Paul's Thursday Reviews CCCXLIV · 1:04am Nov 17th, 2023
Please, forgive any typos. I usually write the opening blog first thing Thursday morning and review it pre-post, but today I had a need to be in the office which kind of superseded my usual Thursday routine, and then I waited four hours as my car's state inspection turned into a whole lot more. So now I’m writing this up just before posting.
Did jury duty again on Tuesday. It was a municipal court this time, so nothing too exciting. At least this time I got to see how it all goes when I’m actually selected. I learned that day that Texas is the only state in the Union that still allows for jury-based trials for traffic stops. Not sure how to feel about that. The sad bit is that there’s no mandate for the government to supply the defendant a lawyer for such small matters as appear in a municipal court, so the defendants have to either represent themselves or pay for their own lawyers – who will undoubtedly cost more than the fee charged for losing the case. As you can imagine, every defendant did their own defense.
For the one case I got to participate in, this was a severe issue for the defendant. Poor guy clearly had no idea what he was doing, and of course he was going up against a trained and experienced prosecuting attorney. Guy didn’t stand a chance. There were times when he outright admitted he committed the crime but didn’t seem to realize it. We went lenient on him because it seemed clear that he found the very law he broke confusing.
In other news, I’m a little behind on my writing so far, but not by much. It’s the same situation I was in this time last week. Losing two days at my parents’ place is the primary culprit, but Mom outright told me “you should visit soon”, and any Good Son™ knows that’s code for “you better be home this coming weekend!” I do try to be a Good Son™ whenever I can.
I have no such obligations this weekend though, so I can use the extra time to get ahead. Who the heck had the bright idea to set NaNoWriMo at the start of the holidays?
But on to the blog! This one’s another Author Spotlight, now going to Shrink Laureate. I decided Shrink deserved the spot this time because they are the reason these blogs look like they do. Years ago – more specifically, around the time when DeviantArt decided to perform shenanigans making embedding artwork here all but impossible because stupidity – I was in a bind with placing cover art and looking for an alternative. Shrink saw and contacted me to volunteer the use of a server they had access to, and this blog has been looking pretty ever since. So this is just another way for me to thank them for the ever-valuable assistance. I hope to someday have access to my own server so that I don’t have to keep mooching off them.
Since I plan to do this again, if anyone out there feels like there’s an author who deserves the spotlight of (almost) an entire review blog, by all means let me know!
As before, the Long Story for this blog will not be a Shrink story, owing to the fact that it was scheduled for this week months (probably over a year) ago and I’m not shifting it around for these spotlights. So, also as before, let’s get to that first before we indulge in all Shrink’s works.
To the reviews!
Stories for This Week:
Sun & Moon Act I: Ascending Star by cursedchords
Abdication by Shrink Laureate
An Unroyal Wedding by Shrink Laureate
Free Moon by Shrink Laureate
Log of the UNS Twilight Sparkle by Shrink Laureate
One Night In A Storm by Shrink Laureate
Princess Celestia's Private Library by Shrink Laureate
Schooled in Warfare by Shrink Laureate
The Best and The Worst by Shrink Laureate
The Taste Of Blood by Shrink Laureate
Total Word Count: 120,501
Rating System
Why Haven't You Read These Yet?: 2
Pretty Good: 6
Worth It: 2
Needs Work: 0
None: 0
Sun & Moon Act I: Ascending Star
85,625 Words
By cursedchords
For decades, Equestria has been under the power of the Mad King, Discord. Celestia and Luna spend their days hustling other ponies out of their hard-earned goods as frauds and tricksters of the capital city. Until a pony representing the Resistance appears with an offer they can’t refuse…
This was weird with a capital W. cursedchords is clearly trying to create an epic, but there are a lot of things that make the whole ordeal feel… ‘off’. This story is supposed to be about Celestia and Luna, specifically how they defeated Discord and gained power. But the entirety of the story feels “not very pony”, for lack of a better term.
