News Archive

  • 179 weeks
    MSPiper’s “Autumnfall Change” [Royal Canterlot Library]

    You might want to keep a whiteboard handy for today’s story.


    Autumnfall Change
    [Sci-Fi][Slice of Life][Human] • 8,419 words

    Magic and technology may have pierced the void and blazed a path between the realms, but that was the simple part. Adjusting to the changes that follow can be far more daunting.

    Yet despite the complexities involved even in basic communication, Serendipity has found friends to talk to among humankind who can cheer her up when she’s down. And occasionally inspire her to bursts of ingenuity unhindered by such trifles as foresight.

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    6 comments · 9,133 views
  • 193 weeks
    TCC56's "Glow In The Dark, Shine In The Sun" [Royal Canterlot Library]

    A villain might just have a bright future in today's story.


    Glow In The Dark, Shine In The Sun
    [Equestria Girls] [Drama] [Slice of Life] • 27,035 words

    Despite all attempts, Cozy Glow still hasn't been shown a path to friendship. No pony has been able to get through to her, and she's only gotten worse with each attempt.

    Reluctant to return the filly to stone again, Princess Twilight has one last option. One pony she hasn't tried. Or in this case? One person.

    Sunset Shimmer.

    Can Sunset do what no pony has been able to?

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    10 comments · 9,337 views
  • 195 weeks
    The Red Parade's "never forever" [Royal Canterlot Library]

    Today's story never says never.


    never forever
    [Sad] [Slice of Life] • 1,478 words

    Lightning Dust will never be a Wonderbolt. When she left the Academy, she swore she'd never look back. When the Washouts disbanded, she swore she'd forget about them.

    Yet after all these years, against all odds, she finds herself here. At a Wonderbolts show. Just on the wrong side of the glass.

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    20 comments · 8,131 views
  • 200 weeks
    Freglz's "Nothing Left to Lose" [Royal Canterlot Library]

    Don't lose out on today's story.


    Nothing Left to Lose
    [Drama] [Sad] • 6,367 words

    Some things can't be changed.

    Starlight believes otherwise.

    FROM THE CURATORS: One might be forgiven for thinking that after nine years of MLP (and fanfic), there's nothing left to explore on such well-trodden ground as changeling redemption — but there are still stories on the topic which are worthy of turning heads.  "Though the show seems to have moved past it as a possibility, the question of whether and how Queen Chrysalis could be reformed alongside the other changelings still lingers in the fandom's consciousness," Present Perfect said in his nomination. "In comes Freglz, with a solidly reasoned story that combines the finales of seasons 5 and 6 and isn't afraid to let the question hang."

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    26 comments · 7,541 views
  • 202 weeks
    Somber's "Broken Record" [Royal Canterlot Library]

    Today's story puts all the pieces together.

    (Ed. note: Some content warnings apply to this interview, regarding current world circumstances and mentions of suicidal ideation.)


    Broken Record
    [Drama] [Slice of Life] • 7,970 words

    There has never been an athlete like Rainbow Dash. The sprints. The marathons. The land speed record. She held them all.

    Until she didn't.

    Until she had only one left... and met the pony that might take it from her...

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    11 comments · 5,347 views
  • 204 weeks
    jakkid166's "Detective jakkid166 in everything" [Royal Canterlot Library]

    Missing out on today's story would be a crime.


    Detective jakkid166 in everything
    [Comedy] [Human] • 15,616 words

    "Every pony thing evre made would be better if it had me in it."
    - me

    I, Detective jakkid166, will be prepared to make every pony fanficion, video, and game better by me being in it. All you favorite pony content, except it has ME! And even I could be in some episodes of the show except cause the charaters are idiot I'm good at my job.

    The ultimate Detective jakkid166 adventures collection, as he goes into EVERYTHING to make it good.

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    171 comments · 9,616 views
  • 206 weeks
    Mannulus' "Sassy Saddles Meets Sasquatch" [Royal Canterlot Library]

    Today's story is a rare find.


    Sassy Saddles Meets Sasquatch
    [Comedy] [Random] • 5,886 words

    The legend is known throughout Equestria, but there are few who believe. Those who claim to have seen the beast are dismissed as crackpots and madponies. Those who bring evidence before the world are dismissed as histrionic deceivers. There are those who have seen, however -- those who know -- and they will forever cry out their warning from the back seats of filthy, old train cars, even to those who dismiss them, who revile them, who ignore their warnings unto their own mortal peril.

    "The sasquatch is real!" they will cry forevermore, even as nopony believes.

