Paul's Thursday Reviews CXCI · 9:41pm Jan 23rd, 2020
Well, it appears I finally have my mojo back. For the last three weeks I’ve managed to consistently write some 2,000 words/day, making good progress on all my projects. Speaking of, the rough draft for my next short story was completed just yesterday. I’m waiting on the artist to get back to me regarding the cover art, so until then I’m willing to entertain the idea of pre-readers if there are any volunteers. Honestly, I wasn’t going to do pre-readers this time, but I figure if I’ve got time before the cover art shows up why not use some? But only if people volunteer. To help with the decision there, it’s a drama about recovering lost relationships.
Finally watched The Best Gift Ever the other day. I thoroughly enjoyed it, even if a lot of it was just reminders of old, well-known ideas.
Alright, time for what you’re all here for: reviews!
Stories for This Week:
The One Week Year by HapHazred
Flank-ology by Fire Gazer the Alchemist
Starlight Jailbreak by bottled_up
The Meaning of Admiration by Konseiga
Let Us Out by Billy G Gruff
A Simpler Time by DJLowrider
Closing Time by Just A Random Pegasus
Alicorn Genesis by Jordan179
An Alicorn's Fate by Smexy Sombra
Silly Stories of the Student Six by Level Dasher
Total Word Count: 57,521
Rating System
Why Haven't You Read These Yet?: 0
Pretty Good: 3
Worth It: 3
Needs Work: 4
None: 0
The One Week Year
28,228 Words
By HapHazred
Wheatfield is the largest and most powerful agricultural business in Equestria. Yes, even bigger than the Apple Family. All of Equestria relies on them for their wheat and wheat by-products, and Fillydelphia in particular would starve without it. So when a fire destroys all of Wheatfield’s farmland, the disaster puts the entire country in an economic and agricultural bind.
But Applejack has a crazy idea. Sweet Apple Acres just finished a harvest, but what if they could do another one? What if, using the ponies’ inherent ability to manipulate the weather, they pushed Sweet Apple Acres through an entire year, complete with all four changing seasons, in just one week? That would be fast enough to save Fillydelphia, if barely. It’s an impossible task. Luckily, Applejack knows a certain weatherpony who knows a thing or two about doing the impossible.
We all know that ponies control the weather and are even responsible for changing the seasons. But I always assumed that nature still worked fairly normally in general, i.e. plants grow slowly and the fruit takes time to pollinate and on and on. This story abandons all pretense of there being anything natural whatsoever about Equestrian nature. If the ponies push the four seasons through in a week, the trees will cooperate and make fresh, healthy apples, and to Tartarus with petty things like logic.
This wouldn’t be much of a story if doing such a thing was a cakewalk. HapHazred still applies rules, such as the limits of pony physiology and magic. What Applejack is proposing is a huge challenge that requires preparation, organization, horsepower, magic, and talent. The story is written in such a way as to make clear that this is an impressive feat. You wouldn’t think a story about a farming rush-job would be that exciting, but this makes it work.
Of course, HapHazred couldn’t resist making this a shipfic, too. No need to speculate, we all know who the ship is. But the author manages to reel it in, keeping the story about the effort to save Fillydelphia and only having the romantic bits a quiet underpinning that doesn’t take center stage until the story is almost over. At the same time, it makes sure the reader is aware of what’s coming by regularly reminding us of Rainbow’s longing for a less lonely lifestyle and her coming to appreciate what Applejack takes for granted.
When I started this, I honestly didn’t expect it to be this serious or good. It ends up with solid weather-based worldbuilding, a subtle romance, and a surprising fight against nature itself to save an entire city. It turned out far better than I imagined.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good!
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
Fancy That? — Pretty Good
Unexpected Turbulence, Remain Calm and Don't Murder Anypony — Pretty Good
Ponyville's Bad Day — Needs Work
Flank-ology
6,607 Words
By Fire Gazer the Alchemist
Twilight has an extremely unusual request for Applejack. She needs to spend a few days… or weeks… maybe months… staring at her butt. For science. Only if Applejack agrees, of course.
This was delightfully awkward and is everything you expect. Well, almost everything you expect; believe it or not, the science bit is legit. But that doesn’t take away from the ultimate point of the story, which is Twilight doing a lot of flank observation and getting a lot more pleasure in the act than Applejack would expect. Of course, it also comes with the traditional romance-based obligatory “I have no idea why she’s acting so strange around me” reaction from Applejack. Which will either annoy you or highly entertain you, depending upon your perspective.
