitalize on it.

[blindluck]

I don't know what I would have spent all my time doing if I didn't have access to as many books as I do. Maybe it will stick one of these days!

[hasapoint]

Do you have a favorite?

[blindluck]

I've always preferred murder mysteries. Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None is one of my favorites. The twist in Ayatsuji's The Decagon House Murders was clever, as well, though I think I probably could have figured it out if I'd read it when I was a bit older. Oh, but if we're talking twists, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is a classic. That's by Christie as well. Sorry, it's actually very difficult to just pick one! But I suppose it would have to be And Then There Were None.

[hasapoint]

Murder mysteries

I don't think I've heard of that. Is it the mystery being 'murdered' or about a mysterious murder?

[blindluck]

Mysteries about murders. A book about mystery itself being murdered could be very interesting, though! But the ones I like best are fair play murder mysteries, which means the clues are there to allow you to solve them before you learn the answer at the end. They're a little like games.

[hasapoint]

[Need doesn't entirely get it but she doesn't really want to be the old person constantly saying 'What!']

More something actively read trying to understand than passively?

[blindluck]

Yes. Of course, you can read it more passively, but I think you lose a lot of what makes this kind of mystery novel interesting if you do that.

[hasapoint]

Getting granular like that must be an effect of books being easy to mass produce.

[Need underlines 'I think I'm jealous' from upthread. Not so much out of real feeling, she's definitely confused on a few points, but she's always generally in favor of art proliferating.]

Maybe that makes up for losing some of the spontaneity of storytelling in person. And I suppose it preserves a version and makes it clear who told it.

[blindluck]

Having one definitive source makes for a lot of interesting scholarly material on famous enough books, as well! [Nagito is kind of missing his Christie collection and its accompanying critique now...] If I can find a copy of anything by her, I'll show you.

[hasapoint]

And on the people who wrote them I assume.

You've certainly persuaded me to be curious, anyway.

[blindluck]

Of course. I had a book filled with Christie's writing notes and the analysis of them! It's really too bad it's so difficult to find multiple copies of the same book, or we could set up some sort of book club.

[This actually might be the most normal conversation Nagito has ever had here.]

[hasapoint]

There's always reading it out loud for people. Storytelling with a prosthetic memory.

[...she is quite comfortable with literacy now but hasn't always been, so she thinks of the subject with a slight remove like that.]

[blindluck]

I don't think I'd be able to do it justice. But maybe if we passed it around, someone else could read it properly to everyone.

[Listening to it could be fun like that.]

[hasapoint]

You know the material best. Don't you think you'd get frustrated if someone read a word wrong or skipped a line?

[blindluck]

[Need is 100% correct.]

Perhaps I could read occasionally.