It Is Recommendsday, My Dudes #147 · 8:04pm January 10th
I've mentioned more than a few times about my enjoyment of Jinglemas and how proud I am to play a role in it. And one thing always impresses me each year: the newbie pod. Day 1 has been traditionally reserved for previously unpublished authors. Partially because there's a cushion for the moderated queue to be cleared out before the end of the holiday, partially because they have a failure rate several times higher than the average.
This year, though, was a great crop! In all, nine authors decided to make Jinglemas their first publish (though two actually got an additional story out in November after registering for the event!) and only two failed to deliver. That's pretty great, since prior years have seen as high as a 50% fail rate. It helps that the quality was pretty high, too!
That's part of why I want to feature them here. The other part is that Jinglemas is probably the hardest time of the year to get eyeballs on a story. There's an absurd amount of competition: rather than 10-20 stories a day, during Jinglemas there's 40-60. New authors get the short end of the stick that way and it's easy to overlook them.
Now, I can't feature all seven - I'm limited by my own sanity and the time I've got to write. But I will say that they all deserve attention. So to give a little boost to the three I'm not listing:
Hearths Warming Miracle by Twiliight
Rainbow Pie Snow Day by Leviathan Eclipse
How the Rarity Bestowed Hearth's Warming by Aromatic Brew
And also the breezie story that Deparnieux did: The Part of Me I Miss.
So first up, I have to feature the just-mentioned Deparnieux. It takes courage to throw yourself into Jinglemas as your first story. It takes an absolute crazy person to volunteer for Breezie duty before you publish your first fic. That's the Jinglemas spirit! So I'm enthused to bring up Feeling Fuzzy, Tasting Colors.
It's Hearth's Warming and Scootaloo's alone. At least to start: her funk is interrupted by Rainbow Dash arriving at high speed. Not voluntarily, mind you, as she was forcibly ejected from Cloudsdale for messing up the celebrations there. So in the spirit of the holiday, Dash takes her honorary younger sister and gives her the most precious gift a filly can receive: a crash course in committing grand larceny as they break into the weather factory to prank Cloudsdale in revenge.
For starters, this one's got a great mix of vibes. You get a nice bit of Poor Scootaloo; there's some great physical comedy (like Dash getting punched through the Sugarcube Corner sign); it has a great riff off an in-universe Rainbow Factory so there's just a touch of spooky; and there's nutty adventure for the break-in itself. A little bit of everything that combines well to a good, humorous whole. The combined result also meshes well with a show-like feel that's a bit goofy but not too goofy.
The eventual twist that ties into the title with the rainbow colors is a really neat idea, too. You could probably develop that out a lot more, but it's pretty interesting even just as an element in this. (Plus I like that it's Scoots that figures it out. It's good to see her getting a little hero time.)
It's a great first publish. Peppy, funny, a great narrator voice, and with some interesting ideas to play with.
Second, I'm going to be a little selfish and feature one of the new authors who's actually gonna be catching this one since I'm in their Follows lists. Hey Hazel Skye. You did great work with Wreck the Halls. Now I'mma tell people to read it.
Pinkie Pie has a gift for Limestone this year. But she can't tell her what it is. Just that they have to go to a natural history museum and that Pinkie needs to blindfold her sister. Predictably, it will end with broken things.
I admit to having a soft spot for the Pies. They're a really interesting family with some neat dynamics, largely owing to how extreme the various personalities are. Throw any two of them together and you'll get a gigantic mess - in the good way. And this story holds true to that: Pinkie's trying and Limestone knows she means well but she also wants to strangle her younger sister. There's lots of love and still also lots of "ffs Pinkie why are you like this."
The idea behind the present is a really neat one, too. Makes total sense from an in-universe perspective, makes total sense about why Pinkie would choose it, and Limestone's thoughts on it... I'll admit that Limestone's reaction surprised me, but in a good way - it wasn't how I expected the fic to resolve, but once I read it? It made sense with who she is. (And not taking the obvious route deserves an extra kudos, I think.)
So yeah. This is great stuff.
