PS Power Books • Forum

So, I thought this would be interesting. I think these are correct, but they are not chronologically congruent with each other.





Really, this makes the bedroom an interesting place in their world, to understate things...

I just saw this today!

Neat.

Trice is a bit slimmer than that...

The Forten are of course different now...

Still, it's a useful size comparison chart! I love it!

Haha. What? Triece isn't a burly dude? I'm astonished.
The size differences still trip me up, even now. The bell ropes at the noble houses hint at it, but the ergonomics in a society of such diverse body types would be a challenge. You'd think it would be worse for the nobles, really, since there are so few of them. It's the hardest part of reading this series for me, relating the differences in sizes in my mind during a scene. Also not thinking of the taller characters as freaks, since even the shorter characters don't think of them like that exactly, at least not in a negative sense.

Yeah, it's common enough though that it isn't a thing for them, so I haven't really given it much thought. The merchant class is tall as well, not just the noble class. yes, there are a lot more commoners, but it isn't as rare as just the nobles.

But if I have it right, the merchants are still quite a bit shorter still than the nobles. Tor's father, for example, isn't that tall, although he might have been picked for his unusual shortness. Sara Debris isn't that tall really, although she's taller than Tor. I think Trice is at least 4" taller than her, or something like that, and they are the women. The noble men are ridiculous, as far as the average split seems. Most of the women don't seem to make it to 7', noble or merchant, while the noble males can get to 9' or more.

Sara Debris most likely has some noble heritage in her lineage. Trice has merchant class genetics as well, though far enough back that the mixing doesn't show overtly.

Men that are large are given precedence by the women (as long as they are under nine feet or so...) so tall noble men are the norm. Women are picked based on looks, meaning there is a limit to how large they can get without seeming like men, due to bone structure considerations.

This isn't the only reason for things, but is certainly part of it. Men can be kind of homely, if large, strong and rich, and still have a successful family life.

Large women who aren't attractive have a harder time of things that way, even in Noram. It's a clear double standard, going either way.

Mate selection in sexually dimorphic species (like humans) is all about double standards. Nature doesn't care, as long as it works. After all, male peacock tails make escaping predators harder for any individual, even if the fellas who make it are fitter as a class. What makes YA messed up is that it was done on purpose -- and is still being done on purpose (Doris, and wizardly meddling [even if the post-birth augmented are currently sterile]). In fact, it's being reinforced and exaggerated by the manipulated psychology of some of the meddlers.

See, that's the thing I never really understood about why the nobles were/are such assholes about short people. It was pretty much explained as genetic changes that Cordes and Burks made based on themselves, although I don't recall which book that was in. There aren't all that many nobles, and Doris screws with people as a hobby. Why not fix it so the commoners aren't abused? That doesn't do anything about the commoners not thinking they're as good as tall people, but surely that's not as much of a problem as the nobles all being abusive dicks? Am I misremembering how the noble/commoner thing went down?

Well, as I remember, the nobles don't actually have to abuse the commoners, even though they are allowed to do so. They just can't see them as equals and find it hard to take orders from them. You may love and coddle your pets, but that doesn't mean you see them as equal to humans; you wouldn't take orders from your dog.

Putting respect and awe in the commoners is a simple way to stop revolution and war.

Same way Afrak removed aggression from males and made them smaller, and Tellerand fears gods punishment, and...

They were all models after a world war three, designed to stop humans from killing themselves off.

And yes, it's very screwed up, but fun to read about.

The rules for sex is similar, they changed all of the human trigger points for violence in YA's world.

Except the nobles, who need that aggression to protect the sheep, which doesn't always work out so well.