(urth) Short Story 4: The Dead Man

[DAVID STOCKHOFF]

Makes sense. Looks like ours used methods ABC: ambush, death roll, hold and drown. 


The description in your source is slightly different---it doesn't mention the disorienting effect of the death roll, although the peasant's leg seems to almost have come off, which effect it does mention. 

What a bizarre book, btw. Where are the monster stats? (never mind where was the editor)



________________________________
 From: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman at yahoo.com>
To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net> 
Sent: Friday, March 30, 2012 3:02 PM
Subject: Re: (urth) Short Story 4: The Dead Man
 
>From: David Stockhoff dstockhoff at verizon.net
>I can only add to this that the depth of research needed for this little OMG-I'm-the-ghost ghost story is remarkable. It's not entirely convincing, because of the little Orientalist "footnotes," but the sheer legwork to get us into the peasant's mind---banter of women, jungle species succession, the croc's chimney, if true (I can't confirm it)---is commendable. 
>
>Incidentally, the croc is known as the "mugger" crocodile and does lie in wait for prey (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mugger_crocodile). However, the manner in which it actually killed the peasant sounds more like the "death roll" described for the saltwater croc (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saltwater_crocodile). One would need to delve deeper than Wikipedia to  sort it out further, but the conflation works, if conflation it is. 

Apparently all crocodilians ambush their prey and roll like that.
 
http://books.google.com/books?id=f8uFPKPzlnEC&pg=PA264
 
Jerry Friedman
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