RinkWorks: Stupid Emails: haybail

573. haybail

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To:  dave@rinkworks.com, sam@rinkworks.com
Subject:  I rule!
Date:  Fri, 21 Nov 2008 17:09:26 -0800 (PST)

I took your "The Fantasy Novelist's Exam" and I only said yes to "Does your
novel contain orcs, elves, dwarves, or halflings?" Woo! My book is going to be
great! And i don't even know what a haybail is.

Thanks for the great exam!

The hay bale question on the exam has generated more questions and comments than any other. (Not the fishing and piracy question, which is an inside joke meaningless to anybody but Dave and me.) The general idea is that some writers carelessly refer to "bales" of hay in worlds that lack the technology required to make them. In the standard stock medieval fantasy world, you'd simply have haystacks.