Ghost Mike's Ponyfic Review Monday Musings #76 · 5:00pm Aug 21st, 2023
All the recent Everfree Northwest blogs have reminded me that UK PonyCon is fast approaching. I’ve been all booked for months now, but with it only six weeks away, I'm starting to get excited again. Too soon? Mayhaps, but I am an easily excitable spirit, least for the right things. Last year’s edition was the rare holiday for me where I didn’t have a “home sweet home” feeling when it was over, which should tell you how much it meant to me.
This’ll be my third pony convention, and my second consecutive one. In many ways, despite getting burned out on normal geek/nerd cons years before I found MLP, I am still in my honeymoon phase here, as I missed so much my first year, and largely stuck to the big things last year. It’s schedule is never jammed like EFNW, so maybe eventually it’ll lose the excitement of having stuff I haven’t done yet. But that isn’t happening anytime soon. 
Plus, you know, there’s friends I only get to see there. A sentiment many of you can share in, I’m sure. 
Pity they can’t see me. 👻
I also moved onto the second Disney100 theatrical reissue with Bambi, which was happily a smoother experience. Mostly because, after the Snow White screening dipped the curtain and projected it cropped, I swapped cinemas and picked the only other Kids’ Club price screening around, which meant seeing it at 10am. But it was worth the early rise to see it in its cropless 1.33:1 glory, even if the heavy amount of black bars off a widescreen screen can leave it feeling really square. And give or take parts of the transfer overdone from Disney’s sacrilegious overdone digital de-scrubbing of their classics, it was about as good as I’ve ever seen it (least, until they give us a 4K transfer bereft of that digital tomfoolery, as Cinderella did earlier this year).
Ah, but what of the kids’ reactions, whose apathy to Snow White left me feeling a little disappointed? Even though I knew fully well, deep down, that today’s media had narrowed their attention spans and styles of storytelling they could watch far too much for most of them to enjoy animated art that is probably the most-seen animated feature? Hard to say, because here… there were hardly any kids! 
Just one father and two tween girls amongst 30-odd people; the rest were solo adults. Which I not only appreciated on its own merits – seeing other adult animated fans savouring the chance to see this classic like this – but actually found kind of fitting. Because, despite all the cute animal appeal, and Bambi learning about the world around him through gentle comic routines… Bambi isn’t really a kids’ film. Possibly the most so of any single-narrative Disney film (waves to Fantasia 
). And this is something I’ve felt very strongly since I first saw it close to a decade ago, and not for the tense scenes of danger or the most famous death in cinema (though, yes, I wouldn’t show it to the very young).
Not to say a kid can’t watch and enjoy it (well, for modern kids, at least the rare patient, curious breed): it is still a family film with nothing inappropriate, bar the very physical animated reactions of the leads when they are turned on by females (and being that it was coded enough to get by the Hayes Code, that’s no worse than a dialogue innuendo in a modern film put in to keep the sleeping parents awake, and infinitely more entertaining and purposeful). But even for Disney animation in this era, when it was completely and utterly for every audience – and this was true of most cartoons, which after all were still primarily seen as shorts before every feature, regardless of if the film was as tough as a gangster flick – Bambi is above all a portrayal of woodland life cycling in and out of itself languidly, with the tone and approach of a philosophical meditation. It’s not a coming-of-age story, like The Lion King, the obvious point of comparison, it’s a going-through-life story. One where even the segments revolving around Man have the feeling of an event that happens and we move on from it, even as “Man was in the forest” is both a threatening full stop to a tense sequence and a statement that something precious has been violated.
I know there are plenty of people, young and old, who find this deliberate, intentional approach that rejects conventional conflict and drama something of a barrier to entry. And certainly, if one expects anthropomorphic personalities and storytelling like any “normal” talking animals cartoon, and isn’t prepared for its kind of quasi-documentary feel, the film may be a bit icy. I can’t argue against that, and fully accept if anyone feels that way. And I would never expect any modern commercial studio to ever do this either – frankly, it’s only that Walt did what he wanted to see, never minding if it was commercially bankable, that led to this approach. See, again, Fantasia. 
