Fireflies

Source

Princess Luna is alone. Alone in the night. All alone.

Except for the fireflies.

And herself.

(Cover art by BlitzPony)

Chapters (1)

Comments ( 6 )

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Azreale

Azreale #1 · Oct 5th, 2013 · · ·

Good story, obviously needs editing as you said but it was a cute idea and well written nonetheless! I don't see too many writers that can make present tense narration work.

angelic_song

angelic_song #2 · Oct 5th, 2013 · · ·

It was...nice

Regidar

Regidar #3 · Oct 5th, 2013 · · ·

Obligatory:

Discorded

Discorded #4 · Oct 6th, 2013 · · ·

Cute

Mercury Zero

Mercury Zero #5 · Oct 9th, 2013 · · ·

Luna is best pony, and I love the idea of fireflies. Little sparkling creatures that light up the night like stars, so I gravitated to your story.

I have a thought though... I love Luna ( pony waifu!), but I love her because she has flaws. The most amazing thing about her, to me, is that she's a sinner who's earned redemption (or, in my head-canon, still fights for redemption), and I'm not alone in that belief. Chances are that's how you feel too, since you wrote a story like this, and this kind of story comes up bunches, but I think that making Nightmare Moon into some sort of external force from Luna (or possibly some discrete mental illness?) cheapens the character significantly. Fanfiction writers have the opportunity to explore what it means to own your mistakes, to truly seek redemption, to suffer from the temptation to do evil in the name of being loved by her subjects, but if Nightmare Moon is some sort of magic entity that invades her mind and can be defeated like any other evil creature, then it says absolutely nothing about the human condition, and it means I have no reason to hate her, or to love her, she's just some boring victim of a boring villian at that point.

That's ultimately a personal thing. I love explorations of what it means to be a villain, and how sometimes even evil can be relatable and understandable. Other writers and readers might not care so much about that, and that's okay.

Also, I wonder if this story might be a little too 'telly'. I wish that things were a little more low key. Like, rather than the voice of Nightmare Moon barking out Luna's insecurities so overtly like that, it might have been nice if they were danced around and hinted at, so that the reader gets to share in Luna's feelings, and to make their own judgements.

Also there seems to be a lack of trust in the reader's ability to understand things, like:

The alicorn’s muzzle wrinkles; she stomps one hoof on the ground as if to relieve stress.

We know what wrinkled muzzles and stompy hooves mean, but there's no need to think about it if you're just going to outright tell us in the same sentence. There are lots of examples of this problem, and if you need some help I'd be glad to point some more out for you.

And, I have a bit of a problem with the emphasis. Some people might use the word 'purple' for it. Here's a quick couple examples:

she coos ever so softly

'ever so' ? Why so much emphasis? Is it really necessary for the reader to be told the magnitude of the softness? Does that affect the plot at all, and if it does, maybe don't just outright say it? Maybe hint at it, or use imagery around it, like "cood almost too gently to be heard".

Slowly she begins to walk towards

"She walks slowly towards" ? If you're not careful, you could end up using 'starts to' or 'begins to' on every verb, which will make it less meaningful when there's a real reason to use it. Like for example, if the character is doing something that will be prolonged, or is part of some progression like, "The earth pony starts to chop the onions."

Meh.. these are minor complaints I guess.. really, it probably just needs a pass or two from an editor. I'm sorry for being so negative. I guess I'm just a grumpy gus. Also, I'm up way too late and I'm wasted on too much caffeine. Don't listen to my ranting :p

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