Jack and Sylvia are two very different humans. Sylvia is a massive Brony; Jack finds ponies annoying and wishes they would go away. The both of them are thrust into the world of Equestria. At the same time, a sinister force seeks to unmake Equestria once and for all. Jack and Sylvia get caught up in the middle of it. Can they befriend the Mane 6 and, together, save the day? Or will mistrust and xenophobia lead to the destruction of everything? Only time can tell.
Rated Teen for language and sexual content. The rating may be upped to mature if it becomes necessary, but this will not be a clopfic.
Massive thanks to Prismwind (http://www.fimfiction.net/user/Prismwind) for collaborating with me to create the overall plot arc.
Also thanks to Rienhart, Soulpony, and Mines5 for proofreading, and to Io Kusanagi for the amazing new cover art =D.
This is very interesting and I'm thinking of favoriting. But one thing confuses me, you seem to be talking in third person most of the time referring to characters as 'he', 'she', and so one, but then you seem to be addressing them as 'my' like you're in first person. Ex.
You're obviously talking about Jack in third person here, but then you say 'it kept him living in my life shut in my room'. Shouldn't it be 'it kept him living in his life shut in his his room'?
Other than that, I'm excited about what the future holds.
1838341 I'll correct that stat - it's actually a relic from the very first draft, which was written in a shifting first person perspective. I found it confusing, so I changed it to a generic third person perspective. Thanks for the catch!
Feedback... well... oh, boy, this is always difficult...
Well, I'll start at the beginning. It's super important to establish this hook to tie in the reader. Your main problem is that your story hinges on these two OCs. So, there's this bias already in the reader's mind to get bored or to feel disinterested. Let's look at the beginning, here.
Jack fell to a knee, breathing heavily. His breath hung in a steamy mist, suspended in the freezing mountain air. A blast of wind cut his face to the bone. Jack's nose was frost-bitten; were it not for Rarity's cloak, he would almost certainly be hypothermic. Rarity... your generosity saves me again. Sylvia's voice rang out over the howling winds.
"Jack! We need to move; they're trying to cut us off!"
Already, I see some of the issues. While you do begin in a moment of action, it's not really tied into the show that well. Also, it seems kind of out of place, you know? I feel like it needs to be more 'grounded' in the sense of feeling Equestrian.
Also, there's a hint of what could be a big, serious problem here. You're mixing up dialogue, thoughts, and action. Those three things really need bright lines between them. I might have opened that-- on the technical side, not looking at characters and the like-- like:
Jack fell to a knee, breathing heavily. His breath hung in a steamy mist, suspended in the freezing mountain air. Jack's nose was frost-bitten; were it not for Rarity's cloak, he would almost certainly be hypothermic. Rarity... your generosity saves me again.
"Jack! We need to move; they're trying to cut us off!" Sylvia's voice rang out over the howling winds, as a blast of wind cut Jack's face to the bone.
And, well, reading forwards in this chapter here I see things playing out with those same issues like just above. I'd seriously revise this story.
1838370 Thank you so much; this kind of constructive criticism is hard to come by ^_^. I'll keep it up for now, but I do expect to make major revisions
1838370
I completely disagree. I turn down 9/10 HiE stories a day, and I rarely ever rate up before the first 5-6k of work. This not only made the cut but earned the rating.So far I have not found this to fall into many of the pitfalls most fics have: Humans know about the show so their reactions are appropriate and ponies react much the way it would seem reasonable for them to react going by the show.... Pro tip (LOL): keep the mane six in character, the last promising fic I read killed it by having Pinkie and Rarity suddenly decide to rape the human when he turned into a pony..... just no. I really hope you don't turn them into ponies though, I hate when a "human in equestria" fic turns into "pony with inter-dimensional knowledge in equestria" fic.
Keep up the good work!
1843340 Thank you so much! Though I see some of his stylistic grievances; it's nothing that a few revisions can't fix though. And I have no intention of turning them into ponies. That's something that a couple of my idea people tried to sell me on, mainly because they were convinced that HiE cannot succeed. I intend to prove them wrong ô¿ô.
"...Jack's face was quite red, and even through Dash's bright turquoise quote (coat) a faint blush was visible..."
Is Word(tm) SpeilCzech.. er spellcheck up to its odd auto-suggest choices again?
1843340 Are you referring to Diaries of a madman per chance?
Wouldn't Sylvia be a pegasister since the term 'brony' infers a male gender?
1885424
Of all the female members of the fandom I know, none of them prefer the term pegasister. All but one actually actively dislike it. So, I opted for making Brony gender-neutral :-p.
love it
and omg that cliffhanger 
Really?
You have the humans willingly go out naked? Would you? I don't think two teenagers, each an opposite gender, would willingly show each other their private parts. That's kind of half the point of clothes.
Though I am liking the story.
1894266
I kind of feel like this component ended up getting gutted a bit by my desire to keep the story within a Teen rating. My initial reasoning here was threefold: One, necessity (if you have one set of clothes which are already rather dirty and torn, you're not likely to keep wearing them day in and day out). Especially in...
Two: A society in which clothing is used to ornament rather than conceal. This is one of the bigger differences I see between Equestrian society and Human society.
Three: I wanted to include some awkward humor at the species realizing the key differences in one another's anatomy. About 99% of this element got cut in an effort to make sure I don't get bumped up to mature.