    But from this day forward, Sassy Saddles will believe.

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    16 comments · 6,203 views
  • 208 weeks
    SheetGhost’s “Moonlight Vigil” [Royal Canterlot Library]

    Take a closer look into tonight’s story.


    Moonlight Vigil
    [Tragedy] • 3,755 words

    Bitter from her defeat and exile, the Mare in the Moon watches Equestria move on without her.

    Read More

    1 comments · 4,842 views
  • 210 weeks
    Unwhole Hole's "The Murder of Elrod Jameson" [Royal Canterlot Library]

    Today's story is some killer noir.

    [Adult story embed hidden]

    The Murder of Elrod Jameson
    [Dark] [Mystery] [Sci-Fi] [Human] • 234,343 words

    [Note: This story contains scenes of blood and gore, sexuality, and a depiction of rape.]

    Elrod Jameson: a resident of SteelPoint Level Six, Bridgeport, Connecticut. A minor, pointless, and irrelevant man... who witnessed something he was not supposed to.

    Narrowly avoiding his own murder, he desperately searches for help. When no living being will help him, he turns to the next best thing: a pony.

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    14 comments · 5,329 views
  • 212 weeks
    Grimm's "Don't Open the Door" [Royal Canterlot Library]

    Today's story lingers like the curling mist in a dark forest.


    Don't Open the Door
    [Dark][Horror] • 13,654 words

    After an expedition into the Everfree Forest ends in disaster, Applejack and Rainbow Dash take refuge in an abandoned cabin until morning.

    This is probably a poor decision, but it's only one night, after all. How bad could it be?

    FROM THE CURATORS: "I don't care much for horror stories," AugieDog mused. "But this one does so much right, I found myself really impressed." Present Perfect thought it was "simply one of the best horror stories I've ever read," and Soge agreed "one-hundred percent" that "this is pitch-perfect horror from beginning to end."

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    8 comments · 4,645 views
Dec
2nd
2016

Author Interview » SaddlesoapOpera's "A New Age" [Royal Canterlot Library] · 12:45pm Dec 2nd, 2016

Today's story lets us hear some voices from Equestria's past.


A New Age
[Dark] [Drama] • 14,963 words

In the closing days of the Pre-Classical Era, at the dawn of the rule of the Royal Pony Sisters, the devastation of Discord’s cruelty hits hard and leaves an open wound. As the young and inexperienced Princesses Celestia and Luna struggle to keep the peace, powerful figures in all three Pony tribes bridle at the upstart Alicorns who so quickly and easily claimed power...

FROM THE CURATORS: Epistolary stories present a number of unique problems to a writer, but sometimes confining the narrative to letters written by the characters is the best approach to take.  And when Soge praised this story for "managing to showcase a variety of points of view from a number of very distinctive characters, all of which have great voicing and believable motivations," the rest of us had to agree.

"Absolutely necessary from a storytelling perspective," Chris said, while Present Perfect called attention to "the variety of media... the stories told, the multiple crumbling tragedies" and called the whole piece "unspeakably awesome."

"The characters are perfectly voiced throughout," AugieDog noted with Chris calling them "sometimes petty, sometimes poignant, but invariably fascinating." "The way that the author weaves in and out of show canon, while simultaneously doing a ton of world building was particularly masterful," Soge concluded. "But what really clinched the nomination for me is how, from so many disparate parts, a full narrative emerges."

Read on for our author interview, in which SaddlesoapOpera discusses fictional vacuums, plausible reliability, and the earthy aspects of earth ponies.


Give us the standard biography.

I am a Canadian raised by highly educated parents and I grew up in a home with more books than literally any other type of object. I spent way too long in University, but I finished everything I started. I work in a field where I use my language skills a lot, which helps keep my fiction writing sharp.

How did you come up with your handle/penname?

No big mystery — I just sat down and mulled over assorted equine puns until I found one that suited my often drama-filled storytelling style. The same brainstorming session led to the creation of a good friend’s moniker as well: Pen Palomino.

Who's your favorite pony?

Definitely a tricky question, but all things considered I will go with Twilight Sparkle. Although I think everyone sees elements of themselves in the majority of the Ponies, Twilight’s life and times, disposition, likes and dislikes, and penchant for overthinking and anxiety resonate a lot with me.

What's your favorite episode?