Either way, this is a fun story that I enjoyed from beginning to end. My only real problem with it is that we never once see any other characters. Considering the story takes place 90% at Sweet Apple Acres, you’d expect to see one of the Apples noticing these events and reacting to it, to say nothing of tree-napping Rainbow Dash or Number One Assistant Spike. Ignoring those issues, though, I liked it.
Shippers will delight in this. And anyone amused by the awkwardness the title and its description implies.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
I'd Do Her — WHYRTY?
Blur — Pretty Good
I'd Kiss Her — Pretty Good
I Want a Throne — Worth It
Starlight Jailbreak
1,162 Words
By bottled_up
In an alternate Equestria, Celestia will stop at nothing to prevent the prophecy that would free Nightmare Moon from banishment. So when she receives word that a filly has received the mark of the prophecy – “the stars shall aid in her escape” – she does only the most sensible thing: send an assassin to murder the child.
Most of the story revolves around the unnamed assassin and his effort to get to Twilight Sparkle. This proves tricky when he discovers that Twilight’s parents aren’t the defenseless, humble civilians he’d been led to believe. The story diverges significantly from canon, not only by having Celestia send an assassin for a newborn Twilight, but also by having cutie marks apparently gained at birth.
This is less a standalone story than the introduction to a multi-chapter adventure/thriller that will never be. Which is a shame because, as with so many stories like this, there’s a lot of potential for a fun epic in this. On its own, the story is little more than a brief fight scene with significant implications. Make no mistake, it’s a well done fight scene, but still just a fight scene. And a brief one, at that.
It’s too bad bottled_up lacks the ambition to follow up on this. Perhaps someone else out there will make good use of the idea.
Bookshelf: Worth It
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
Gateway Drug — Pretty Good
The Meaning of Admiration
1,826 Words
By Konseiga
On a particularly rainy day, Rarity gets a customer with a heartfelt request.
According to the description, this was supposed to be a story for practicing description, dialogue, and emotion. It involves a stallion, Rarity’s only customer for the day, telling her about his wife and how his wife admired Rarity as a hero. Or, if you’re a cynic (as one commenter clearly was), it’s about Rarity falling for a con to get free service. I’m an optimist, though, so I certainly believe the former.
The story isn’t bad on the whole, but I think they messed up in one crucial area: the repair. The stallion wants his hat, given to him by his late wife, repaired. This could have been the centerpoint of the whole story, but instead Konseiga focuses on the dialogue of the stallion. When the time comes to actually repair the hat, what do we get?
Carefully and deliberately, she applied all of her skill into mending the hat, taking great care with every stitch and seam. The end result was close to flawless. The color of the patches blended together to create a beautiful medley, and the seams were nigh invisible.
That’s it? I mean, really, that’s it? This is supposed to be a story practicing description and emotion, and this is all you’re giving us for what could, no, should have been the most intensely emotional and descriptive portion of the story? This is the part where the narrative was meant to shine, in which we really come to understand the meaning and value of something so simple as a hat. It’s a shame Konseiga made no attempt to capitalize on it.
Oh, well. Again, it’s not a bad story on the whole, but neither is it a shining example of literature. I won’t begrudge that Konseiga didn’t wordsmith it – Luna knows I almost never bother to wordsmith my stories – and I only cry foul over the hat mistake. This will likely appeal to Rarity fans and lovers of slice-of-life.
Bookshelf: Worth It
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
Forever Faithful — WHYRTY?
Halloween Special: Dreaming — Needs Work
Know When to Quit — Needs Work
Let Us Out
4,598 Words
By Billy G Gruff
Pinkie Pie wakes up groggy and weak in her room, unable to remember much of what happened in the last few days. And now she realizes she’s been sealed in, Twilight and Starlight working in tandem to prevent her from getting out. She doesn’t get why. She just wants to make cupcakes. Find Gummy. See the ponies. They want out.
For the second time, I find myself trying not to compare a story to my own. Just like how Rinnaul released No One Goes There roughly a year after my own Aurora with a remarkably similar premise, Let Us Out was released roughly a year after my own Pressure with a remarkably similar premise. So similar, in fact, that even the cause of Pinkie’s suffering is identical. It’s interesting to think how two people with no contact can write on the same topics like this.
Generally speaking, I liked the story, but it never impacted me in a way a horror should. Part of this is because Billy G Gruff writes Pinkie Pie’s mentality well, and the bouncy, happy Pinkie Pie has no place in a horror. There are certainly creepy things happening, but it’s all painted in Pinkie’s signature voice, and the clash was just too much for me to take the events seriously.
