Blank!
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Hm. Where is this story going to go?
Also I thought the minimum word count for publication was 1000. Maybe the word counter's wrong?
5132735 See the Author's Note.
5132763 Ah, thanks for that.
I feel like you spoke to my soul…
Really great start!
felt
Oh, I liked the second chapter as it was when I read this first posted. Hopefully you don't change it too much? It tonally counterpointed this really well, and established a great picture of Twi's psyche. (As much healthier and more relateable, honestly.)
5135083 Thank you. There's some problems with her character voice and such that I need to hammer out. I also had the usual trouble with tense shifts.
Stop being in my head.
Woah... That was deep, depressing and accurate to me to a point.
5140565 5133740 5140926 I'm glad to hear it reached you like this. One of the big challenges in this story is keeping Twilight Twilight while also making her relatable to the reader, and having the narrative reflect that. Which is why the second and following chapters are giving me such trouble—and that's trouble with a T and that rhymes with C and that stands for Clop
This very much resonated with me. I'm looking forward to your next chapter.
Regarding the soundtracks; if you think a track is not mood-appropriate, or badly-timed, do let me know. Any other comments, critiques, ideas, protests, encouragements, discouragements, and, especially, feelings, that you may want to share, please go ahead. I'll be looking forward to your feedback.
Why is there a huge blank space at the end?
I was in an area where I didn't want to have music playing, so I didn't check the sound tracks.
However, I quite enjoyed the chapter! I can feel, very much, that I relate to this story, as a girl rather like Twilight herself and seemingly in a similar situation as the Twilight in this story. It's perhaps a bit too close to home for me, but there you have it. I'm very interested to see where you're going with this.
Twilight checking her heart rate and various physical signs of lust and the conclusion she reached actually made me do a double take and lift my eyebrow. I'm not sure, entirely, why it intrigued me so, but it did. I sort of habitually did that today, actually. There was a female friend of mine in a science lab at my university leaning against a table. She was resting her forearms on the table, and she was wearing a tank top, and an unbuttoned plaid shirt over it that was just hanging off of her shoulders. I surprised myself, however, as for a good 5 seconds, I couldn't tear my eyes away from her, and when I checked my heart rate, it was significantly higher.
Granted, I get what Twilight's up to with trying to prevent that reaction. I get uncomfortable in a certain respect if I allow myself to think of my friends like that, even if sometimes I simply cannot help it. Unfortunately, I don't have a particularly large amount of time left outside of school in which I can, er, reset my mental state, so to speak. Physics major. Bit stressful.
At any rate, enough of my meandering. I think my point was that I am interested in this because I feel a bit like you're writing about me, and I find it interesting to know that with every word, I relate more and more to Twilight. I'd say that in order to write in a relatable way for a story such as this, you'd need your own semblance of experience with it, but I still find it very interesting that you're managing to write so, well, accurately, I suppose.
This is really an interesting medium through which to communicate something so deep and difficult to wade through as this, and I am very much looking forward to where you're actually going with it and what conclusions you will inevitably draw and assert.
I am very much looking forward to your next chapter, whenever that may be.
So, I know what I read, I just don't know why. The obvious impulse to answer "Cryo, you were looking for a clopfic, and due to the title/premise you thought you'd get to read about Twilight playing with her bits." That might seem to be an accurate answer, but it would be wrong because it answers a different, though very similar, question than the one I asked.
On to the what.
What this is is a character study. It is not a story in anything but the most permissive sense. Stuff happens, but we're given no reason for this particular slice to be told about. There is no plot. There is no conflict. There is no meaningful growth, change, or even just something silly happening for cheap laughs. What is there, and what is cheap, is that the story dances around the fact that Twilight was masturbating shortly before the story starts.
With that understood as far as what this is and isn't, the characterization is... interesting to say the least. Not interesting in the sense that it grips you and keeps you hooked into the story, wanting to read more. Interesting in that it takes a fair amount of thought to wrap my head around it. Several things about Twilight's depiction in the piece are recognizable to the character we know and love. There are parts that delve a little deeper than the surface shown on the show, and they build Twilight in a particular direction that at least tentatively is believable. I am specifically referring to the necessary inclusion of lists, Twilight's particular use of them as laid out here, and her reasons and musings as to why. All of that is rather solid. There are of course objectionable things, but I'm mostly focusing on the positive things here first and will get into those later. Structure is important, after all.