My answer to this has changed more than once over the years, but at this point I’d have to say Amending Fences. It’s the first time we see Twilight just plain screw up with terrible results, not by being frantic or overusing magic or the like, but simply by being careless and preoccupied. It’s all shockingly mundane and grounded — no monster attacks, no evil spells, just a lonely Unicorn who Twilight heedlessly left broken inside, and a wrenching exploration of how painful and difficult and humbling it can be to face that kind of wrong and struggle to fix things. The explosive rant from Moondancer and the emotional conclusion are the icing on a wonderful, wonderful cake.

What do you get from the show?

Happiness. I have said elsewhere that far too many shows these days revel in being too cool to feel good. They mock and sneer and knock everything down, and they may make you laugh, but they never make you smile. Friendship is Magic makes me smile, and with all the cynical, world-weary vitriol getting tossed about, it’s really important to see a positive show that neither talks down nor comes across as naive.

What do you want from life?

Enough money not to worry about it, enough wisdom to recognize what things and people are truly the most important to me, and enough time to enjoy them.

Why do you write?

It’s a combination of things, from working out my own baggage, to building on what I see in the world (or what worlds like FiM show me), to seeking approval, to simply loving language. I’d say that I’ve tried to stop and can’t, but that’s a lie. I’ve never tried to stop.

What advice do you have for the authors out there?

READ. Read other fics, re-read your own, read professional published works, read newspapers. Devour the written word in all its forms. Reading is a workout for the muscles of writing, and the more you read the more you will come to recognize common mistakes, missteps, cliches, and other pitfalls. A writer who doesn’t read is like a chef who lives on nothing but thin porridge.

What inspired “A New Age”?

More than anything else, it was fiction abhorring a vacuum. The ancient times of Ponies are almost entirely empty in canon, with only teasing little details. Even digging into semi-canonical sources like the Journal of the Two Sisters only offers vague hints. There was a great big hole, so I decided to plug it up with a story. After that, the format was a personal challenge — I’d never done an epistolary work before.

Talk about the challenges of telling an epistolary story.

Not unlike “shaky-cam” films, it can be hard to remain plausible sometimes. It’s a struggle to convey action and keep things vivid and immediate, while remembering that somepony was sitting somewhere and faithfully writing it all down each time. A lot of the entries are scattered, meandering, or speckled with crossed out errors to help create a feeling of immediacy. The “dialogue” format of characters addressing their diaries like conversation partners was a huge help at times, as were unexpected points of view, like Clover’s mother or Smart Cookie.

And speaking of challenges, talk about writing a story that’s almost entirely original characters.

It was tricky to be sure. I suspect that the bulk of OCs was what led to the somewhat lukewarm early readership for the story. But I wasn’t working in a void — there were the Sisters, and Star Swirl, and the Hearth’s Warming gang, and they all provided groundwork from which I could build the others. Hurricane and the other Spartan-esque Pegasi established the style for Northwind, for example. Once the characters had a world to live in, their voices and traits came pretty easily.

What are the doctrines of the Old Way? What can you tell us about creating a religion?

I drew on a blend of Old-World and Pagan faiths for the style of Brome’s religion, which really shows in her authorial voice. Her formal, ritualized delivery is Wiccan in some places, and Classical Mythology in others. I wanted to capture the, well, earthy aspects of Earth Ponies. Fertility, agriculture, family, and the life-cycle were all sacred. All of that was very Pagan, as was the idea of worshipping in the nude. The “Thrice-Blessed” concept is drawn directly from the Maiden/Mother/Crone concept, seen in ancient Greek, Norse, and even Egyptian mythology. I wanted the initial faith to seem like a primeval mystery-cult, which slowly became more gentle and civilized as Brome experienced her trials, tribulations, and revelations.

The conspirators are an obvious choice, but what went into choosing who else to include in this story?

It was usually just necessity, in the form of what you might call “camera-work”. When I needed an angle or perspective that the main cast couldn’t offer, I “zoomed out” to servants, associates, friends, family, bystanders, and so forth. They helped to reveal — or conceal — things to help shape the rhythm of the plot in ways that the core characters couldn’t, and kept the story fresh with new voices and attitudes.

Is there anything else you'd like to add?

I found writing in an entirely new format a fascinating experience, and I recommend it to others. Don’t just go weird for the sake of weird, but if you’ve never tried changing person or tense or perspective, or writing in a different genre than you’re used to, give it a try. It tickles the brain in fun ways, and who knows — you might discover a new favourite.

You can read A New Age at FIMFiction.net. Read more interviews right here at the Royal Canterlot Library, or suggest stories for us to feature at our Fimfiction group.

Comments ( 1 )

I really liked the character development of the religious zealot earth pony, and how it laid the framework for some aspects of modern equestrian society!

Good story, would read again!

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