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Don't look at me, I'm hideous right now.

 

By which I mean this page.  Srsly, don't look at it until I have it all fixed. 

 

Until then, you can read my regular blog here.

 

I was/am also sj on goodreads.

The Plains of Passage (Earth's Children, Book Four)

The Plains of Passage - Jean M. Auel This book should've been called How to Pleasure Your Way Across Europe, Righting Injustices Along the Way.I've been meaning to do this write-up since I finished the book (over two weeks ago), but kept putting it off.  The Plains of Passage comes in at just under 800 pages, but they're 800 pages in which nothing much happens.  It's meant to chronicle the trip Ayla and Jondalar make from Ukraine to France (on foot, across a glacier) that takes over a year.  You end up feeling like you're there with them the entire time because it's so. much. nothing. happening.  If you take out the minutiae of the scenery and plants (and the Pleasures bits), I'd be willing to bet this book would be less than 200 pages.  That's a whole lotta nothing, guys.The book  starts with a mammoth pr0n scene.  By this, I don't mean a lengthy scene with much lasciviousness, I mean actual mammoths having actual sex.  In great detail.  For many pages.  I'm talking all the gory details about scents and what the male mammoth's...manhood...looks like - it's really too much.  I almost put the book down right then, but I had to keep reading because I know you guys are expecting me to.  See how much I heart you?More nothing happens for a while, then they come across a herd of funny looking animals and Ayla asks her One True Love what they are.  He tells her that they're onagers and she laughs at the funny name and the funny sounds they make, and even wonders why she's never seen them before.  This part made me super annoyed.  Why?  Because with as much research as Ms Auel does for her books, she can't remember that she's mentioned the stupid onagers at least five times already, including the time that Ayla hunted them because she wouldn't kill horses anymore?  They were what she was hunting when she found Baby!They passed massive herds of bison, and giant deer with huge palmate antlers, horses, onagers, and asses... - CotCBandOnce the pitfall was prepared, Ayla whistled for Whinney and circled wide to get behind a herd of onagers. She couldn't bring herself to hunt horses again, and even the onager made her uncomfortable. - VoHandThen she poured water into a cooking basket from the large onager-stomach waterbag that was hanging on a post, and she put some cooking stones in the fire to heat. - VoHSo, yeah.  I was only, like, 6 chapters in and I already wanted to punch someone.Rest of review (with pictures! and awesome hovertexts!) can be found here.