For example, Discord apparently created for himself a capital city. As in an actual center of governance. And he spends most of his days sequestered in the palace. And when he does make an in-story appearance, he… doesn’t… do anything? He’s just there. Talking. Or not. Honestly, it’s the most boring and un-Discord rendition of Discord I’ve ever seen. Where are the chaotic antics? The passive-aggressive goofiness? Everything we associate with Discord is gone, and he appears in this story as little more than a milestone to be achieved.
And there’s a resistance. An organized, powerful, rational group that supposedly exists to end Discord’s reign. With armies and magic and something something unspecified prophecy. But this is Discord. I get that he’d like something like this to be around for the sake of spreading chaos, but you’d think he’d make an appearance every now and then or do something to throw a wrench in their plans just for the lulz. Instead not a soul amongst the Resistance seems to have ever so much as seen the draconequus and are free to live their lives in perfectly orderly and organized peace.
So much for the Spirit of Chaos.
That’s just the surface stuff. Really, there’s nothing in this story that possesses any of the atmosphere and feel of the FiM universe. It’s more than simply being under Discord’s reign. I’ve read plenty of serious, even grim stories that still have a perfectly “Equestria” feeling to them. This story doesn’t have that. Honestly, it’s more like an original fiction with a couple coincidentally familiar character names than an actual FiM story.
Other oddities abound. Celestia and Luna were born alicorns, and this is apparently a “big deal”, except when it’s not. Nopony in Eridian treats them in a particularly special way, but somehow Resistance leaders Atlas and Aqua could tell “at first sight” that they’re unique? Then they get to the resistance headquarters and supposedly there are more alicorns in the crowd… who we’ll never, ever hear so much as an offhand mention of ever again. For most of the story there’s this regular repetition of the divide amongst the three tribes of pegasi, unicorns and earth ponies, with alicorns practically never coming up. Then two characters (other than Celestia and Luna, who are already alicorns) get turned into alicorns and suddenly being an alicorn is important again and a reward for doing Great Things™? So whatever happened to all those other alicorns supposedly in the resistance but whom never are heard from again or do anything whatsoever?
Then there’s Celestia and Luna, who are meant to be the main characters but don’t really do anything to earn their status. They’re discovered in Eridian, they go to Resistance School for a year, and boom, they’re heroes. There’s no great quest for them to complete, the entirety of their teaching period is skipped as though unimportant, and when the time comes to seize the sun and moon it’s painted as if they had the ability all along and simply never tried. Then a McGuffin is quite literally dropping into their laps for no apparent reason, which they then use to defeat Discord with pathetic ease.
At no point do Celestia and Luna ever struggle with anything outside of their personal relationship. There’s no great challenge to help them evolve. They just… do things and then save the world. It’s all remarkably anticlimactic.
And then they’re crowned Equestria’s new rulers. Because… uh… because? It’s not like it’s put to a vote or anything, nor have they really done anything to earn it. A couple key characters declare “you’re the rulers now” and everypony present cheers – strangers, enemies, and allies alike. No explanation is offered for how their joint rule is going to be better than Discord’s, or those of the secondary antagonists. It’s just assumed. Because they’re alicorns? Because they’re Celestia and Luna and the readers know those names and can just assume?
All of that is just the surface-level of oddities with this story’s main plot, and I haven’t even started on the framing device yet. A framing device that sets unicorn Twilight Sparkle up as the ruling princess of Equestria writing a historical recitation of Celestia and Luna’s rule after they’ve been… uh… deposed, I guess? Killed? Retired? Oh, and apparently Equestria is now part of some interstellar “Imperium”, possibly led by humans, and Twilight, ruler of all Equestria, is nothing more than an employee to some Imperium master? Don’t look for any explanation for all this, there isn’t one, and it goes completely unremarked upon after the first chapter. No crossover tag either, for those of you wondering.
Looking at the sequel’s description, I don’t see any indication that it will be explained there either.
