Glowmelon News and a Review

LAST TIME, ON THE BLOG:
My fanfiction, "The Glowmelon Mystery" is being completely re-written, almost from scratch. Only the plot and dialogue are staying relatively the same, but with new things being added by the moment. Everything else is being changed to be more "show" than "tell", as well as just overall being easier to read and understand.

NEW NEWS:
The re-write will probably be finished by tonight. I am giving a concrete day because I need to make sure I stop flaking out. The story is more than half re-written at this point, and I know exactly what I need to do for the rest of it. You readers are in for some nice little surprises. :)

NEW REVIEW:
Gato of the SSMB Forums recently wrote a very well thought-out review of the original, currently online version of The Glowmelon Mystery. I'm going to post it here now, aside from the section that contains plot spoilers (just in case anyone reading this hasn't read the story yet). Also, the rewrite has fixed or will fix many of the legitimate issues that Gato had with the old version, even before I heard what Gato had to say. So there's more incentive for people to read the new version of the story once its out!

Gato "Okay, this one is a quite nice story, it's about Twilight who one morning just learns about the glowmelon festival, a really special day when some animals deliver this amazing fruit to the ponies... Being curious as she usually is, Twi decides to investigate the source of this fruit as well as the veracity of the legends surrounding the fest. And as I said before it's really well done at some parts, but it has a fair share of problems I found...

For starters I don't know if it's just me but I felt like it took forever to get into the story, we have a big introduction that goes on and on and on... When things start getting interesting we are kind of halfway in the story.

The other problem I found is that I just can't shake the feeling some characters are a bit off... This is most noticeable with Twilight who seemed to be channeling Rainbow at points or being pretty much a jerk at some other parts. (and even if she tends to act with disregard of other ponies this mostly happens when she is worried or stressed or when she pretty much lost it), it also seemed a little off how she *spoilers*

And for a episode like story some jokes were a little off but I don't really care about that... Just felt like pointing that out.

As for the positives the story really fits within the show, it gives some sort of background to Fluttershy's abusive relationship with Angel (though I personally didn't like that part that much) and I can't forget to mention the manticore... Awesome continuity nod there (that had to be intentional).

So yeah, all in all a good read. "

Reviews like this are the best to receive, because they point out where improvements can be made. And I hope I will have made all those improvements by the time the new version of the story is out (old version, new version, geeze I really wish I hadn't jumped the gun uploading the currently-online version).

Also, if anyone has idea how to make the story not take too long to get started, please say so in the comments here. I'm trying to fix it in my own ways, but more advice would be great.