1920423Trust me, when it comes to nudity, people would choose wearing the ratty clothes. It's built into our brains that nudity is bad unless it's with someone you love *cough*bullshit*cough*. And the whole reason that clothes are decorational in Equestria is because:
a) stallions have sheaths, therefore their reproductive organ isn't hanging out like human males' do.
b) mares don't really have to cover that much up. They just swish their tail behind them and they're good.
1885424
that is if she wish to be called like that...
some fellow pony admires are proud to be called bronies, and not to be treated differently for being a girl for liking MLP
no matter if she says pegasister or bronie respect and tolerance is a norm we all grow in to
also its bro-hooves /]
not sis-hooves/)
is it?
its should have been colt-hooves and mare-hooves instead but that's not rolling of off the tongue as bro-hooves do's
but if she prefers pegasister, we can respect her for that, but it change nothing of who we are in the end
Do the ponies cuss here or is it only the humans?
1959398 The ponies use a sort of stylized cursing that seems to be part of a lot of headcanons. Things like "Buck" in lieu of "Fuck", "Hay" in lieu of "Hell", etc
1959432
Good. I'm not used to reading ponies cursing, so I generally stay away from fics with language. Glad that isn't necessarily the case here and I'll reading this when I wake up
Kind of like the kind you would see a wandering merchant in olden times wear. And the whole changeling thing is definitely unexpected. But maybe you shouldn't have skipped over anything about Sylvia gaining powers. We know about her magic, but only that she grew a plant. Anyways, I don't want to sound like I'm complaining, so I'll leave you on a good note. I definitely enjoyed this chapter, and I am looking forward to more.
In medias res, eh? I liked the way you implemented it: dramatically, but smoothly.
What strikes me most is your style, especially the way you write those descriptions. I'm amazed, really; it all flows so naturally!
And the conversations aren't shallow and static like in many other fics I've seen (including mine, :P), but instead they have depth and emotion.
Oh, and your vocabulary is fantastic.
You're doing a marvelous job here, man, I'm being completely honest with you. I can't say anything about the story yet, but as far as quality and author skill is concerned, you pass with flying colors.
I'll follow your story and see where this goes.
This review brought to you by Authors Helping Authors.
Grammar (out of 10): 9 out of 10. When a character speaks, a new paragraph is started. I have the same bad habit, so don't worry too much about it. Most people don't really notice.
Pros: Quick moving, easy reading, and accurate character portrayals
Cons: The first two chapters move a tad bit too quickly. Although I like the pacing overall, the first two chapters seem somewhat abrupt.
Two, sometimes you assume that the reader is going to follow you from your introduction of a concept in the story to 'the next logical step', is the best way I can think to put it. Look over these five chapters a bit, and see if you gestalt from initial concept to the next logical assumption. Ex: Sylvia has magic= Sylvia knows magic.
Three: Again, I like your pacing. But sometimes it seems (as a writer) you are in a hurry to get it all down on the page before you forget, or while you have time. That's fine, but remember to go back and make sure it doesn't feel rushed when you read it.
I won't swear to you that it will be a favorite of mine, but it certainly has the potential to be a ripping good yarn. I wait with anticipation!
Oh, and thank you for your review of The Dragon that came to Tea.
This is actually reaaally insteresting not like some of the crap people post.
I liked that 'After life' or 'waiting to return to your body' thing. Makes sense and really interesting!
2034233Dude, you got a shout-out? That's top. Didn't know you read this story too.
2034855Yeah, I have been. And it is pretty cool that I got a shout-out. Oh, and don't worry. I am still editing chapter 3 but I hope to have it back to you by the time I go to sleep. (Which will last anywhere from 3-6 hours from now. So I've got the time to not rush. Though I will half-rush, seeing as how I'm already behind. Still, I say half-rush because I don't want to do a sloppy job.)
Shit! My bad dude, I totally forgot to check out the new chapter.
2231419
It's all good, I was able to run it by a couple other people :-p.
2231423I still feel horrible about it.
Update?
Hot-diggity dog! Phenomenal. Too tired to be any more coherent, this is great.
Holy crunch nuggets.This is the most in character I have ever seen the mane 6 in a fic react towards a random human(or two) appearing out of mid-air.
Fantastic.
I am officially floored. This story just keeps getting better. Not only did it have hands-down, the best introduction scene I have ever read(in a HiE fic), but it has the most well thought out and executed housing arrangement AND the clothing-related offer from Rarity was not generous to the point of obligation like the last HiE fic I started.
Imagine a story half-written in Italian with english in parenthesis as translation, in bad grammar no less. A story where RD hardly bats an eye at the appearance of two hostile humans, Twilight cordially invites them to stay in her library for an indefinite period of time, Rarity remakes both of their outfits in less than half a day, and they get to meet the princesses before the second day is out.
This story on the other hand, is a diamond in the rough of Tom's proportions. Everything is perfect. I cannot find any flaws with this fic. It doesn't even move too quickly!
I. Can't. Stop. Reading.
I would give you a comprehensive comment on my feelings about this chapter, but I haven't slept in 20 hours.
noooo...
Update: I'm aware this seems dead, but I am working on the next chapter now. Hopefully it'll be up within the week :-)
RIP only decent HIE story
Rest in pieces.
Slap with fish.
twilightoops: enjoy your stay in Ninivah