Between Twilight's musings on the Rarity/Spike dynamic, and her thoughts about her friend specifically, those were fairly good and dovetailed well with the aforementioned depiction of Twilight. The brief amount of time we spend outside of Twilight's head and being allowed to directly observe Rarity and Spike are also well done, and very believable.
And that pretty much dries up the well in terms of positive things to say. It is a character study, and it does a passing job on characterization. Only passing though, not amazing or insightful, and certainly not engaging.
On to the technical/grammar/style section!
Despite generally good grammar and well-constructed prose, there were a few errors that popped out to me in particular. Wrong/mispelled words at least one of which should have been picked up by and spellchecker, while the other two would have been found by an out-loud reading probably:
In chapter 1, "won" should be own.
In chapter two, "sa" should be said, "abstracted" should be distracted.
Also, as pointed out by Worldslayer over there, you have this giant block of empty space at the end. I was prompted to highlight everything to see if there was some irritating white-colored "hidden" text or something, but no.
For something that barely tops 1k words, these sorts of things stand out all the more, and are easier to find and fix than in a novel.
I don't normally pick on style too much, unless there is something atrociously wrong. In this section, I'm pretty much expressing a bias here. I understand some readers enjoy this sort of thing, but I personally don't, I know this is my opinion, but I do know it is not a rare one. Video links and links to other outside material like pictures are always bad. Even when they're done well they still break immersion. Taking even a moment to look away from the story to fiddle with youtube is time your brain is forcibly taken out of the narrative and forced to deal with reality before working back into the magic of storytelling. Now, the fact that this character study lacks any immersive quality to speak of means that there is none to break, but in the off chance you do work on this and turn it into an actual story, do keep in mind that even for those who enjoy it, even if your selection of music is spot-on, it still ruins what you're primarily going for: immersion.
Which leads me out of the technical section and into the meat. The bad. Back to the fact that this is a character study. There are two major sections to this, part A and part B.
Part A.
The characterization, as mentioned above, is pretty much the be-all and end-all of a character study. You have no plot, no conflict, no growth, nothing. You are essentially showing us a picture of who Twilight is, by examining a small slice of her life. Now, in this endeavor, there are parts you did well I'll remind you. You have a decent framework of who and what Twilight is in there. The bad is that it is all used to set up this... personality that doesn't fit at all. At the risk of sounding like a personal attack, I can only assume you're writing some of yourself into this character, as is generally the case of all authors. I only bring it up because while it is generally understood that authors do write themselves into the story they tell (write what you know), there is also an expected effort to hide or mask that self as well as possible. Perhaps you were trying to with the somewhat more than merely token nods to canon quirks and personality elements. Maybe it would be possible to do a better job and end up far less objectionable.
Now, this wouldn't be the first attempt by anyone to look into the sex-life of one of the characters, nor will it be the last. The idea that Twilight is a somewhat creepy nymphomaniac who has to mentally keep herself in check to avoid staring at and becoming aroused by her friend simply by being in proximity with her is a hard one to accept. That this is Twilight's normal, and she mentally cheers (accompanied with picture) for successfully not doing so is really odd.
Part B.
If the story were to continue, hypothetically, into a scene where Twilight loses control in the spa and ends up embarrassing herself in front of Rarity, only for Rarity to reciprocate and delve into steamy and sticky lust-slaking, it wouldn't surprise me. It feels like I'm reading a bad porn setup, and that is the direction it is going in.
But it doesn't.
If we were thrust into Twilight's bedroom to witness her actually making the mess, then we were "treated" to all this aftermath like some sort of over-long epilog to a mindless clopfic, it wouldn't surprise me either.
I'm honestly not sure if I should be happy or disappointed neither of those happened. I suppose disappointed, and I again reference the initial question of why this was read. If it were just a bad clopfic, at least the point of its having been created would be obvious: porn. If this was some well-written, but perhaps smutty in parts, story that followed this variant of Twilight around and actually depicted her being tempted, dealing with those temptations, and perhaps eventually coming to some kind of more stable and enjoyable solution, such as forming a friends-with-benefits relationship with one of her friends (Rarity comes to mind simply because of her already inclusion in the story), the collection of words would then at least have a purpose, and we readers would have a reason to read. There would be a story to tell and be told to us. We would have a reason for accepting this variant of Twilight, and we would have context for why we're being shown her.