There are a great many ways to write Pinkie Pie. It’s certainly possible to maintain her voice but also make her a serious character. Possible, but tricky. This story doesn’t seem to really try, instead having Pinkie blissfully unaware of what is wrong even as she’s performing acts beyond even her unnatural abilities. She does notice some things that are weird, but at no point do I ever get the sense that she’s afraid or even worried. Mildly annoyed, at worst. It’s hard for me to get into the mood of a horror if the protagonist from whose eyes we are seeing everything isn’t in that mood herself.
It’s a shame, because the concept here has a ton of potential. I like the intention, but not the approach. The writing is still good overall and the implications damning. If you want to give it a try and maybe get something out of it, I won’t blame you.
Bookshelf: Needs Work
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
New Author!
A Simpler Time
4,130 Words
By DJLowrider
While helping Rarity at the boutique, Twilight spots an old, worn filly’s costume of a lobster. It reminds her old old days, and she abruptly realizes that one of her only friends from a very long time ago has been right here in Ponyville all along.
This is a semi-silly story in which we learn that a filly Rarity was once brought to Canterlot by her mother but was left in a mall’s daycare with one other, highly bookish filly. The story is, perhaps ironically, very simple in its delivery, but that works in its favor. It ends with Twilight and Rarity concluding that, as fun and carefree as life was back then, they much prefer the here and now.
The story is decent enough, I suppose, but it does come with one glaring problem: at least at the time of writing, DJLowrider had no idea how to write children. I’ll grant we don’t know how old Rarity and Twilight were in that coincidental meeting as children, but the suggestion that both their parents left them at the mall’s daycare because, quote, “walking too much tires them out quickly” suggests that they’re very young. Certainly too young to be talking like adults, which they do continuously.
The narrative, too, fails to match the personality of children. Their thoughts are too logical, too focused, too mature. Even when they’re playing their make-believe game, they think and speak in a manner that makes it feel like we’re watching grown-up Twilight and Rarity instead of two kids. It puts a significant damper on the cutesy feel that the author was undoubtedly going for. This is made all the worse by the overall telly nature of the writing style, which does nothing to help us get into either character’s mindset, either as kids or adults.
A story that doesn’t manage to achieve what it’s after. It’s too bad, really; the idea here has all the potential to be adorable.
Bookshelf: Needs Work
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
New Author!
Closing Time
1,755 Words
By Just A Random Pegasus
Up until now, I hadn’t read any stories shipping Starlight with Trixie, so I was curious. This one was pretty popular. Seemed a natural choice. The story is little more than Trixie buying a necklace for Starlight so she can ask her out.
Alas, I was unimpressed. First off, why is Trixie interested in Starlight? “Because she’s a good friend and beautiful.” Really? That’s it? I mean, I’d get such a shallow answer if Trixie just saw Starlight one day on the street, with no prior knowledge of who she was, and decided she had to ask her out. But this is her first and best friend, a pony she’s known for a while now, whom she’s had time to get to appreciate on a deeper level than mere surface characteristics. If you’re interested in taking the relationship to the next level after that, you’ve got some much bigger reasons than “she’s beautiful.” This was an opportunity to really see Trixie get out of her element and say something profound, or at least touching, and instead we get “she’s beautiful.”
There’s also the nature of the gift. It’s a necklace. A ridiculously expensive one, at that. Seems to be going way overboard to me, especially for a first step of asking for a date. It’s also shallow. If you think you have to give a girl an expensive and exquisitely useless rock in order to get her to date you, you’re looking at it all wrong. Even if she happens to like jewelry, you don’t have to go this far over it. I would think that Trixie, who lives her life practically out of necessity and knows how to produce theatrics, would have a far better, more personal, less expensive manner of showing her affections to Starlight than giving her a giant rock.
The majority of the story has Trixie at the jewelry store getting a particular necklace. I’m not sure why. Nothing special happens there. The author could have expanded the second chapter to be more personal and completely removed the first chapter to create something far more effective. In fact, the second chapter could use some expansion, as it is very direct and telly and doesn’t do much to pull the reader into the mood.
I’m sorry to say that this one was entirely underwhelming. The writing and the behavior of the characters are shallow and there’s no atmosphere to the piece whatsoever. I’m honestly not sure why this story landed such popularity when it was released, except that perhaps the TrixiexStarlight ship might have been trending at the time. This is an example of why I don’t trust public opinion much.
Bookshelf: Needs Work
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
New Author!
Alicorn Genesis
5,301 Words
By Jordan179
The Concept that we would call Fusion calls upon her sister and friend, Gravity and Dissonance. She has discovered a world among the many dimensions of the universe containing a new race: the ponies. She would very much like to get to know them and, maybe, help them become one of the greater races.
