Fic recs, March 15th · 12:43pm Mar 15th, 2014
A while ago, I reviewed a long-form poem by AugieDog called The Laughter and the Night and was rather disappointed by it. Well, thanks to some urging from Mr. Dog and me traipsing back through old reviews for some old reason, I took it upon myself to give the whole thing a metric analysis and have since sent my findings to A. Dog, Esq.
What I found is, I had that piece all wrong.
This is me, formally revoking my earlier disparaging of AugieDog’s poetry skills, and praising The Laughter and the Night for fantastic metric patterns and a highly complex ABCB/CDED rhyme scheme that really blew me away to see up close. Unfortunately, I think this also means I have to blame Illya Leonov somewhat for messing it up. That said, there are still some errors, but at an average of 1 per section, that comes out to around 95% perfect meter, far above my earlier estimation, with hardly any half-rhymes, and set to rise if he takes any of my advice. The Laughter and the Night is now Recommended by myself.
H: 2 R: 0 C: 1 V: 1 N: 1
The Numbers Don’t Lie by short skirts and explosions (idea by theworstwriter)
Reading (part 1) by DRWolf001
Genre: Magical Mishap
The CMCs dig up an ancient artifact that casts a spell over Ponyville, giving each pony a counter above their head that keeps track of how many lies they tell. Surprisingly, this isn’t just a story about honesty, but about trust and friendship. It’s also got a tertiary moral about how preoccupation with honesty (or, I suppose, anything) can be detrimental to one’s well-being. I couldn’t help but remember a post from someone — and I believe it was in the context of a “why don’t more bronies read fanfiction?” discussion — who stated that they detested reading fiction because “it’s all lies”. And I had to stop, mouth open, and go, “Well, that’s kind of the point,” after which I then had to wonder if that person hadn’t been lied to in some life-devastating manner in the past and developed an aversion to all things deceptive. Because there’s a big difference between fiction, white lies, the platitudes upon which society is built, and actual, malicious inveiglement. That difference is what Twilight has to learn through the course of this story, as, surprisingly, even Applejack tells little white lies now and then. This gets the recommendation based on its ideas more than anything — there were a few spots where dialogue, especially Twilight’s, felt ever so slightly out of character — but honestly (hah!), it’s one of SS&E’s best.
Highly Recommended
Melt by horizon
Reading by Illya Leonov
Genre: Poetry
You know what I haven’t done in forever? Actually check into my to-read to find a story. Boy has it changed (I mean the to-read page), and entirely for the better. :D Anyway, this purports to be based on "The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock", which, if you must know, is what I consider to be the greatest poem ever written. (In case you ever wondered why my benchmark for poetry is so high…) It’s been a while, but Melt at least seems to take structural cues, as well as some direct alluding to the text, from that poem. Mostly, I think this is just horizon showing off what a smarty smart pants he is at poetry okay I get it now geez. While the structure is ponified, the story is original, chronicling the last moments of an ancient city made of ice, now beginning to melt. It’s a really fantastic world-building idea, and it’s pulled off remarkably well. Honestly, horizon would have had to fuck this up majorly for me not to like it.
Highly Recommended
Decay by Thyrai
Reading (part 1) by Cherax Destructor
Genre: Sad Shipping
I’m not sure what to take away from this story, other than it’s one of the most misplaced shipping setups I’ve ever seen. We begin with Rainbow Dash failing a Wonderbolts tryout due to, as quickly becomes apparent, an illness that turns out to be terminal. Twilight, in a phenomenal case of poor timing, reveals long-held feelings for Rainbow, who flies off to puke for illness-related reasons. Chapter two documents Rainbow’s stay in the hospital, chapter three has her trying to make good with Twilight in her last days, and I am just seriously flabbergasted by the whole thing. I think the characters’ actions are what drag this down. Rainbow is dying of a mysterious condition that is necrotizing her from the inside out, hence the title, and has been given about three weeks to live after she wakes up, but very little of the story seems to keep that in mind. Twilight’s scrambling for a cure, yes, but meanwhile her friends break Rainbow out of the hospital so that they can have a party (?), and she runs around doing normal things (like having sex with Twilight) as if there’s nothing wrong with her. Beyond a particular puke scene, she seems fine. No one else seems to be pressed to make sure Rainbow’s last days are really anything in particular. And worst, I don’t think the main conflict is “get Rainbow a cure”, but “make sure Rainbow says ‘I love you’”, since the first thing she does after leaving the hospital is track Twilight down and kiss her. And yes, this does toe the “I’ve always loved you” line, on the “well, you like me, so let’s kiss now” side of things. I honestly think this would have worked better if Rainbow and Twilight had begun the story as a couple. In the end, I think the message has something to do with making the most of one’s life and/or facing death with dignity, but the amount of time spent setting up the ship and then taking it into sad territory deflates that a considerable amount. This is one of the least-wholehearted recommendations I’ve ever given, because I just can’t work up any emotion for this story beyond confusion.