But whatever one’s opinion on Bambi as entertainment to the modern viewer, that it is high art is impeccable. It is spiritual and sacred, from the constant humble awe at the natural world as we pan through a verdant forest like its a cathedral of shaded greens via a minute-long multiplane camera shot for the ages, to the “Little April Showers” raindrops getting at the kind of abstraction the opening number of Fantasia somewhat fumbled. It's in the minute amount of dialogue (less than 1500 words spoken, and the songs barely bump that over 2100), and the score that is a proper orchestral landscape and driving the action, with all the variety in tone you’d expect from a modern film as done via scoring styles then. And above all, it’s in the most perfectly realist animation ever done at Disney or nearly anywhere else, a kind of “extra realism”, from wet tree bark and silver moonlight down to humid air causing a slight blur on the backgrounds. A kind of expressive realism, you might say, that imbues everything with mood and physical feeling. And the tactile feeling of this painted woodland on a 160-seat screen was really something special, let me tell you.
This is all done with animals that, while wholly realistic in design, have large-eyed, easily reasonable facial expressions (a precursor to anime, you may be surprised to learn), be they going through gentle comic routines, or battling other deer bathed in bold, dramatically-lit swatches of shadow and colour. Which makes the film go down really smooth, even as it’s basically six reels of different life phases with minimal narrative tissue connecting them (Bambi’s birth; early forest exploration and learning to talk; encountering his future mate and dad plus the first encounter with Man; Winter and losing his mom; Spring and falling in love; Man’s return and the forest fire). Possibly because, while the experiences are always about what an animal would experience, so many of them are still common to humans. It just doesn’t need to spell that out of us.
Do I love it? Not in the same personal way I love something like Aladdin or Lilo and Stitch, not nearly. But I do highly treasure it, even as I’ve only seen it all of four times in full.
Now that’s done, I know what you’re thinking. “Good grief, is Ghost Mike gonna drop a thousand-odd words on each of these films for the next two months? Lord help us all…” Well, considering how rarely I do more than two paragraphs in these intros, a little indulgence would only be fair, no? But not likely; these first two were special cases because the Golden Age films don’t get their due from most folks these days and are, if not horribly underrated, at least not appreciated as the fine art they are. You need more space on something underrated; I don’t need to tell you why Beauty and the Beast or Toy Story are masterpieces, and next week, it will take far less space for my lack of enthusiasm on Cinderella. And so forth.
That behind us, here’s what you’re (probably) here for. From realistic-proportioned deer with big readable faces to pastel cartoon equines with big readable faces, I did have a buildup to all that! 
Ponyfic time.
This Week’s Spectral Stories:
Echoes by Tela
The Clever One by Winston
Changeling: The Movie by Obselescence
Three Hoofwidths To The Left by Estee
Her Song of Jubilation by Impossible Numbers
Weekly Word Count: 32,821 Words
Over time, Winona has gotten used to the feeling of the Apple family house being empty, and what was once panic has subsided into assurance that her ponies will be back regularly. And even more so nowadays, as they often take her out with them on their escapades to the forest and the town full of ponies, full of scents and flavours most unlike those at home. She values those scents so much, that when some become absent unexpectedly, and stay that way, she sits alone, waiting for the house to feel full and right again.
Another fic with a different and offbeat character voice, another poor sell of an opening blurb by moi. 
So bear with me as I try to sell it. The first thing one will notice is the voice for Winona, not at all the usual ‘limited intelligence’ viewpoint an animal perspective fic like this might normally have (a lesson the author learnt from writing a similar prompt in years past). No short, excited bursts of narration meant to emulate a dog panting or wagging their tail, or anything of that ilk. There are plenty of concepts Winona doesn’t get, not least pony speech, yet it’s always shown with the utmost sensitivity, making it clear to the reader yet always rooted in Winona’s view. This continues through to the use of scent and feel, which isn’t made too flowery in delivery either; it hits a balance of being intimate and involving for the reader, evoking description without needing to actually do so more than occasionally. From repeating short phrases to show either repeating patterns or the dissonance from the breaking of those patterns, you never stop feeling you’re experiencing this through Winona.