As it stands now, you essentially have some words thrown together that say that Twilight masturbated, went to sleep, woke up, cleaned herself and her room up, then went to go hang out with her friend for the day. The attempts to turn what is normal behavior into something slightly abnormal through twisting Twilight's character around don't in and of themselves make this a story. Again, this is still Twilight's normal, and this particular day doesn't stand out in any way whatsoever. Slice of Life doesn't mean pointless, it just means the scope of the story is very small and focused.
5204396 Well, this is a "clop story" in that it's a story about clop. Why does one regularly masturbate? How does it make one feel? What conflicts can it create, or, for that matter, relieve?
Why write a story about it, one may ask? (Heck, this story ended up featured in the "WHY?" group, somehow). Because no-one else will, as far as I know. Because it's a topic close to my heart and an important part of my life since puberty, for better or for worse, and I want to talk about it frankly and in depth.
As for Twilight being a closet pervert, the idea comes mostly from Demesne. I found Twilight the Creeper who Pervs very entertaining, and, honestly, relatable, and I couldn't help but want to experiment with it.
"Abstracted" is being used correctly, though people keep trying to correct me I might change it just to avoid confusion.
5204394 Thank you kindly. Your comment has made me very happy. Also, Physics are awesome. I'm an Engineer myself. Do give it your all.
once?
Sweet chapter. Not as brooding as I remember the last chapter, but, especially at the beginning, it picks up nicely where the last chapter left off, exploring the consequences of her clop session. I wasn't as entertained, but I was happier for Twilight toward the end.
5204535 By design, the story's a slow starter. I can promise that things will get more intense, for better or for worse.
5204545 Sweet. I look forward to it. I was thinking this chapter did feel mostly like a set up to what might be coming.
...
I see very little to do with rationality, and again I question its submission to the LessWrong group.
It looks very interesting, though, especially given your stated intent of the story.
5205797
In other words, this is an exercise in instrumental rationality, where we have a rational agent aware that she's running on corrupted hardware. Romance, sex and lust are some of the most rationality-challenging compulsions humans can be subjected to in daily life. They can even alter terminal values, and become the point at which the "why" chain stops.
We've spent a while on LessWrong game-theorizing things like work, nutrition, economic relations, status games, and so on. I think romance, sex, and the management of the deprivation thereof, are topics worthy of serious tackling with a rationalist tool-set.
By the way, I'm looking for proofreaders, so if you'd like to help me craft this story and make it as good as it can be, I'd be thankful.
Huh. This is, uh, definitely a completely different chapter than I read the first time. I don't think I liked it nearly as much, honestly? I know that probably hurts to hear. :/ Do you happen to still have the earlier one around somewhere – it was around a month ago and I don't recall it exactly, and I'd kinda like to compare what I liked and what I didn't.
5258537 I think I might have it somewhere among my GDocs. Me and my editor went on to eliminate a lot of stuff that seemed "Out of Character" or "unnecessarily fancy", sentences that were too long and complicated, and so on.
5258569
Oh, cool, you do write in gdocs. Edit history is basically the best thing! :D
Anyway, uh, as Cryosite said, this is basically just a character study. Characterization and style are all you have! Trying to trim the fat leaves it kinda soulless and empty.
I completely disagree with him on the quality of 'accuracy', though – I think that's harmful perspective that ends up hindering a lot of potential writing? I don't mind that I have to take a few steps back, and reassess my assumptions of Twilight in this case. The character you have presented is interesting, and I'm willing to follow her psyche.
(But yeah if you find that thing, you have no idea how happy it would make me)
5258610 workunderstood. thank you for your kind words
I read this story because someone added it to LessWrong's 'Nominated' folder. I can tell Blank! is familiar with LessWrong concepts, but the story is a pure slice-of-life, at least until it's completed. It's well-written--I mean, surprisingly well-written--but I'm taking it out of LessWrong. Anyone who disagrees can make their case in the "Stories" thread there.
ADDED: Found author's comments in another thread; making Blank! a contributor and leaving the story in Nominated; not moving into Approved yet because a reader will not yet find LW-type interests in the story.
it's a small thing, but somehow stood out to me as the most relatable detail..
she percieves air resistance less than radiation pressure??
5204396
that's the most comprehensive comment i've seen...