I left this one more miffed than anything. While there’s not much wrong with the writing itself, it feels as though cursedchords made a lot of missteps and questionable decisions. I suppose the good/bad nature of said decisions will depend upon the reader, but for me it doesn’t work well. I never got the sense of any moment-to-moment conflict, and in many ways Celestia and Luna felt like bit players in what is ostensibly their own story. Many pertinent elements of the plot and the world’s background are skimmed or completely unexplained, and I often felt like I wasn’t reading an MLP fanfiction at all.
Still, others may find some value in it. It does star the royal sisters (to a degree), and the quirks might come off as a plus for those looking to see a story that bucks more common storytelling methods. Give it a go if you’re feeling like something “different”.
Bookshelf: Worth It
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
The Legend of the Scorpion Queen — WHYRTY?
Patience — Pretty Good
What Society Expects from a Princess — Pretty Good
Abdication
3,021 Words
By Shrink Laureate
Celestia bowed. She called her a princess. She even had a coronation before the entire city of Canterlot. And yet, somehow, some way, Twilight Sparkle doesn’t understand that Celestia and Luna were abdicating the throne to her. The royal siblings are about ready to pull out their own sparkly, wavy manes in frustration! But they’ll find a way to make it absolutely clear to the new princess. They will retire if it’s the last thing they do!
This brief and silly story repaints every major event after Season 3 as elaborate plots to make it clear to Twilight that she’s the princess of Equestria now. I don’t want to go into spoiler territory because the fun is in discovering it on your own. Let’s just say that not all villains are as villainous as they at first seem.
A bout of goofy fun for the sake of it, and believe me when I say I’m not complaining. Give it a go if you want to enjoy some humor at the princesses' expense. And Twilight’s, if you subscribe to her being utterly oblivious.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good
An Unroyal Wedding
1,000 Words
By Shrink Laureate
Lyra and Bon Bon are getting married! Well, sorta...
I admit I was skeptical going into this. I mean, it’s a wedding story. 99% of the time, those are all practically identical (which is one reason why I never want to actually write one). But every once in a blue moon that 1% rears its head, and this is one of those times. The lesson: make sure your fiancée knows which name to use at the pulpit… or that you have another name in the first place!
I am amused, and expect most others will be too.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good
Free Moon
1,000 Words
By Shrink Laureate
Three ponies, one from each tribe, prepare to land on the moon. To them, it is their one and only chance of doing away with a tyrant.
This was curious in a variety of ways. There are a lot of questions, some of which will be answered but others not. The story is told strictly through radio transmissions between Ponyville and the landing capsule, and then only from the ponies (or maybe just one of the ponies) in said landing capsule. The ponies themselves are never identified, although Shrink Laureate using the OC tag suggests it isn’t anypony we know.
Presumably this is set in an AU where either Celestia or Luna banished the other to the moon and then went on to become a corrupt tyrant. Which one got banished eventually does get revealed, but then they are described and more questions arise. Is Equestria really ruled by a tyrant, or are the astromares just rebels looking to change their society by any means necessary? They say “if we show her pictures of modern Equestria, she’ll understand”, but does that mean Equestria is a wasteland or are they simply cherry picking and exaggerating a few inevitable negative traits and saying “see how bad our world is, please fix it”? There’s no way to know. It’s also entirely possible the alicorn they’ve come to rescue from the moon is just as bad if not worse than the one they’re trying to depose.
Needless to say, this is one of those stories where you’ll walk away with a lot of questions. In this case, I think that’s a good thing. Shrink Laureate played the game well. If I had anything that bothered me, it’s only that the characters don’t really sound like they’re professional astronauts. It felt less like a real space mission and more like a bunch of actors reading a script put on by someone who has never really saw or paid any attention to those videos/movies depicting real-world space missions.
On the other hand, this could be a bootleg mission put on by amateurs desperate for a solution to their current predicament, real or imaginary. It could go either way.