What this is all in service to, is a portrayal of the feeling of one key moment in Winona’s life, along with the prior ones in a timeline lapse that gives it all context. There’s a gamble here that, amazingly, pays off, making the timeline setting unclear for a short early stretch until it does click, and this elliptical strategy doesn’t annoy. Those early scenes do a workman’s job of showing how the Apple house and each of its inhabitants feel to Winona in their own way, ditto with things in the outside world. And having used Winona’s initial fear diluting to understanding about being left alone as a brief scene-setter early on, it means all the more when it becomes, in the second half, the basis for one of the best portrayals of grief I’ve ever read in a Ponyfic. One where it’s messy, tied up in knots, incapable of being set right, only mitigated. There are paragraphs here, especially towards the end, that mix in the cascading emotions one would normally expect from a written depiction of a panic attack, and make it work for a dog so perfectly. All culminating in enough display of raw emotion that this is a fic that feels, and even the fact that it doesn’t so much end as stop is fully fitting.
Really, I don’t have much more to say about this one; it’s a fic that, despite the author’s assurance they just wrote it and hit submit without any editing, is meticulously crafted in its messiness to a desired result. One of the best pet-perspective fics and portrayals of grief; that it is both of these things at once makes for an even more unique and beautiful result.
Rating: Really Good
The Clever One by Winston
Genre: Comedy/Drama
Starlight Glimmer
1,048 Words
March 2021Reread
Starlight knows what she’s getting into with this magic lamp. She’s done her homework, and accounted for all the possible failings with wishes – she even figured out a way for infinite wishes! But as they say, be careful what you wish for with a djinn. You just might get it.
Starlight is a promising character to use for a “genie screws the pony” story, what with her sense of ego and proclivity for being smart yet, on balance, still going crashing into situations like this (apparently the original writeoff version had Twilight). Even with the pressing problem of the short length meaning the wishes going wrong happens between scenes and it’s just played for ironic comedy, there’s potential here. Alas, not quite. Starlight mostly ends up as a cross between her normal self and Trixie here, a bridge too far in her recklessness. The opening scene of her successfully getting infinite wishes to the lack of amusement of the djinn nails this, as does the ending closer where she humbly concedes defeat. And I do like the djinn’s personality, neither snarky, nor caring, but not quite indifferent or bored either, yet still being wry and amusing in that lightly jaded way of life.
What’s here is amusing enough to make for a diverting read, and cleverly delivered, but like many stories of its ilk, it’s more of a sampling of the possibilities than a fully-fleshed result. Your taste in genie stories and Starlight getting in way over her head will be the clincher here.
Rating: Decent
Changeling: The Movie by Obselescence
Genre: Comedy
Chrysalis, Twilight, Changelings
8,714 Words
August 2014
Chrysalis’ ambition to conquer Equestria has one snag she can deny no longer. She knows bugger all about ponies, and with only an army of poorly-hive-mind-managed drones at her hooves, it’s not a disadvantage she can just ignore. But, being the cleverest of all changelings, she knows just how to amend this. Make a documentary on the ways of ponies to educate changelings. And it’s her cover story to Equestria too, just omitting the purpose of learning more about ponies and making it seem more like it’s for future unity. Twilight does not like this one bit, but with Celestia having approved Chrysalis’ request, is obliged to guide Chrysalis and her entourage around Ponyville.
What a chortler of a fic. If the above bits of comedy potential haven’t hooked you, this also has changelings unable to comprehend that ponies do not, in point of fact, eat houses; Chrysalis and her lot convinced that lamps are a source of great power, her being adamant to Twilight that sugary foods are toxic to them (“Okay, no, but they are plenty irritating”) and more. The whole fic is almost like an episode-length take on one of those comedy fan comics that Scribbler does comic dubs of all the time (show-derived, yet heightened in absurdity). Usually, trying to sustain a narrative for even this length in a fic like that would be a dicey proposition indeed. The high quality of the jokes and humour here helps, but the real saving grace? Chrysalis and Twilight’s characterisations, and their interactions.
