Read It Later Reviews #8 – Be Mine, A Filly’s Guide to Not Making Headlines, Twilight Sparkle Earns the Feature-Box, ‘Taint Natural, An Eventide Lament · 3:17am Jan 8th, 2015
I read A Filly’s Guide to Making Headlines in light of commentary on my last post that I should read it to see the outcome of the scenes in GhostOfHeraclitus’s latest piece, and decided to read some other stories as well for good measure to make a full set of reviews out of it.
The stories I read today:
Be Mine by LightningBass94
A Filly’s Guide to Not Making Headlines by Bradel
Twilight Sparkle Earns the Feature-Box by Skywriter
’Taint Natural by Minds Eye
An Eventide Lament by GroaningGreyAgony
Be Mine
by LightningBass94
RomanceTwilight opens the door to her library on the morning of Hearts and Hooves day to find a surprise waiting for her, but who is it from?
Why I added it: It was recommended to me.
Review
This story has major problems with telling, and really could have used another proofreading pass; I noticed a few capitalization errors early on in the story, and the writing quality in general is pretty rough. It also takes the somewhat unusual step of color-coding some of the character dialogue for no apparent reason, but inconsistently; some of Twilight’s lines are purple, and some of Rainbow Dash’s lines are blue, while others are the usual black color for no apparent reason.
While the idea behind this story – of Twilight finding a box of chocolates and a present from a secret admirer, then asking every single stallion in town if they had left it there for her – was decent enough, unfortunately I was very much let down by the fact that Rainbow Dash, who spent all day following Twilight around and being annoyed over Twilight not realizing that the box of chocolates were from her, never just told Twilight that they were from her. Indeed, I never understood why Rainbow Dash didn’t write her name on the box in the first place; she obviously wanted Twilight to know who they were from, and spent all day following her around worrying about her talking to stallions, and at the end pretty much point blank tells Twilight that it was her… but there never was much of a reason for Rainbow Dash not to do so.
Between the issues with the text and the issue with character motivation, I wasn’t left with warm fuzzies after reading this story – and what are cutesy Valentine’s Hearts and Hooves Day shipfics about if not the warm fuzzies?
Recommendation: Not Recommended.
A Filly’s Guide to Not Making Headlines
by Bradel
Comedy, Slice of LifeNEW PRINCESS ATTACKS GRIFFONSTAN IMPORTS
The Equestria Daily can exclusively report that newly crowned Princess Twilight Sparkle became embroiled in an argument with the Griffonstani trade minister about the inferior quality of griffon quills, alleging that "they just don't hold ink as well as pegasus quills". Import markets tumbled overnight, threatening the solvency of numerous Equestrian quill merchants. Princess Sparkle could not be reached for comment.
Why I added it: It was recommended to me, Bradel is a good writer, and Ghost of Heraclitus wrote a prequel to it which I found worth reading.
Review
Twilight Sparkle is having trouble with the press deliberately misinterpreting everything she says in order to generate headlines and controversy. Frustrated and despairing, she ends up sobbing on the floor of Rarity’s boutique, driving her friend to try and get her ready for the press, with a little bit of help from Applejack.
The story was fun; I think my favorite part, other than the headlines and press stories, was the roleplaying in the second chapter, though I do have a soft spot for the Cutie Mark Crusaders. The third chapter of the story was satisfying, as Twilight put the journalist in her place, but I felt like it was almost vindictive in its quality. We are all cheering for Twilight, after all, and putting scummy journalists in their place is something all of us can cheer for, and yet, it feels like Twilight sort of lost in a way, as she sort of gave up her innocence to do so, and she felt a little bit too perfect in her retorts to the reporter from Equestria Daily at the end. Still, the quill line was a great little jab.
Recommendation: Worth Reading
Twilight Sparkle Earns the Feature Box
by Skywriter
Romance, Comedy, RandomTwilight Sparkle and Spike the Dragon have dreams of making good with the Audience of FiMFiction.net and the Readership of Equestria Daily, respectively. Metafiction ensues. An off-the-cuff satire of adult ponyfic that got way, way out of hoof...
Why I added it: Skywriter is a good writer, and this is an infamously banned metafic which was grandfathered into the site.
