• Member Since 27th Apr, 2012
  • offline last seen Mar 22nd, 2018

PoweredByTea


Very occasionally, I post pony stories. Twilight Sparkle is the best pony. I drink my tea with milk, no sugar. Those would be the important bits.

More Blog Posts31

Feb
4th
2014

What I've been prereading lately. · 9:32pm Feb 4th, 2014

So, turns out I’ve been doing some prereading lately. Have some verdicts...

Moments, by Bad Horse

Moments is a story about an ordinary that is also the end of the world and about what you might do when there really is no hope. At least, it was that. However, since then it’s undergone several revisions by Bad Horse I’ve kind of been left feeling like I can’t keep up.

I really, really to tell you that this is a good one, go read it. I really do. I mean, it’s a natural instinct after prereading, but, I’m not certain I can. Something didn’t click with this story for me, and I’m not sure what it was. Perhaps a misreading on my part? Perhaps is was because I was feeling really spaced out all last week when I was looking at it. I don’t know. The best I can give you honestly is to say that other people seem to be enjoying it.

The original version, however, is still available as part of a The Writeoff Association's January contest with the prompt “a single moment” where it won second place. It’s shorter, simpler, and about that single, ordinary, day that is also the last day. It is probably the one I prefer.

Three Nights by Bradel

Another story I’ve been prereading for, in which Bradel aptly demonstrates why you’ll probably never see a seasonally themed story from me by finishing a Hearthswarming story in February.:rainbowlaugh: Also Cadence.

Three Nights is essentially a story about, well three nights of Cadence’s life separated by years. It’s very much a pure slice of life without that much in the way of conflict. Don’t expect any mustache twiddling villains to be defeated here. But, well, sometimes one can find oneself in the mood for something other than all that and if one does, Three Nights could well be worth a look. I will tell you that I could feel the aching loneliness leaking through by the middle of the third chapter even though I usually find myself in full-analytical mode when prepreading.

Report PoweredByTea · 507 views ·
Comments ( 7 )

Read Moments. Had the usual feelings of bleak hopelessness that normally occurs from his stories. Trouble is, his reply to my comment would seem to indicate the story was meant to leave a positive impression at the end. :applejackunsure:
About to start Three Nights.:twilightsmile:

1796498
Reread. I should probably let a little time pass and then come back to it. It could very well be me, not the story. There's a 50+ email chain of analysis and discussion between the various prereaders in my inbox for a start. Reading has always been a solitary activity for me. I found it very difficult to get into with all that noise.

1796638
I spent hours at work yesterday analyzing the story in my mind, (my job is not exactly mentally stimulating.) And ultimately I concluded that Bad Horse stories are Not Safe For Drepressives.:twilightsheepish:
And wow, that's a lot of discussion.:applejackconfused:

1796667
Some of it may have gotten sidetracked onto the physics of impacts. That may have been partly my fault. :twilightsheepish:

I'm starting to wonder how professional editors do it. Doing analysis while trying to read a story just pulls me out of the story and then I end up not really enjoying the story as much as I would have and of course, without appreciation, I don't make good calls.

I'm starting to think I need to change my entire approach.

1796769
While I would hesitate to call myself a really good pre-reader, I haven't gotten actually kicked off a story yet, so I must be doing something right. Usually I don't spend a lot of time analyzing too deeply during editing. I mostly concern myself with how it "sounds", so to speak.

1796769 You could decide before you begin what "zoom" to work at: whether to do line edits, or critique scenes, or read the whole thing and make no comments until you get to the end and then say one thing.

I don't do that, exactly; I go through and make some line-by-line comments about things I like or dislike (but not grammar), then try to summarize story structure issues at the end. But it's hard to focus on more than one level at a time. I can barely review a story with lots of grammar errors. Each one derails my thought.

The better the writer is, the easier it is to look at the big picture

Thanks for pre-reading! A funny thing is, with all the criticisms, nobody criticized what I thought was the weakest, least-believable thing in Moments: the implication that Twilight had gone thru the loop countless times, and never talked it out with her friends.

Login or register to comment