Next up on the hit parade is PantheraQueen with We're Orna-Meant To Be, which even if it wasn't a good story I would feel obligated to recommend on that title alone.
Hearth's Warming is tomorrow, and Rainbow Dash needs Twilight's help. See, she and Soarin have a bit of a holiday tradition: they each hide an ornament meant for the other. First one to find it opens a present early; loser does the other's chores for a week. And Dash needs Twilight's help to cheat. Not to win - but to guarantee a loss, because she can't wait any longer to see his face when he opens her gift for him. And then everything goes completely wrong.
I'll be up front: I'm really not a fan of the SoarinDash ship. Part because he doesn't really have much of a personality, part because it has the smack of several S1-2 ships which were just 'slap each of the Mane 6 with the nearest male character' that resulted in things like CaramelJack or RariPants. So when I say this is good, it's me being mighty impressed.
It's the light touch that makes it work here, I think. The focus doesn't need Soarin to carry things - he's there, but at just the right balance to be sweetly romantic without needing to do any heavy lifting with the story. The focus is much more strongly on Dash herself, which works out fine. Rainbow Dash has personality to spare, and she's pretty adept at getting into dumb trouble.
Beyond that? The writing here is tight and smooth. The concept is simple but funny. The dialogue is on point. It gets the comedy from the nutty situation rather than trying to lean on jokes that may or may not land. Short, simple, efficient, effective. Everything you're looking for in a short one-scene fic.
And last but not least we come to SteelTheWarrior and Cozy's Hearthswarming Flurry.
Flurry Heart - now about eight-ish (I'm guessing) - is excited for Hearth's Warming. But she has a brainstorm: everypony deserves a gift on Hearth's Warming. She knows that to be true. But logically, somepony out there isn't going to get one! So she sets out to find who in Equestria is most likely not to get a gift and make sure they're given a happy Hearth's Warming. That she decides it's Cozy Glow just makes things… interesting.
The first thing that really makes this fic stand out is that it's a reverse Christmas Carol. Instead of the reader following Scrooge as he's harassed by ghosts, we follow Flurry and her action (effectively as the ghosts) to badger Cozy Glow into finding the joy of Hearth's Warming and letting it into her heart. That's just such a wonderfully novel idea it guaranteed this fic a feature at some point.
This one also stands out against most FlurryGlow fics because of the ages: like 90% of them pick up when the two are in their late teens/early 20s, but this one preserves them at their young ages. Flurry's grown up just enough to be self-motivated, and Cozy's pretty much frozen in place. That keeps it fresher than the norm and helps the story along since they lack the baggage and more stubborn natures of full adults.
And that childlike immaturity carries throughout the fic proper. Flurry swings between dogged, blind determination, being inconsolable at her failures, and boundless holiday cheer at the drop of a hat. Because she's eight, and children are like that. It's a big credit that she does that rather than acting like a short adult - it makes it real.
New or catching up? Try Recommendsday: The Index for your story needs!
Knowing how set you are on keeping these blogs always featuring a pair of stories lest the backlog become an odd number, I copped pretty quick that this was a double feature. New authors debuting with Jinglemas deserve it, though, for putting themselves out there and rising to the challenge. Being someghost who too debuted with Ponyfic at Jinglemas once upon a time, I sympathise, and approve of them getting the boost here.
I will say, it's nice to see a FlurryCozy fic that keeps them as kids, whatever the dramatic potential for them as teens/adults is hard to ignore. It's not enough to counter my opposition to both players, and especially Cozy, least in terms of the fic appealing to me, but it's admirable, especially in a new author.
Agreed. It sets the story nicely apart that way and gives a very different dynamic.
I like this feature of first-time authors doing Jinglemas. The prompt you get can be hit or miss as to whether it really inspires you to do something special or makes you force it just to have something, but several of my favorite stories I've written were Jinglemas ones. Maybe it's just because the show is about good feelings and friendship, and something about Jinglemas makes most authors stick to that.
wooow! :O so many reviews from you! :D
Thanks so much for the review and recommendation
It really made my day!