It sounds simple and plain to say it boils down to Chrysalis and Twilight gaining a sort of odd respect for each other, both as capable individuals smarter than those around them, and as dealing with the weight of being surrounded by dunderheads. The snarkiness is key here; Twilight isn’t quite her S1 incarnation, but she’s pretty close for being a Princess, and while not at the level of Chrysalis, it allows for her to give enough to be within range of the changeling queen. The story, as it is, doesn’t end up being much beyond a couple of episodic instances around Ponyville, and yet they give it a sturdy enough centre that it feels like a properly structured tale, down to the regressive ending that nonetheless is just right, reminding us what kind of fic this is when we thought it was getting too serious.
I realise I have said very little on the comedy beyond listing a few examples, but it really does hit that balance of being wonderfully absurd and surprising without feeling tired or rote. For comedy fanfics with lots of dry, witty one liners and punchlines with just enough of a centre and structure to not feel like a pretext for the gags in a way that would detract from them, this is one of the more solid I’ve read in a while. Even my usual notes of tightening it up and reigning in the prose repeating points or being indulgent apply less (if still applying); ditto for some unravelling towards the end and with a still-funny ending.
Rating: Really Good
Three Hoofwidths To The Left by Estee
[No Cover Image]
Genre: Comedy
Twilight, Spike
7,370 Words
July 2018Reread
When the Bearers of the Elements are sent out on missions for Equestria, their day jobs don’t just wait for them. By now, the crown has fill-in ponies to do the jobs that can’t be patched over. Simple for most of them, less so for the Golden Oak Library, where Twilight invariably finds all sorts of sloppiness and mistakes when she and Spike return, and spends hours straightening them out, and reporting the latest perpetrator. Then a new hire arrives, one with immaculate upkeep… and a penchant for changing Twilight’s organisation of the library to the ‘government standard’. Thus begins the war of attrition between two compulsive organisers.
For a recently-ish Estee story (okay, 2018, but you know), and despite being a story that tells itself over short scenes in fragments along a longer period of time, there’s remarkably little dawdling. Estee is quite good at making the relaxed, leisurely pace that their chunky stories unfurl at feel important and not wasteful (though they have their slips), but it is nice to have one that jumps in pretty quick. After a succinct and flavourful narrated exposition on the concept of substitutes for the bearers while they are off on missions, and the usual quality of Twilight’s replacements, we get right to Twilight’s reaction to what the newest replacement is doing.
The rest of the story concerns her attempts to wrestle with an outsider rearranging her space that is just so, getting more mad and making more desperate attempts to force her way only for the unseen interloper to double down, getting confronted with evidence that not only did she perhaps bring this on herself, but she’s obsessive about the library as though it’s hers, not a public one. I might be angry that the end retribution Twilight eventually inflicts is so petty, were it not is funny and so deserved – the fic is good at making us see why Twilight might be wrong only to reveal that, no, this other librarian is even worse than the pre-Bearer part of Twilight she doesn’t like looking back on.
As mentioned, the scenes have the episodic feel while still being continually purposeful. Twilight’s neurotic characterization remains a delicate balance of neurotic, zany, yet grounded in what is still a comedy. Also, for a story where Spike is just a hang-on and someone for Twilight to vent to, he’s treated with a lot of respect (well, he doesn’t get dunked on more than anyone else for an Estee fic, where it’s an occupational hazard), which is a plus. A lot of the comedy boils down to Twilight being infuriated and obsessive, but it’s kept varied enough to avoid being repetitive, and zippy enough to never feel too pacey.
It’s not, necessarily, one of Estee’s classics, but perhaps because I value a solid Twilight personality story, I’ve always thought highly of this one, and this reread didn’t change that. Unless you think you’ll really mind Twilight being overtly humbled getting short-changed for a joke ending – the tone modulation makes it work for me – it probably will for you too. It’s certainly an easier read than some of Estee’s works that, immersive and entertaining as they are, can be tough to swallow at times.