Objectionable Content: This story is marked as mature for Twilight’s “enthusiastic” response to being faved and upvoted.
Review
I don’t know what I expected, but it certainly wasn’t that. It was all very metaphorical, you see, with a conversation between Twilight and the Audience, and later, between Spike and the Audience. The Audience (of FIMFiction) was personified (or ponified?), but in a very amorphous way, and…
…look, you just have to read it, alright? It made me giggle, to be sure, but I’m not sure if I would call it “good” in the usual sense of the word so much as it was amusing. It is a strange story, and it is very meta, but if you liked his story “Cousin Braeburn Writes a Crop-Fic”, you’ll probably enjoy this one as well.
On the other hand, if you’re of a sensitive disposition and find Twilight’s “enthusiasm” for being upvoted and faved unpleasant, you will want to steer clear of this one. It isn’t graphic or anything, but it is clearly a parody of sex.
My favorite bit: I laughed out loud at “lexically satisfying dream”.
Recommendation: Worth Reading.
’Taint Natural
by Minds Eye
ComedyCaramel is tired of his cousins ragging on him for having a pegasus marefriend, so he proposes a drinking game for the three of them to play.
Why I added it: Because Minds Eye is a good writer.
Review
Big Mac and Braeburn are racists and make Caramel hit on every earth pony (and unicorn) in a barn because they disapprove of his relationship with a pegasus. Every time Caramel gets rejected, the other two Apples take a shot.
They’re pretty plastered by the end of the night.
This was a cute enough setup, but it wasn’t really that funny to me; I’m not sure if it is because I don’t drink, don’t hit on women in bars, or just didn’t find the ending funny enough, but it just didn’t work for me.
Recommendation: Not Recommended.
An Eventide Lament
by GroaningGreyAgony
Tragedy, Dark, Alternative UniverseShe had a choice to make, the most important one she would ever make in her life. In this side of the story, the choice she made was her very own.
Sometimes, behaving selflessly is the most selfish thing you can do.
Why I added it: This was recommended to me.
Review
Twilight solos Nightmare Moon, resulting in her own demise. At 1,100 words, it really doesn’t go beyond that; there isn’t anything wrong with the story, and yet, it feels somewhat insubstantial just because it is so short. Twilight never learned the magic of friendship here, and while she could have, instead she went it alone and paid the price.
This is really short, so if you like this sort of thing, it won’t take much of your time, but for me, I found it had too little meat for me to really enjoy.
Recommendation: Not Recommended.
Summary
Be Mine by LightningBass94
Not Recommended
A Filly’s Guide to Not Making Headlines by Bradel
Worth Reading
Twilight Sparkle Earns the Feature-Box by Skywriter
Worth Reading
’Taint Natural by Minds Eye
Not Recommended
An Eventide Lament by GroaningGreyAgony
Not Recommended
Of course, by reading a lot of short stories, I’m only further driving up the average length of my read it later list. I think, however, that I am done reading short stories for a while; my next set, I am going to try and knock out some longer pieces.
Number of stories still listed as "Read It Later - Recommended": 172.
Number of stories listed as “Read It Later”: 1539.
Thanks for the vote of confidence and the signal boost, even though you didn't like the story. For what it was, I'd say it over-performed.
2707994
I've enjoyed a number of your stories; I followed you for a reason, after all.
Huh. I didn't find the end of A Filly’s Guide to Not Making Headlines vindictive at all. I mean, she actually gives the reporter an honest compliment at one point. As for being too perfect, I can totally see Twilight taking a few weeks to memorize every single newspaper article so she can refer to them in a discussion.
2707994
Given the number of TD reviews that start "because X is a good writer" and end with a Not Recommended, you're in good company, I think. :B
2708813
I don't mean "vindictive" in an in-character sense; I mean it in an out of character sense. The scene is about putting the press in their place, something we, the audience, want, and Twilight does show her up.
2709402
Eh, I guess so. Just felt like the normal story introduce problem / solve problem dynamic to me. Then again, I miss that sort of thing all the time.
Thank you for the new readers!
2708855
I've been told I'm a downvote tax of a follower.
Though I guess now on the upside, I review stuff, so that's a plus.