Overall, I enjoyed this. It does a lot with its tiny wordcount.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good
Log of the UNS Twilight Sparkle
1,445 Words
By Shrink Laureate
For hundreds of years, Sunset Shimmer has wanted to go home. Now a Fleet Admiral of a space navy, she is about to take part in humanity’s first ever contact with an alien species.
This was a curious one. It involves a world where Sunset Shimmer got stuck permanently on Earth due to the mirror portal shattering. Set hundreds of years later during an age of space exploration, we find that she is apparently immortal and, surprisingly, everyone knows it. The story opens up with one of her crewmen outright acknowledging the fact.
Short, well-written, and with some curious implications. I liked it, both its presentation and the overarching idea. But it also doesn’t do much beyond its base premise. Fortunately, there is a sequel that I have every intention of reading.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good
One Night In A Storm
7,116 Words
By Shrink Laureate
Brûlée didn’t have many options. She was lost in a forest in the midst of a storm with night soon to fall. So when she finds a tiny cave to take shelter in, who is she to not use it? Even if it’s already occupied by a similarly lost young griffon hen? A griffon who might be hungry…
This was a pleasant little slice-of-life friendship story where a pony and a griffon, each running away from something, spend the night in a cramped little cave and try to find some common ground. The pony has never met a griffon before and only knows of them through unpleasant stories, whereas the griffon has led a rural upbringing and knows equally as little about ponies and their ways. The end result is an awkward, bumbling first step towards an interspecies friendship.
I liked this one. Shrink Laureate goes through a lot of trouble to really identify who these two are as people, making them feel at once real and interesting. I especially approve of how the story explores the culture of the two characters by them being totally clueless and simply asking questions. Brûlée’s utter horror at what Ava considers food is coupled nicely with Ava’s fear of being seen as a monster, and Brûlée’s work as a chef makes for a great bridge of communication.
Definitely a good one, especially for readers looking to explore the whole Friendship is Magic concept.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good!
Princess Celestia's Private Library
6,158 Words
By Shrink Laureate
Tercet, a book publisher, has been summoned to the palace for a special project. He is woefully unprepared for what Celestia reveals to him. For all her efforts at appearing aloof, she might not be ready for it either.
Da’yum. I’ve still got two more stories to read in this collection, but from where I’m sitting at this moment this is easily the best Shrink Laureate’s got.
The gist is that Celestia has a private library filled with the collected works of a wide range of ponies who were dear to her and, more importantly, saw her as something other than an impeccable leader of equines. She’s been working to keep it secret for nearly 1,000 years. Tercet is hired to refurbish and collate the entire library, and to have it all done in a very demanding timeframe
This story dances around varying topics, particularly the different works of the collection, while Tercel tries to unravel what Celestia’s purpose for this entire project is. In the meantime we have Celestia’s ever-growing angst over the project, treating it with such grave seriousness that it might as well be a matter of national security.
The end result is something that feels a lot more complex than it actually is. If you’re paying any attention at all, you’ll get the point early on, and yet Shrink Laureate’s excellent directing ensures that not a single sentence is uninteresting. It’s a pitch-perfect Celestia story, and one I can’t recommend enough.
If I had to criticize anything, I suppose it would be this one scene where there’s… a thief. That’s it, a thief. You’ll never know who the thief is, what she stole, why she stole it, whether she was caught, or what her fate is. There’s just a random scene with a thief, and you’re expected to just accept that.
I suppose I get it. This story is told almost entirely from Tercet’s perspective, and what Tercet don’t know, we don’t know. And the scene does serve as a clue that Celestia is pretty gung-ho about nopony touching her private collection, thereby also serving as a reminder to Tercet to keep his yap shut. Which was probably the whole point. Still, it felt a little odd, so I figured it warranted a mention.
Excellent characterization, strong pacing, a touch of worldbuilding, all wrapped up with a sweet bow that is the ending. Definitely glad I gave this one a go.
Bookshelf: Why Haven’t You Read These Yet?
Schooled in Warfare
2,583 Words
By Shrink Laureate
Commodore Grosvenor and his crew of gryphons and ponies prepare to launch a surprise night-time attack on Mount Aris.
