R4 (Reactions, Reviews, Reference, Redirection) #0003

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Here are five slightly edited old reviews:
Yours Truly by Thanqol
The Glass Blower by Cold In Gardez
Movements of Fire and Shadow by InquisitorM
Faithful Student by Phantom Fox
Eso Sí Que Es by WTFHIW

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Yours Truly by Thanqol
(story link) (my original review)

Yours Truly by Thanqol is another My Little Pony fan fiction written by the same author of The Old Stories, which I enjoyed immensely. This story is done entirely as letters written between various characters, referring to various events without describing them directly. For the most part anyway. It does go into a little more detail than you’d put into letters to someone who knows what you are talking about, but it is still pulled off beautifully. This was a story I read while on a trip away from my computer, but wrote up this just after reading it so it should be fairly accurate about what the story put into my head.

The story is very sweet with a primary focus on different romances between various characters. It is a wonderful exploration of the different forms that love between two people can take. How not every relationship needs to fit into the classical romantic stereotypes. As mentioned in the opening paragraph this story is a look at alternate ways to tell a story. The letter format allows characters to show reactions to important scenes without needing to go through each entire scene the characters experience. Which allows for a wonderful level of detail concentration. So of like the reverse side of show, don’t tell. Tell, but don’t show. Just taking so far to the other side that it inverts back around to be good again. It’s all about how concise you can get telling the story.

This story touches on a concept that is one of my favorite things to believe. Which isn’t exactly the best way to put it, but trying to explain the story not my brain. I don’t know if the author intended it, but this belief is always in my mind when I’m reading romance. If you carry a green light and stand in front of a reflective item you will see a green light. It doesn’t matter what shape or purpose the item has, you will still see it reflecting a green light.

The concept is that true love is a transcendent force. Whatever limitations you try to impose, loves goes beyond them. Whatever obstacles get in the way, love will go around them. Whatever definitions you attempt to categorize it with, love will extend outside of them. It may not be the same afterwards, but love can only be transformed or lost, never stopped or destroyed or prevented. This story is a wonderful example of this line of thought. Succeeding where so many stories fail by being too shallow. Love transcending time is not an immortal falling in love with a mortal and sharing immortality with them so they can be together forever. It is two people loving each other and the one that lives longer continuing that love past the first one’s death, but never letting it turn completely into grief and never stopping being the person that their partner had loved. Sadness transforming the love without ending it, and with the belief that the love continues even beyond death, that the one that died is waiting somewhere and that no matter how long it might take they will be together again in that other place. That is love that transcends time. That particular example is pulled off the top of my head and not in this story, but I feel that the romance in this story is of similar mindset. The idea that true love cannot be limited, defined, predicted.

This story is one I would recommend highly. Even if my personal headcanon for MLP now has conflicting stories in it now. Might just have to settle on having divergent timelines for both this and Eternal.

One last note from near the end. I really liked the idea that Celestia taking on the responsibilities of the moon and stars after banishing her sister was not simple or painless. The idea that one sister attempting to handle the other sister’s responsibilities was going against their own nature. It fits so nicely with my personal conception of the twin sisters are not just very powerful ponies, but in fact semi-divine immortals that are actually manifestations of something greater.

The Glass Blower by Cold in Gardez
(story link) (my original review)

Just a short story this time, but it is another romance like the previous story. This one doesn’t end as well as that one did. I read the two back to back during a recent vacation, but both were good enough and had enough thoughts during each of them that I figured they would get their own posts here.

This story also touches on a concept I think about from time to time. The idea that love is something that exists between two people. That if one person says they are in love, but the other doesn’t return the feelings, that isn’t really love. Affection at best, often just lust, obsession at worst. It can be corrosive, or occasionally lead to great things but it is not really love. Though the uneven emotions can lead to love if they, well, even out between the two.

I like to think that this story takes place before the MLP show. Something of a origin story for Rarity, a glimpse at what she was like before she had gotten real friends. When the worst aspects of her personality were much stronger, her personal vanity the driving force in her life rather than the desire to share beauty in general. It builds up the idea that Twilight is the focus of the show, her growth and improvement through friendship, but the other ponies involved are going through the same self-improvements as well. The rest of the mane six needing the lessons in friendship and life just as much, or more, than Twilight did. It makes me think about what the previous lives of the rest of the cast were like before Twilight showed up in town to bind them all together.

Recommended, but it does not have a uplifting conclusion. However, it does support my theory that earth ponies have magic like the other two pony types, as well as the idea I’ve run across in the fandom that the types of ponies typically hook up with others of their own type.

Movements of Fire and Shadow by InquisitorM
(story link) (my original review)

This short story seems like a piece of something bigger. Not incomplete from bad writing, but just the opposite. It is such good writing with such an interesting premise that it seems like a narrow window into a much larger story. It is a interesting look into the ramifications of inspiration and how the ability to talk with people in dreams might not be as good a ability as it might seem at first. A good glimpse into Princess Luna as a character.

My Faithful Student by PhantomFox
(story link) (my original review)

A simple story. Not quite as good as the others I’ve read. It is trying to be another ‘could be a episode’ story but doesn’t quite make it. The author doesn’t get the mane six’s personalities/voices quite right. One scene in particular has Applejack and Twilight being outright rude to each other, with another scene having Twilight throwing books hard at her friends.

Near the end of the story is a monologue type scene where Twilight is comparing the elements of friendship, as embodied by her friends, with the magic of casting spells. It has some fairly horrible metaphors and comparisons. Like honesty means doing a spell the way you are supposed to and not improvising the bits you don’t know. Or loyalty is you have to keep going with a spell once you’ve started, not stopping halfway. Which makes no sense because it was mentioned earlier in the story that rule #1 of spells going wrong is to simply let go of it to stop casting the spell. This part was so dull and nonsensical that I honestly just skipped most of it. Skimming to make sure I wasn’t missing anything important to the story (spoiler: I wasn’t) until the scene was over and I could start paying attention again.

It just seems like a situation where the author has a message they are trying to convey and is hitting the climax of the story with a sledgehammer until it says that message. Regardless of how it looks or how much coherent sense it makes. It is not a read again story for me, but giving it a try wouldn’t be a waste of time.

Eso Sí Que Es by WTFHIW
(story link) (my original review)

I really don’t have much to say about this one. It is incredibly short and left no lasting impression on me in any way. 4 Conversations About 1 Thing did the premise of this so much better. It would be a decent quiet scene in a broader story, but by itself it just seems incomplete. Reading it wasn’t a waste of time, but I would have been more entertained using the two minutes (this story is really short) rereading The Contest or Celestia’s Teeth instead. Checking the author surprises me because I can’t conceive that the author who wrote the amazing story -Memories of Those Friends Who’ve Gone Before Us- would also have written this. Guess we all have good days and not-so-good days.

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