Not Recommended
Games by CCC
Genre: Character Study
This story presents one of the best explorations of Discord’s character since Diary of a Pliant Tyrant. Unfortunately, it doesn’t really make the best use of it. Discord responds to an invitation from Twilight for a chess game, and then tells her if she can’t find a way to surprise him somehow, he’ll go back to being evil. Why this works is Discord: given a little bit of omniscience and a terrible aversion to boredom, he mopes through the mane cast’s attempts to surprise him in a most sympathetic way. But where the story falls flat is, well, in being predictable. Discord spends a day with each of the mane cast; it’s a plot we’ve seen time and time again. There was a particular line that gave me what I thought was going to be the final game, namely Twilight conceding that she couldn’t surprise him, which would be enough out of character for her to really blow Discord’s mind. I don’t know whether that would have been less predictable than what happened (the CMCs are often used as a seventh, or in this case, eighth main character). And each of the days is very short, suggesting that there simply wasn’t enough time spent in coming up with honest attempts for the characters to run through. This is a really great example of how to squander a story’s potential, and all I can really say for it is that Discord fans will likely get a kick out of his portrayal.
Vaguely Recommended
A Discreet Favor to her Majesty by Device Heretic
Genre: Self-Insert Wankfest
Imagine my surprise when a recent post over at City of Doors clued me in on a Device Heretic story that I had not read, by virtue of its not being in his story list! As far as we can figure, this was unpublished but not deleted after the ban on meta fiction, and by gum I will read it because far be it from me to do anything unthoroughly. So, I stand before this story in something of a state of slack-jawed awe, and not the good kind. On the one hand, it’s a clear example of why self-inserts are a bad idea: no one gives a shit about your roleplaying group. This is masturbatory as hell, because, oh yes, Celestia would of course have read Eternal and (incomplete fic I have no knowledge of) Composure, and liked them, and she actually commissioned them, and oh yes, she thinks that you have such marvelous talent with symbolism and philosophy! Because that’s what we all really want, isn’t it: to have our stories read by people in power, who in turn appreciate them and give us critical feedback. On the other hand, there’s a lot of self-criticism in this, but unfortunately, I can’t really know how much of that is self-loathing, how much is parroted from actual criticism, and how much is genuine "I need to work on this". On the third hand, this is at least structurally funny, with lots of URLs linked to various things in a manner that comes off as something out of a short skirts and explosions journal post. Then again, there’s a scene at the end featuring AbsoluteAnonymous that seemed nothing more than a cruel joke about shippers and fic writers in general. So I have no idea what to make of this. On the surface, it seems like yet another self-wank, but I can’t help feel like there is, just maybe, something more to it.
Recommended Only If You’re Familiar With Eternal, Composure, and Everything Having to Do With Their Respective Authors
Yeah, I can see why the site doesn't allow fics like Discreet Favor anymore. I ended up laughing at Device Heretic instead of with him.
If you want to read all unpublished/cancelled DH fics, he has at least one more: Nocturne.
1928820
Not complete, so I'll skip it.
Melt's use of the city of ice was stolen from the excellent indie tabletop RPG Polaris: Chivalric Tragedy at the Utmost North by Ben Lehman. Its use as a Sombra/Cadence backstory, on the other hoof, was all me.
I'm glad you liked it. Melt's gotten the least views of anything I've ever written, despite a glowing signal boost from darf, cross-pollination from Pony Verse, and my followers list being unusually literate/literary; FIMFic just doesn't do poetry. It warms my heart whenever it gets more attention.
1930837
What you need, sir, is a Seattle's Angels bump. brb