Rating: Really Good
Her Song of Jubilation by Impossible Numbers
Genre: Drama/Sad/Slice of Life
Coloratura, Applejack, Cherry Jubilee, Svengallop, Other (Silver Shill)
10,174 Words
January 2017
Things didn’t go so well for Coloratura after she separated herself from her manager Svengallop. Less for her trying to carve a new and different image for herself, and more those in the industry and the big city not caring about the practises he carried out. Thus it is that, during a slump, she finds herself working at Cherry Jubilee’s farm, to get herself back on track. But perhaps finances and her creative voices aren’t the only things in need of a course correction…
For a “Coloratura struggles after reinventing herself” story, even one going with her being so down on her luck as to do manual labour, this is more creative then you might think, largely for how committed it is to her inner voice struggling with itself and the reality of her position. Which is a strange thing to say from a dive this hard (most fics just have her less popular, not totally down on her luck), one that could turn some folks off at the conceptual level. Yet perhaps because we start in media res, and only get two flashbacks covering crucial snippets of the events with bookending exposition, it hits the sort of heightened realism that a world like FiM can make work. Even there, the fic is very good at having just enough side details to keep things out of the lazy cliché they may sound like. Svengallop is correctly positioned as keeping a smart image, hence why he stays afloat while she sinks as he remains top-tier at picking out legit talent. It helps that he’s treated less as a character and more as a presence, one who what he represents is all over the story despite never being in the present.
Decisions like that carry all the way through to the unconventional ending, of Rara not taking the easy way out in a manner not altogether predictable yet totally fitting. In between that, we have three other players making their own impressions on her, in the wiser-than-she-lets on Cherry Jubilee, Silver Shill happy doing honest work even if it doesn’t earn as well, and the ghost of Applejack’s parting words. All influence Rara’s situation, knowingly and unknowingly, in different ways, from the spark that Rara gets in writing a new song one night to realising different factors about them all that shift not only her perspective of them
That said, this is undeniably a “less than the sum of its parts” story. Partly that’s for some rather muddled control of prose and voice, making it not always easy to really get a bead on what’s going on inside Rara’s head. Partly that’s because the actual incident of the story is rather thin in terms of what happens, yet still has just enough happen within to not sit well as an out-of-time reflective piece, and the attempt to split the difference leaves its identity a little adrift. All this combined to the conclusion feeling in the moment like a bit undeserved, only afterwards clicking. And less in the satisfying way, but more realising points that should have been communicated better just kind of sat there on the surface.
To be fair, for Impossible Numbers’ second wave as an author (discounting his earlier works, he only really began in earnest in 2016), this is an early enough work, and while some of his more recent works can still be muddled or not well expressed despite the evident thought that went into the depth and layers, in a manner that dilutes the reading experience, it’s far less common. And even here it just deflates the fic a bit, it doesn’t sink it. Plus, on the other hand, its overlongness only really manifests towards the end, and not in a ballooning of density either. All in all, a fic I admired more than I enjoyed, but I admired a lot about it. Certainly worth a read if you want unconventional stories of Coloratura after “The Mane Attraction”.
Rating: Decent
Spooky Summary of Scores:
Excellent: 0
Really Good: 3
Pretty Good: 0
Decent: 2
Passable: 0
Weak: 0
Bad: 0
Nice batch this week!
I for one, thoroughly enjoy your animation reactions/analysis!
5743232
Best bit is I didn't even realise the high average – much less that three scored a Really Good – until I was totalling up the ratings after copying the reviews over from the stockpile. Just as pleasant a surprise for moi!
How could I forget, after you being a frequent presence in the Season Five Unused Episodes miniseries of blogs?
That, and you having had plenty of experience in animation and game development and yourself. Among other things. 
In any case, I was largely just taking a playful jab at me possibly putting too much of that into the "what's been on my mind" intro to what is otherwise all about Ponyfic, and my tendency to go overlong on topics I'm passionate about. I know plenty of readers do read it anyway, but off me knowing some would gloss over this topic for this length, and there being some brief yet heated controversy over my thoughts on Snow White last week, I was being a bit more consciously cautious.