This one is set in an AU belonging to Mitch H called Good Trooper Gilda, which I have never read but have heard of. Perhaps someday I’ll actually read it. It’s a short action piece in which an air navy from Trottingham prepares to attack the hippogriffs of Mount Aris only to be surprise attacked themselves. Turns out Trottingham had no idea that the hippogriffs can take on seapony form.
There isn’t much to this. It’s an action scene, nothing more and nothing less. A well done action scene, to be sure, but still just an action scene. I for one liked it for what it is, but I can’t say for certain how broad its reach will be. Perhaps readers with an interest in airships and their military use, or anyone who wants to see how hippogriffs might function in a combat scenario. Perhaps readers of Mitch H’s Good Trooper Gilda will get the most out of it.
Bookshelf: Worth It
The Best and The Worst
4,777 Words
By Shrink Laureate
Gilda and Zephyr Breeze, completely separately from one another, tell the story of how they dated in flight school.
You read that right: Gilda and Zephyr Breeze. Sound crazy? Yeah, it kinda is. But that’s also what makes this story work.
The first thing of note is that Shrink Laureate did a phenomenal job channeling both characters’ signature voices. There is no doubt at any point that it’s Zephyr and Gilda telling the story. Zephyr’s still a narcissistic little creep destined for prison and Gilda’s still a grouchy griffon. Bonus points for also going further with griffon vs. pony cultural norms than the show ever gave us.
Is the story wholly accurate? Not a chance. There’s no doubt that both of them are lying to some degree, although I’d trust Gilda’s retelling more than Zephyr’s. But at the same time, a lot of their individual versions line up well enough to clarify that A) it absolutely happened, and B) they both might have truly gotten something pleasant out of the relationship, even if it didn’t last. Which is hardly surprising.
This is ship denial at its finest, with excellent characterizations. It’s as ridiculous as it is believable considering who we’re dealing with, and a fine example that any ship can work – even if only temporarily – under the attention of the right storyteller.
Bookshelf: Why Haven’t You Read These Yet?
The Taste Of Blood
7,776 Words
By Shrink Laureate
Princess Twilight Sparkle has been having dreams. Heavy dreams. Dreams about the cost of victory.
This is, ironically, the first story I read for this blog, and whew, did it have an impact. Most of the chapters depict a different dream of Twilight’s. Each one features a villain (or in one case, a mere rival) suffering from having been defeated by her, and not in a “friendship is magic” kind of way. These are traumatic dreams, the kind that makes a pony think.
Then we get to the end, when Twilight decides to confide in Celestia in hopes of getting some advice. What Celestia tells her is… yeouch. I shan’t be spoiling it, but it was nothing at all like what I expected, and the epilogue makes it out to be a pretty damning thing despite the narrative somehow not treating it as such.
I liked most of the story, but I don’t like the reveal of the epilogue. When we put everything together in the big picture, Celestia’s decision seems flagrantly out of character. The fact that she and Luna treat it so lightly afterwards only makes it worse. If Shrink Laureate should correct any one thing to make this story the best it could be, it should be this. Everything else in the story is great.
Except maybe fixing the typos. I’d really like to know what “the fires of manga bubbling up from deep in the earth” looks like.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good
Stories for Next Time:
Sunny Skies All Day Long by PhantomFox
Sunset Shimmer's Very Respectable Class Reunion by Sporktacles
The Wool we Weave by Lambs Prey
The Stars Have Eyes by Exterminatus
We're Trapped in Stone, and We Must Scream by King of Madness
Something About Midnights by evelili
Pinkie Anonymous by Daemon McRae
For want of a book by Hoopy McGee
To Walk Unseen by NaiadSagaIotaOar
Entry #649 by KitsuneRisu
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ooh, exciting :D glad to see you and I are very much in agreement on Celestia's Private Library :)
I've read that first one, and it was fine, though it did have an odd feel to it. It's not a genre I'm too enamored with, so I didn't know if that was just me, but I found it entertaining enough.