This is a highly experimental story designed around the idea of describing the indescribable. Set some ten millennia before the present, it describes the gods – for lack of a better term – that comprise the true nature of Celestia, Luna, and Discord. Much of the story is about how and why they chose to manifest themselves on the mortal plain to be among the ponies.
I have to wonder at how much effort Jordan179 put into this story. The descriptivity is clearly its primary draw and where all the focus was set. There’s nothing wrong with this, and it lends the story a distinct creativity on the cosmic and theoretical scale. It will appeal to the worldbuilders and anyone who enjoys descriptive exploration.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
New Author!
An Alicorn's Fate
1,373 Words
By Smexy Sombra
In this story, Smexy Sombra decides to tell (emphasis on the tell) us the two possible ways a alicorn can die. Yes, “a” alicorn. In the author’s dubious defense, they were sleep deprived while writing this.
This is one of those “I have a theory, here it is, story over” types. Roughly half of it is a long, almost encyclopedic recounting of what happens to alicorns when they die. The other half is Celestia suffering the worst of the two possibilities. It’s a decidedly dark result, in case the cover art didn’t tip you off.
I won’t judge the concept, as it could work just as well as any other theory with the right prodding and detail. The execution, on the other hand, is certainly a problem. This is an idea best demonstrated through a direct view of the happenings in all its dark glory, not told offhand via cool logic and a quick scene of defeat. Had we witnessed this through multiple scenes over time, gradually showing Celestia’s weakening and unwillingness to let things end properly, this could have been a vastly more interesting and emotional story.
This may appeal to the worldbuilders seeking more theories about how alicorns “work”. Otherwise, I don’t see it affecting a lot of readers very strongly.
Bookshelf: Needs Work
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
Little things... — Worth It
Time Well Spent — Worth It
Little Lyra and You — Needs Work
Silly Stories of the Student Six
2,541 Words
By Level Dasher
Requested by Super Trampoline
A short collection of mini-stories, all of which are feghoots. For those of you unaware, a feghoot is a story that exists solely to set up a pun at the end. They are usually cringe-worthy.
And these are no exception, but hey, if they make you smile, it was worth it. My favorite, which also happens to be the one I judged for Super Trampiline’s feghoot contest this was made for, is the waiter one. I might be biased though, having once been a waiter.
If you’re interested in reading a bunch of silly stories, all less than 1,000 words in length, that exist for no reason save silliness, here you go.
Bookshelf: Worth It
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
New Author!
Stories for Next Week:
Moonlight by Grey Sentinel
The Royal Ponyville Orchestra by Distaff Pope
Twilight Falls, Sunset Dawns by DrakeyC
Five Star Service - A Gentleman for Mares Tale by Firesight
The Secret Life of Rarity by BronyWriter
Twilight Sparkle of the Royal Guard by King of Beggars
The Daughter Doo: Honorary Cutie Mark Crusader by Ponky
Empty Horizons by Goldenwing
Diamond in the Rough by Peregrine Caged
Final Solution by Luna-tic Scientist
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Thanks! I wasn't really expecting anything to come of those; like you said, they were purely for silliness. And I was a waiter once myself, so that one was from personal experience.
In defense of A Simpler Time, which I really liked, I expect the adult-style dialogue is meant to mimic not what the two were saying, but what they thought they were saying. All part of the make-believe.
I haven't read it in a long time, though, so if that doesn't sound quite right, tell me. :B
Haven't read any of this batch. Looks like you struck an uncharacteristically low group of them this time, too. Four out of nine got a "Needs Work"? That doesn't happen often.
Man, I really need to finish One Week Year
I wish I could write half as consistently as you. Most of my stuff would have been finished by now.
5190846
Being a waiter wasn't too bad.
Never want to do it again, though.
5190888
I never considered that angle. I don't think it would have swayed me regardless, but it's an interesting one to consider.
5190937
Four out of ten, actually. But yeah, it's not common at all. I suppose they can't all be filled with shiny gems.
5191004
I mean, it's only 30k words, so why wouldn't you?
5191055
I wish I could write twice as consistently as me. I still wouldn't be satisfied, though.
5191062
You overly humble bastard >:(
5191066
If I have to choose between being an overly humble bastard or an egotistical jackass, I'll take the former.
Writing mojo... I remember having one of those, not long ago. I'm glad yours is rollin'. I need to get mine rollin' too.
5192588
It can be tricky to get the momentum going again, as I've been experience over the last half-year or so. But oh, does it feel nice when you do.