Hm. If I ever start a Letterboxd (something I've been considering for ages, to the point of "stockpiling" short written reviews of a decent handful of films I've seen this year), I may well make a post here every month with one-paragraph extracts from the reviews since last one, linking to them. Like a highlights reel; it'll do for most, but has more for the curious. With these stockpiled reviews sprinkled in among the totally new ones. Best of both worlds!
Loganberry does a similar thing for his Ponyfic Roundup here every month.
5743237
I think that's a great idea!
There's. So many things I wanna say, and at least sixty percent of them are some variation of a hybrid between thanking you and doing my best impression of a batpony with a mango. I'm gonna pull some things from the review and elaborate on them.
This is, I think, one of the aspects of the fic I'm happiest with. Limited intelligence POVs used to be something I absolutely loved, but as I grew up and my tastes shifted, I realized just how much of a slog it can be to get through when it isn't done well. And the previous fic where I used it... let's just say, "done well" is subjective, and by most standards, it wasn't that.
When I wrote the fic with a similar prompt, I was actually in seventh grade. So it sits in one of those weird "this was pretty okay for your age!" holes, where you can objectively recognize that something was better than most people would have produced at that age, but also realize it's not very good as a whole. When I went to reread it, it was almost painful. I think I wanted to differentiate from that, or maybe I thought that restricting myself to limited intelligence would restrict me to that kind of quality. I don't know - Echoes didn't have too much preparation or planning put into it (and we'll get to that in more detail soon), but I am so, SO happy it ended up working well.
I... can't take credit for this.
I'm... I think I write like some sort of strange literary sponge. While I do pen things occasionally, I'm VERY much a reader first, and about a year ago, I first found Estee. Well, that's not true - I found Estee a couple months beforehand, but I bounced off the first couple chapters of Triptych HARD and it took a while for me to circle back. I'm not gonna be shy - they're currently my favorite author. Not just on here, but ever. I've tried to describe why before, but words have failed me. They just have this mastery of prose and pacing, where every sentence seems to have LAYERS of meaning. The thing I admire most about their writing, though, is their ability to provide a chapter's worth of description/context with a single clever sentence. It's stunning. And I've been studying it.
It feels weird to say that I study ponyfic for writing pointers, but it's genuinely really helpful. I tend to soak up the mannerisms of the authors I read, and they reemerge in writing. It's very hard to say how much of my writing style I owe to Estee (and Aragon, too, he's been a huge influence on my writing and actually inspired me to start again), but I do know that this fic wouldn't be possible without them. I tried to emulate the way they layer meaning into sentences, and let the reader connect dots, and oh BOY was this a good prompt to do it with. Trying to figure out how to convey concepts that the reader knew, but the narrator didn't, was a challenge. I was VERY worried I wouldn't strike the balance between obfuscation and understanding, but it appears to have worked! So the biggest of props and thanks to Estee - without them, I doubt I would have gotten the Really Good score I did.
Ladies and gentleman, I present: the Austraeoh gambit. (Super SUPER happy it worked out, though!)
I'm just gonna be honest. I don't know how this is possible.
This is gonna be a little bit of a longer response, because this is the first time I think I've been able to talk about the reaction to this fic, and my ensuing confusion. I apologize in advance.
I don't know how it's possible for me to have written something that appears to have hit so deeply with its portrayal of grief, because I've been fortunate enough to not experience loss. The closest I've come is the death of three cats, and that's NOWHERE near as intense or deeply impactful as losing a person. Hell, I don't even own a dog - the one time my family tried when I was younger, the dog we rescued had some violent tendencies and we weren't able to keep him. The two main components of this fic are things I don't really know how to address, because I've never addressed them in my own personal life, and yet, multiple users on this website (you included, thankyousomuchohmygod) have said this is one of the realest portrayals of grief they've seen.
Suffice to say, I am, and have been ever since the fic first got featured, really damn confused.
It's not just that that's contributing to the confusion, either. This fic was a first draft, written over the course of a single stream of consciousness, and finished in a bit of a state of panic. I had plans the next day, plans that required me to be up at three in the morning, and I FINISHED the fic at eleven that night. I was not concerned with the climax of the story, I was concerned with the fact I was about to get, at MOST, four hours of sleep for a fairly physically intensive activity. This fic was not edited, this fic was not revised, it was slammed onto the website in a HURRY right before I went to bed. You said that this fic didn't really end so much as stop - that rush is why.
