Rewrite: My First Tree · 5:25pm Jan 24th, 2015
This weekend, I will be performing tense surgery on My First Tree. After, well, some rather harsh feedback regarding the tense and the voices (since this story leaned heavily on the voices for perhaps far too long), and some of my own thinking on it, I've decided that the experiment was a failure in some aspects. Not all. I still would like to keep the tale as Applejack tells it intact. I think, despite some of the criticism regarding that portion, that it worked rather well.
So, if you wanted to read it as a Present Tense experiment again, do so after it's reposted. The original will still be available as an unpublished chapter, to keep it around for posterity and as a learning experience, but it won't be available otherwise.
I would like to thank those who have offered criticism of the story, for taking their time to read my experiment and tell me what didn't work with it. Sadly, present tense was probably the largest. And I have to agree. Thus: rewrite. Not a large one. Some expansion of Fluttershy's voice will be happening - letting her be more herself even as I stretch her a little out beyond her comfort zone--just enough to go race with Applejack. Something I don't think she would do except in a circumstance where a friend needed to do something that was them.
So... That's it, folks. Have a good weekend, and good luck in the contest, those of you who've entered. I'll probably be reading and dropping comments.
Just stated reading it myself today and it does seem a bit terse. Doesn't help that Fluttershy seems a little out of character to me (and not necessarily in a good way either.)
I wouldn't call it a fail, Lambent, but more of a step into uncharted ground. There are bound to be a stumble or two along the way. If you feel a rewrite will do it justice, then by all means do so. Just don't look at works that didn't succeed as failures but as examples of what to watch out for.
I don't see why you've gotta rewrite it. I thought it was pretty great as it was.
Good luck with your revisions!
Any experiment where you learn something is a success, not a failure. I liked Applejack's story in it, glad you are keeping it intact.
Aw, c'mon, I didn't think I was that harsh. :( You experiment, sometimes you fail. A bunch of people read your story, sometimes one doesn't like it. Don't let one person's comments drive your writing ethic.
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It wasn't one person, PP. (Edit: It was the opinions of a number of people whose opinions I respect) And, this story being the start of a larger arc, it's important that it goes off better than it did. I really shouldn't have written it the way I did. Whim, y'know. Fancy. I wrote this in two hours. Let it sit overnight, and then published it. Got ahead of myself and let the rose colored glasses stay on. Others liked it, said it was different and decent before I hit the publish. I still like the core of it, the story, but the execution of that story (the voicing in particular) leaned far too much on the strength of the voice for what there was.
And no, you weren't that harsh. TD helped to take off the rose-colored glasses for a little while. That was the first thing, and the first update to the story, along with Bradel's commentary on the same blog. Other things said in PMs kinda helped solidify that, and the glasses came off altogether.
I know others like it the way it was. But, once you get the glasses taken off, kinda hard to put em back on and not see the blemishes hidden by the filter. I might have been happier, perhaps, but also in ignorance. I think I prefer not living in the latter. 'Sides. I'm keeping the spirit of the story alive. The feeling of it. Fluttershy is just going to have a little more time to be herself is all.
Present tense feels like it's a rush to get through when writing it. Like everything is happening now and there's not enough time to sit and look at things. Ponder what might happen or what needs to happen or just sit and be there for a friend who just needs a little peace and quiet. A little time to let a friend come to grips with what might be.
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This is true. I have learned. One, that I would need to write quite a lot more in present tense to be able to fully grasp and understand how to use it best. That was one thing I learned. I was treating it like a past tense that was happening now, not a different tense that would be better employed in other ways.
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Thank you. And thanks for knocking askew the rosy glasses. Sometimes it's hard to let go of the first positive thing you hear about a story.
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Perhaps. But, for reasons noted above in this reply and for others—most notably that it's the start of something larger—I kinda need to rewrite it to fit into that larger framework I had in mind for months before I wrote this. This was... well, it was meant to be a small spark that sets something going a year or more down the road (in storytime).
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And I will learn from it. Noted above, mostly.
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Noted.
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Okay, well, let me know when you've rewritten it.
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It's been rewritten.
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:O