TOur Lives Among The Equine

• MLP: FiM
• Dark
• Drama
• Anthology

We "animals" never get to speak in your language, Equines, but we do have some interesting tales to tell. Some perhaps disturbing. (And also, some Equines have disproportionate say in this, which I'm highly against)

• Death
• Violence
• Fluttershy
• Applejack
• Angel
• Octavia
• Other

Fabian Corcair · 9.1k words · 562 views

I read: 6 chapters, 7k words
I rate: 4/10
I recommend: Skip

I don’t know about you; namely as I’ve just woken up from two days of debauchery and 20 shots of cheap vodka and some questionable fashion decisions and don’t really know all that much about anything right now, let alone the preferences of random internet denizens; but I can safely say that, for all its various failings in actually giving coherent and satisfying lore, I never really felt like MLP really had to expand on the non-pony creatures - especially those that never played a significant role later on, like the cows or the birds. And what, might you ask, it's this story about? Why, it's about the cows and the birds!

Specifically, it is an anthology of flash fiction (somewhat) that details bits and pieces of Equestria from the non-pony inhabitants’ various perspectives. And then it turns into novella with chapters and recurring characters in a move I can only describe as more jarring than a cannery. Because the writer asked me to, I’m reviewing the novella specifically - the story of Octavia getting blinded with acid. Yes, really.

In terms of plot, I cannot say I was impressed. This is for two main reasons: Constantly shifting and unmarked first-person perspective narrative makes it awfully difficult to actually understand what is going on, especially when a lot of this narration is coming from OCs and poorly developed and weakly distinguished OCs at that. Furthermore, the characters, not just the OCs, are not particularly likeable and have a habit of coming off as obnoxious or bland. 

The plot, in case you were interested, for Murky Mystical Bonds is as follows: Octavia, for whatever reason, ambushed by some rival, is blinded, and her various friends and bandmates then rush her to hospital and fret over her for a while - did I mention that this anthology’s original “draw” was the fact that it focused on non-pony perspectives? 

Furthermore, the actual writing style is not particularly remarkable either. In addition to a noticeable amount of grammatical errors and poor phrasing, the narration itself is fairly clunky and often concentrates on irrelevant details and skims over the significant developments of the plot. Furthermore, a lot of it is stream of consciousness and, as I’ve stated before, little of it has enough character to it to be really be enjoyable to read.

Plot: 2/5. Murky Mystical Bonds is paced poorly, either too fast or too slow, and the multitude of characters introduced makes actually understanding its story to be a challenge, especially with arbitrary vignettes and flashbacks seeded in it.
Characters: 2/5. Everyone is underwhelming here and it makes it difficult to feel sympathy for characters with incredibly cardboard dialogue and actions.
Style: 2/5. The grammar is poor enough to distract from the story, the narration is otherwise bland with poorly handled and phrased exposition.
Execution: 1/5. The novella is disappointing for what could have been an interesting intrigue story told by the fly-on-the-wall character of the crow.
Overall Rating: 7/20 = 4/10

To Brony Philosopher: My primary advice would be to decide on a narrator character, instead of switching between perspectives and not marking said switches either - that was really disorienting to have to read. Furthermore, I would clean up the grammar and stop Unnecessarily Capitalizing Words. I would also advise that you cut down on the pony OCs because MLP has literal herds of characters and new ones don’t add anything if they’re going to be forgettable and replaceable.

For something like this: Not The Hero, although not an anthology by any means, is an excellent story that does take the time to discuss non-pony races in great and appreciable detail.

As always, if you enjoyed this review, why not check out one of my stories? While totally unrelated to anything mentioned above, Biography of a Hikikomori is, in my overinflated opinion, not criminally underrated but there’s definitely a misdemeanour involved if you haven’t read it yet.

7076249
The lack of proper lore is a side effect of the show's production. They were kinda making it up as they went along, which is why the backstory for the Pillars often contradicts itself.

7076252
I am aware of that, I'm just saying that I don't really that some bits - like the cows - needed to be expanded upon.

7076255
Fair enough. I enjoyed the review, anyways.

Thanks for the criticism, I've been waiting for something like this for over a year now. I like to understand more about the clunky narration and the focus on irrelevant details. I have ADHD and Autism, so I could use as much advice as possible to fix that

(BTW, by off the wall, do you mean angry or eccentric?)

7090412
You're welcome for the review. What I mean with clunky narration is that your writing doesn't "flow" well - as in reading it out loud is difficult to do and it doesn't sound natural to read or to listen to. The word choice and syntax are important here and your poor use of them make the story hard to read and stay immersed in. Its often wise to read over your work or have somebody else do so in order to avoid this.

Irrelevant details are things in the story that don't advance the plot or build characters or the world in a meaningful way. Definitions vary but a good rule of thumb is not to mention anything that doesn't come up again later or have an effect on the story. Chekov's Gun as an example, if you write that a house has a rifle on the mantlepiece that rifle should be fired later or it should show that the person who owns it likes and uses firearms. Focusing on things that don't matter, often like appearances or scene details, detract from the story as a whole. It would be like going on a game drive and having your guide point out the buttons on his shirt to you instead of the animals and plants you could be looking at.

Off the wall can mean either of those, depending on context. Did I use it in the review or something?

7091385
Read it out loud during revising and editing, got it.

I may have added unnecessary details in an attempt to immersed the reader in the plot or setting, and I additionally and impulsively world build, but now I see that I added too much and should only write things that are brought up or used later in the story.

You called the crows "Off the wall" I wasn't sure which meaning you were trying to say

7091385
When I started writing, I was told a lot that I don't add enough details about the scenes. And then later in the weird part of the anthology where I started to write about the ponies, I was then told that seems to add to much irrelevant detail and not on the main story. How do I know when or what to add detail?

I can't tell seems to be very different than the audience. I like some irrelevant details because those ground me to the world, and I like some of the key details missing to add suspense. But clearly I executed it poorly. I don't seem to be reliable, so I wonder if you have a guide or formula that will aid me