I've also read "One Night in a Storm" and thought it was pretty good.
That's insane.
Oh wow. Thank you!
I'm pretty happy with the result, and I agree with all of the criticisms. Especially on The Taste of Blood, which was very much a "this darn thing is stuck in my head and won't go away, so I need to publish it before I can move on" situation. I consider it my weakest story as a result.
5755242
Yeah, it was great!
5755246
I was reading a high fantasy story slice-of-life/adventure, but it never felt like I was reading one set in the FiM universe. Everything just felt... "removed" from that. I'm not sure if that was the author's intent or not, but it kept putting me off.
5755290
I have mixed feelings about it. I feel like America's over-regulated as it is, and having more lawyers would just make a bad situation worse. Plus the lawyers we do have are probably better used protecting defendants from things like false murder charges rather than a $50 traffic violation. Besides, these guys didn't go a hundred thousand dollars in debt studying to accrue the knowledge necessary to pass bar exams in a country with way more laws than sense just to make a pittance resolving ordinance disputes – cases that, might I remind you, can take weeks or even months to resolve (because we're over-regulated and all those regulations mean more cases which means more court time for a limited number of judges). That's a pretty shitty pay for the time investment. So yeah, inevitably, the lawyer is going to charge more than the actual dispute is worth because becoming a lawyer is time-consuming and expensive and they'll want to charge a fee that at least allows them to start recouping those debts.
On the other hand, watching that guy struggle to even understand court proceedings (the judge had to inform him that jury selection is not the time to argue your case or submit evidence, just for example) made it clear that he didn't stand a chance. I mean, in this case there was no question he was guilty (he outright admitted it by mistake), but imagine if someone like that isn't guilty? Having an actual lawyer who knew what he was doing would have made all the difference. So it does feel kind of... ick... that the state does not provide a lawyer for such matters. But then if they did, such a lawyer would undoubtedly be way overbooked, and since they're paid by the government they'd probably be underpaid, and so possibly not giving it his all due to overwork and lack of motivation. Still better odds than going it alone though.
5755301
And thank you for the long assist.
You are very welcome!
5755307
I'd say the legal system needs an overhaul, but I don't know it well enough to say HOW, to say nothing of the headaches that would cause lawyers and the like.
Princess Celestia's Private Library is the only one here I've read, and it is excellent (I believe now that all five notable still-active Ponyfic reviews/recommenders have looked at it and given it high marks). I was considering a spotlight on Shrink for a while, but held off as much of his library didn't look interesting to my personal reading tastes, and that can have a negative effect on the mood and intended takeaway of the spotlight. But I'll bat for them as a great author. There's enough high praise here for me to considering works of theirs to read again, at least.
You know, someone it never occurred to me until now that you might host the story pics elsewhere. Me, I just link to the cover art opened in a new window! Which does run the risk of it being a dead link should the author swap pictures, I grant. So I see the merit to your method. Hm.
5755367
That's not the only advantage! By downloading and keeping the images in my own space, I can edit them at will. Every cover art showcased in my blog is resized to a maximum height or width of 450 pixels, which I do to ensure consistency throughout the blogs and so that the images aren't huge. I have some pretty big monitors, but that doesn't mean everyone else does. I think the max size you can go before FIMFiction starts auto-shrinking them to fit is 850 pixels, but I couldn't say for sure because I haven't tested it.
5755389
Dang, you really do think of everything, bud! But as I have noticed both the tiny embedded size for really small cover arts (you know, the 150px kind) and the brief loading time if one scrolls super fast on a page of max-size cover arts before they’ve all loaded, I see the value in both of those decisions.
Geez, just give more reasons to play copycat again, why don’t you?
I believe it’s 1024px, least in width, because that’s that a 16:9 thumbnail on one of my stories is set to. Probably is in height too, what with 1024 being a squared power of 2, and all that means in bits and bytes storage size.