Lateral Movement by Alzrius [first 2 chaps] (Recommendation-style short-review - for fics I would recommend, but for flaws with the format that can be sorted with editing) · 7:46pm May 12th
Overall.
"I have a huge fic, and I know how to use it."
"Oh, Brad!"
Best lines:
Her soft white coat was tinged with a blue shading so light that you could have stared at it for hours and still not have been sure it was there at all. It was perfectly accentuated by her mane and tail, whose gentle arctic coloration was interspersed with darker blue stripes that seemed to shimmer as she moved. And her eyes{!} {T}heir soft raspberry-red hue contrasted perfectly with the rest of her, giving them a captivating look. Even her cutie mark was beautiful[...]
"Every minute that I’m distracted from doing that by that obsequious dimwit is a minute longer that its citizens have to suffer.”
Between the severe flooding that Vanhoover experienced, and the attendant influx of aquatic monsters, the damage was likely severe, if not catastrophic.
The two of them spent the next hour lost in their own little worlds, until the feel of the train stopping shook them from their respective reveries.
Whenever Lex used his magic, even something as innocuous as lifting things with his horn’s telekinesis, his eyes began to glow with a sickly green light, and purple contrails sprouted from the outer corners of them.
“You have to take into account the map’s scale.” The words, spoken around gritted teeth, were almost a growl.
The neighborly sentiment that characterized the individual towns and cities across the country would have been elevated into a national sense of unity, letting the recovery effort swell in response.
Sonata blinked as Lex looked at her with an inscrutable expression. She was about to ask him if something was wrong, when he leaned towards her, giving her just enough time to feel surprised before he kissed her gently.
“Those nags!” he hissed in sudden fury. “Those miserable[,] treacherous[,] backbiting… []nags!”
Why read? great OC characterisation; compelling practical conflict; great pacing; nails the adventure/drama/romance tags; page turner
Flaws. The writing isn't bad, but is not quite there for a recommend. Very close, though. You have a great grasp of most of what makes reading fun 
Special flaw The set up between Sonata and Lex, while believable, reads to me as a trope.
I wasn't going to call this out, because people always get so heated about this stuff, and they shouldn't do, as it's totally understandable, but a few places got a bit much:
Maybe Lex would get captivated by how cute she looked when she was embarrassed, and forget all about being angry at her?
I'd have to hand in my sisterhood membership if I didn't call it out 
One way to have a tropey character without seeming too tropeish would be to be cautious with the in-character narration joining in with criticism of your female character. Another way could be to try to imagine how you, yourself, would talk about your own flaws. I don't have much ability to distract people from my clumsy mistakes with my looks but, if I did (with a lil license for the reviewer to become writer)
Embarrassed by her error, Sonata sought to deflect his attention on to something that had always been her inner strength: her looks.
Writing tips Word-use could be better eg “invariably” “unmitigated proportions”; em dashes rather than semi-colons (suggest avoiding these in general); dialogue is good, but could be better (eg Lex[.] Was that…); separate dialogue from non-dialogue paras; expressive punctuation could be better; em dashes not ellipses for interruptions; ellipses are three dots and use sparingly; thoughts need to be distinguished from in-character narrations (eg "They did it on purpose"); efficiency (a material manifestation in the real world.); occasional proofing lapse eg odd missing word
Final thought. All the way to the end of the line! (Just. One. More. Chapter!)
Thanks so much for the review!
For what it's worth, I like to think that my writing gets better over time as the story progresses (whether or not it actually does is something else altogether
). With regard to Sonata being a bit trope-y...I plead "existing character," since even though she doesn't have much official screentime, she's long since become FiM's poster child for an adorably airheaded ditz (Derpy notwithstanding). That and the whole "we will be adored" thing.
As for the technical/editorial/punctuation issues, well...I'd fire my editor, except that they're me.
Otherwise, all I can say is that I'm using the style from the fantasy novels I grew up reading, which made use of things like em dashes et al in the manner I am here. It's probably wrong, but as far as being wrong goes, that always struck me as a relatively mild infraction. 
All of that said, I'm really glad you liked the story! I know a fic that has hundreds of chapters and millions of words is a turn-off for most people, so I'm always really happy whenever someone gives it a chance and ends up liking it!
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that's no problem - it was a great read :) thanks for producing such great content (and in such quantity! D: ) you have some fierce character and adventure/drama/romance writing going on!
in relation to the later improvements, that's so true with longer fics like this that have been written over years. I'm tempted to come back to this one - break it down into segments and review a part, perhaps.
thanks for taking the tropey comment in the right spirit - I know what you mean about Sonata - in the show it's fine as she's just a lil character beat and not a full char. It's not too bad at all and I was very borderline whether to include that point - it certainly didn't put me off much
for the technical stuff - that's fair. The writing flowed in general, and especially with such a beast of a fic it's gonna be tough to write/edit constantly! So you're doing a good job overall there! I am also my own editor, for my sins, and recently produced a story of just 10K words and the editing process was a, literal, nightmare
if you want to read about it, the link is here https://www.fimfiction.net/blog/1038754/writing-thoughts-to-separate-from-the-general-thoughts-blog-nsfw-material-will-be-referenced-occasionally-but-will-be-blacked-out
aw
keep this choo choo train going pony friend!