I'm confused. Absolutely baffled by the reaction to this fic. I've spent a good chunk of time just sitting and wondering what unholy deity I channeled to make this happen. But it's the good kind of confusion. The surprising kind, where you don't entirely understand WHY something is happening, but are thrilled nonetheless. My IRL friends have been trying to convince me I'm a good writer, and the scary thing is, I'm starting to believe it. This review pushed me DANGEROUSLY close to the edge, too.
That's way too many words to say "thank you." Deeply, profusely, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for writing this review. I never ever ever thought I'd see one of my fics getting reviewed alongside one of Estee's, let alone receive the SAME SCORE. It's the kind of thing that's gonna keep me going on the writing front, and I won't be forgetting this. Ever.
I don't know how this story ended up being so impactful for you. I don't know why you think this is one of the best portrayals of grief in ponyfic you've read, especially when I don't even know what real grief feels like. I was NOT expecting this to be lauded as one of the best pet-perspective fics on the website. I am stunned. Flattered. Flabbergasted. Utterly bamboozled. Run through the emotional equivalent of a panini press. I'm confused - but I am so, so glad something I wrote ended up being all that for you.
Thank you so, so much for not ONLY taking the time to read through my silly little horsefic, but also for writing this review. This has been the highlight of my August by a LONG shot. I don't know if I can thank you enough.
Changeling: The Movie was so good :D super miss Obs even now
Oof, that was rough. Still, Her Song of Jubilation was one of the fics that never made it past the Equestria Daily prereaders, so I've long since gotten used to ignoring it along with most of my backlog. I'm not fond of my earlier work.
I remember Pascoite (I think it was Pascoite) coming to the conclusion that the fic was basically one long attempt to find a concrete conflict, which didn't happen until the very last chapter, and even then it still wasn't emphasized enough. He was also critical of the way Svengallop and Joy Denim seemed so prominent early on and then basically disappeared from the plot, which (if I remember correctly) he thought was muddled direction.
Too much indulgent introspection, would be my diagnosis, marred by what I assume in hindsight was my early deathly-afraid attempts at sticking to the "show don't tell" advice, without stopping to think that maybe the audience sometimes likes to be told what the heck is going on. I had similar problems with Transience, which also failed to pass EqD muster.
As ever, the work continues.
5743280
Well… you're very welcome! Evidently, my ghost words on your horse words meant a lot to you, and that's one of the best rewards one can get when they talk about someone else's Ponyfic.
I'm not gonna respond to everything you said – on top of everything else, I read this fic and wrote up my review on it nearly a month ago, mere days after its featured box spotlight – but I will try and cover the main points I feel you have pressing questions or concerns over.
You know, no writer learns in a vacuum. Some may develop their style primarily from subconscious observation, others from directly studying that which leaves an impression on them. But either way, learning from others and making it your own is something one absolutely deserves credit for when the results turn out solidly. And I would say you made it your own – I didn't think of the Estee comparison at all when reading it, and while I can certainly see what you mean, the way you applied even that element was no copycat. Chiefly because Estee primarily uses it to further fuel dark comedy or the ideally cynical tone of their works, while you're using it for pure, sincere, raw drama here. But for other reasons too.
I completely get that you'll feel in the shadow of your idol, and what I say won't change that. But take my word for it: as someone else who also reads far more than he writes, and like a literary sponge of sorts, and who also has doubts about his style's tics (though without having a singular analogue of influence), you're more than your influences. Even if this fic wouldn't exist as it does without them, that doesn't invalidate it. We're all intricate, complex webs of influences and our own personal histories, after all.
Also, the public thanks to Estee are appreciated, but they don't seem to follow or read reviews of their work. At least, I've never seen them reply here when I've looked at one of their works, anyway. So, they probably won't see it!
I'll have to take your word for it – never read that doorstop or any of its sequels!
But considering the one-liner description and density of it from the outside, I'd believe it'd pull that kind of gambit.
