Starting a showcase of good fics: The Solar Flare Review · 11:53pm May 28th, 2012
If you liked "Watching Paint," I hope you'll like my next project.
Hello folks,
I'm starting a pair of blogs/e-'zines
- to showcase the good stories on FiMFiction and
- to host discussion of how to write it.
They will be critical and fun with a strong editorial voice and standards similar to Equestria Daily. Unlike EqD, they will not autoreject fics by subject: if someone can beat the odds and write Brony-in-Equestria Halo-crossover cloppy slasher-horror that tugs at the heartstrings and makes me laugh and cry, I want to find an audience for it.
The Solar Flare Review will be for general audiences and The Lunar Annex will deal in mature fare.
We're going to grab recently-completed stories from FiMFiction and pick the best. Then, we'll talk about why they're the best and what they don't do perfectly.
More than anything, I need slush-readers, folks to do that sorting. You don't need to be an established author or critic; I only ask that you be well enough read now to be able to recommend eight fics and briefly tell me what's good and bad about them. [Edit: pick eight above-average stories, don't agonize over finding the best. I'm more interested in what you have to say about them. They do have to be on FiMFiction, though.]
I also need articles, a few editors (please start as an SR first), and creative visual folks ('cuz that's not my talent).
If you'd like to contribute or lurk the creative process, please swing by
https://groups.google.com/d/forum/solarflare-discussion
If you'd like to receive The Solar Flare Review by e-mail when it's ready
https://groups.google.com/d/forum/the-solar-flare-review
or by FiMFiction,
http://www.fimfiction.net/index.php?view=group&group=683
Sincerely,
Eustatian Wings
Editor in Chief
Wow, really looking forward to this one! I guess this is kind of like what you did with Project FaveBrigade, but on a much bigger scale. I'd definitely like to participate as a slush-reader, as soon as I figure out how to use GoogleGroups. I especially like that you have a mature audiences section since EqD refuses to deal in clop and it can be hard to find an audience (Applejinx talked a lot about this).
Well of I go, to assemble my eight fics.
[A few hundred paws rise into the air] We'd like to help. But, um, gosh ... eight fics on FIMFiction worthy of a collection headed by Eustatian Wings? Not gonna be easy.
But for the sake of literary integrity, we'll do our best. "Recently-completed" will be interpreted to mean within the past two months or so.
Changes to the favourites system pretty much ended FaveBrigade before I figured out how to get it off the ground.
Google Groups:
- You need one of the following to set up a Google Account: (Google anti-fraud policies)
-- An existing e-mail address or
-- A phone line to get gMail (they call once during registration) or
-- A domain name for Google Apps (if you spend money on your pony e-mail, you are wonderfully mad. I just list this for completeness.)
Upper-right corner: Sign-in, then New Account or something like that. This also gives you Google Docs/Drive, which is just about the coolest online collaborative writing tool ever.
140557
They don't have to be recent or short or even the best stories ever. Eight above average, please.
I would like to suggest a fanfic of my own (inb4 attention whore). I will go and say that it is a 'Cupcakes' spin-off. But it isn't the kind that its rushed or the kind in which we have Pinkamena prancing around Ponyville with a chainsaw.
See, I'm a med student, and I really thought about every single aspect of the fanfic to make it perfect. If something is there and you're not sure why, trust me, it has a purpose. I like to think of it as psychological horror. It has almost-zero gore (apart from a few brief mentions of blood, but nothing else).
Well, here it is: One of the fanfics I'm most proud of: Borderline
I've even had people who simply hate 'Cupcakes' with every fiber of their being telling me that it is really great.
If I were to suggest something else, it would be another fanfic of mine, Forever Yours. It's the first story I've ever written, and I'm very, very proud of it. (This one is completely devoid of gore, but it is very dark).
140797
I am hugely backlogged at the moment; yours is the 68th story on my to-read list. From a very quick glance, I can say I like your psychopath Pinkie, but your control of perspective leaves a lot to be desired and ultimately throws me out of the story even before the shrink calls the guards in.
Taking time to correct common mistakes like that is not something I'll have time to do for every story. But with your permission, I'd like to feature it in the first "FicFix" column. I'll tear it apart, rewrite it, and explain what I'm doing. Think of it as writing gross anatomy.
I only have time for one per issue. Submissions from authors are closed for now.
[EDIT: haven't looked at "Forever." And perhaps Pinkie is BPD...]
140825 Please do. I'm planning on revisiting it anyway. And with your help (and the PonyChan's guys), I'll give it an extra polish.
[EDIT: BPD is one of the psychiatrist's hypothesis.]
Should we go for eight shortish, already-completed stories, or may we pick incomplete and/or longer pieces?
141073
Whichever you prefer personally.
All of mine are completed, but Ambassador's Son is decently long.
Well well, color me intrigued. I've been an avid reader for quite some time now, and if people know me, it's usually from my comments.
Been pre-reading a lot as well...
In that case: Private Glassed at your service sir!
-Glassed
I've been looking for something like this to contribute to for a while now. Sign me up.
~Signed, InfiniteBrony
You're one of my readers and commenters, aren't you, Eustatian? And familiar with my in-character reviewthread (mostly on ponychan, but also sort of on FIMchan, such as it is?)
Drop me a note if there is anything you'd like me to do for you- including writing reviews for your zines. I like your hubris. Gotta have some of that to do anything worth doing. If it's beyond reproach it probably isn't 'a thing', so the possible foolishness of this is a point in its favor.
I'm dying to see this succeed. I'm working on my application as we speak, and as I've already mentioned, I'd be more than happy to help in any capacity you deem me suitable for.
EDIT:
My form, which I spent a lot of time on, got eaten by the system. I do not know why. I simply pressed "post" and found a "this message has been deleted" box where I wanted my application to be.
Needless to say I'm kind of pissed, though at least I should be able to remember what I wrote and recreate it without too much more effort.
148657
Oh doubleplus ungood. First glance shows me two "message deleted" boxes, and I have a ghost-post in my e-mail: copy of my post with no text. I'll see if the moderation side of things has anything.
Not cool. If this keeps affecting people, I'll find us a new host.
Looks like it got spamfiltered to moderation. I just tried to release it. That is an extremely lame error message.
Looks interesting so far. I'd like to apply as a slush reader, but I don't like having to go through Google accounts because I mainly use my personal one for work and academia, and I have no other alternative accounts. Any chance of it being moved off-site to FIMFiction, perhaps?
Also, in reference to your post on the blog, there was a minor discussion on the Featured Box system on TheBandBrony's blog here. The general consensus is that it really needs some touching up, since it's essentially nothing but a popularity contest for the already-popular (case in point: Skywriter has two of his stories up there).