FREETHINKERFREETHINKERFREETHINKERF
I don't really want to say much about it, since almost any information at all would ruin the effect. What I am willing to give you is this simple question: Have you ever wondered what it'd be like to live in Ponyville?
I'd appreciate any constructive criticism!
Purdy picture made by Niklas123dk:
http://niklas123dk.deviantart.com/art/A-Delightful-Journey-460841363
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Chapter 6 will come when it comes. It depends on what ideas I come up with really. If you have ideas on what to do I'd be glad to use them! In fact, it'd probably speed up the writing process...
I don't see any problems. I'm not a critic but I do read a lot of fan fictions.
I can't wait for the next few chapters.
4161671 Ahh thank you! Sorry for the late reply, I haven't been getting on fimfiction very much recently. I'm actually halfway through the next chapter right now and with your inspiration expect it to be released soon!
4400276 yay! I can't wait.
Nice, so our Human is named Human? Why hasn't anyone thought about that before?
4474956 Lol, ikr?
I don't mean to puff my own feathers or anything but such a concept is genius!
Well, I'm not line-editing yet, so I wasn't looking for grammatical stuff. There are a few stylistic things that you may or may not want to change, but that is optional and I'll mention it later. Beyond that, I'm not seeing any huge problems, your formatting is pretty consistent, you are using italics for thoughts, Lyra and Bonbon seem reasonably in character. This is pretty good, and I don't have much criticism besides the stylistic stuff. I'll look a little more closely, perhaps do a smige of line-editing in the following chapters, but I have no huge problems with this.
On a second brief look, I've caught a few things.
This is a bit confusing. You start paragraph with Lyra jumping back and then immediately follow it with your human character saying something. Because of how this is formatted, it made me think on the first pass that it was Lyra saying "Don't--Argh!!!" not your human. The core problem here is that you change focus too quickly from one character to the next. The sentence right before the dialogue is about Lyra, so the audience will assume that the following dialogue is Lyra's too. Try to keep your paragraphs all focused on one thing. That thing can be an action or a character, but it needs to be consistent.
Next, you using action tags to their full potential. You are using dialogue tags perfectly I applaud you
I've worked with several people who have a very hard time figureing out where the commas go in and around the "he said" "she said" bits of your dialogue. And you are using the occasional action tag, which is good, but I would like to give you a new tool.
I introduce to your writing tool-box, the interrupting action tag.
"So"- he asks while idly scratching at his nose -"what's an interrupting action tag?"
This is when you stick the thing that is being done inside the dialogue with hyphens. Depending on where the hyphens are, it slightly changes the meaning. Hyphens on the outside of the quotation marks means that the action is being done in sync with the dialogue, so he is still talking while he scratches his nose. If the hyphens were on the inside of the quotation marks, then the dialogue stops until the action has been completed.
It's just a tool, but it's a tool I thought you might like to know about.
The rest of this is going to be about stylistics, so consider it optional. And since you want this to have a more relaxed feel to it, you are free to decide it doesn't apply here.
So, lets take a look at this quote.
Would you ever see this in J.R.R Tolkine's The Lord of The Rings? How about any other published book you can think of? No, you wouldn't. And I'm not trying to be mean, but you don't see stylistic choices like this outside of maybe a comic book, which is an entirely different medium and should be judged by different rules. The cap-locks (The Royal Canter-lock voice, if you prefer) and the miss spelling of a word to show how it is pronounced aren't things that professional writers do. It's just a writing convention, but if you want to look professional and be taken seriously, you should follow it.
I think the reason for these particular things to be avoided falls under the spirit of show, don't tell. In that quote, you are just telling the reader how Bonbon sounds with the dialogue, telling the reader she is yelling with the cap-locks. You can send the same message, and send it better without those things and with a little bit more description.
See, that gets about the same idea across in a more professional looking way that is also more colorful.
Now, I want to reiterate, what you have isn't technically wrong in any way. If you decide to keep writing the way you have been writing, more power to 'ya. But you have been warned that it is frowned upon in some of the more professional circles, and shown that there are ways to tell your readers the same things without using things like cap-locks. Oh, and the same goes for using multiple exclamation points in a row.
I hope this is helpful, let me know if you want me to go through the rest of your story looking for stuff like this.
4496839 Thanks!!! So much to work off of! While I won't go back to fix these issues, I'll definitely apply them to future chapters. First off, I'd like to mention that I had no clue the interrupting action tag existed and quite frankly, I'm intensely excited for the new forms of dialogue I'll be able to write in the future. Thanks for that!
About the Royal Canterlock voice, I don't know if I'll be able to resist
I'll try my best though.
Thanks for the feedback, I really mean it. If you have any other criticisms to offer, I'd be happy to receive them! Though, make sure they're different criticisms, because I'm not actually going to go back and edit the ones you already mentioned, my story being relaxed and all.
From a quick glance, your punctuation and grammar is better than most. The most glaring error is when you occasionally put different speakers in the same paragraph. Different speaker, different paragraph. There's some tense confusion here and there, but you have a decent grasp on tenses. There's at least one spot where you could use a hyphen.
Your dialogue tags could use some work. Some of what you learned in English class is terrible for writing. "Saidisms," the various things you say instead of "said"—such as enthused, chimed, argued, etc.—are actually detracting. Your teachers probably taught you a billion words you could use instead of other words, or if they were lazy, just how to use a thesaurus. Some will get on my case about this, but you rarely need to use more than "said," "added," "replied," or "continued." I also like to use ones that portray volume on occasion. By nature, "said" is easily ignored—as much as some like to say otherwise. You don't have to use dialogue tags either. Take this quote for example:
Action tags are a good way to add variety. Let your dialogue set the tone instead of the verb afterwards.
I sincerely hope those deleted comments aren't your doing. Any deleted comments will make you look bad, like you can't handle any sort of negativity.
Almost forgot to ask about eggs. Are your ponies full vegan? Cakes are a vital ingredient in cakes and pastries, and eggs can be laid unfertilized.
4554590 I really appreciate what you've got to say here (seriously thankyousomuch), and apart from what you may have assumed by my deleted comments, I take criticism very well.
I only deleted my own posts because I felt they were irrelevant to the story as of now.
As for the different speakers in the same paragraph, you'll notice that I've figured that out at around Chapter 4, where each speaker should now have his/her own paragraph. When I started this story, I was still trying to get used to the formatting and flow of creative online fiction.
As for the dialogue tags, I'll try to keep what you said in mind. I've always been iffy on what words to use, and how to avoid dialogue tags as much as possible without confusing the reader. I really appreciate your insight on this.
As for the eggs. I've never thought about that...I'll get back to you.
Once again, I am eternally grateful.
4554590 I'm not sure if you saw my response (which ended up in Chapter 8 for some reason), but I'll make sure to look for and fix all of what you said. I really appreciate the feedback.
As for the eggs, the ponies in my story will not consume these. However, you may notice the presence of cupcakes in future chapters. My explanation is that they've developed an alternate method of creating said cupcakes.
4572850 I actually didn't get your previous message, and I'm glad you took the criticism well. If I remember correctly, eggs are usually a binding agent, and I have heard that applesauce can be used as well, though I haven't actually tried it and it would probably influence the flavor.
I feel a little silly for not noticing they were your comments that were deleted.
4573064 Perhaps tasteless applesauce? xD
No worries about the comments