I'm not sure how well I can explain this, but I'll give it the old college try. It certainly is rarer to write so fantastically on a deep issue has no personal experience of, but it's not unseen. Observations in real life and fiction you read are likely the cornerstone of that, as is your prior attempt at a similar story and prompt, learning from its (relative failings), honing in on a different approach, and then committing to it. And while I certainly don't support first drafts rushed and submitted before that little sleep for a busy day, I think the degree of no-faffing you faced just… brought out the best in your writing. It's a curious thing, but I've seen it happen many times, for myself and others. And it's not as simple as a deadline just forcing us to write either.
Also, something else you'll come to learn as an author: a work you rattle off real quick can get far more love and attention than the thing you slave over for ages. It's easy to be put off by this, but all those people do mean it as a compliment. When a work speaks to people, it just does. That, and doing something not often seen, and typically only done passably. When a work is unique-ish like that and speaks to people, they express their admiration, and tell their friends.
There are a couple of caveats I should mention. Best portrayals of grief and pet-perspective fics that I've read.
And while I've certainly read some, it's not nearly exhaustive, in either area.
Also, while I have lost loved ones, it's rare, and not so close that I've been hung up on it beyond the very specific window where it happened. I'm not often hit hard by interactions and relations with others, so I barely have an idea of what real grief is like either. But this hit me when I was reading it, less in terms of giving me flashbacks, but more just feeling I was there, in the fic.
Oh, stop it, I'm blushing so hard I'm solidifying here! 👻
But again, you're very welcome, and I'm happy I made your day. Reviewing Ponyfic's no exact science, and one's gotta own both their biases and their gut reactions and enjoyment. So when something strikes me, it gets the rating it deserves, and as well-articulated a write-up as I can manage (
). Glad it meant all that for you, buddy.
5743408
Your ghost words DO mean a lot to me! My first foray onto this site back in secondary school never got close to having people straight up review the things I wrote - it's a new experience and a VERY exciting one. Apologies if the gushing was too much, but I'm still processing that things I write are worth reviewing to some. It's cool!
I never need an excuse to gush about Estee, haha. I don't know why their stuff connects with me as much as it does, but their fics LITTER my top ten. I do appreciate the remarks around the work standing on its own, though. When I look at my own work, it's very hard to not pick it apart under the lens of "Who did I steal this from," and the assurance that this does not come across as a rip of Estee's style is very encouraging. Still learning to stand on my own two legs, as it were.
Highly recommend Austraeoh if you like a) adventure and b) longfic. It's daunting, but it grips you in a way I haven't really experienced outside of that particular series. Once you get to a certain point, it begins consuming you, to the point where (in my case) it became an obsession that's lasted for upwards of five years at this point. Semi-related, a screenshot of my screen time from my last reread to really send the point home that it pulls you in and doesn't let you go. cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/613532135084654592/1143614074278650017/IMG_6765.jpg
I think the explanation you posited about analyzing where other fics did well and fell short with grief is the most plausible as to how this came about. And while I ALSO do not support that sort of rush (and I don't usually beat myself up like that when I'm writing, I promise), I have always performed better under pressure. Dunno why. Guess it's the procrastinator in me, haha. (Also, I am SO aware of the tendency for things that were fired off in a single sitting to outperform those you spent time editing. Happened on my last account, has been happening here, too. When Echoes first got featured, I joked in Aragon's discord server that it was following a decade of well-established FimFiction tradition.)
Didn't think those remarks were exclusive! That does NOT take away from their impact, even a little bit. Thank you again, seriously. Never thought something I wrote would be placed into those categories at all. The explanation of the grief feeling like you're there in the fic also makes a lot of sense - I've been interpreting those reactions as relating to it.
Your write-up was BEAUTIFULLY articulated, don't worry. I'm glad I could make ya blush a lil! I meant every word I said, and I thank you deeply. I said this to another person recently, but this is the kind of feedback that keeps new authors going - and I have no doubt I'm not the ONLY author walking away feeling giddy and warm inside after reading your reviews. You do good work here, don'tcha forget that.