Read It Later Reviews #27 – Farewell, X is a Changeling, Experience, For Ages and Ages to Come, Shoots and Roots · 1:17am Aug 19th, 2015
I managed to get sick this last weekend. It was a really rapid onset; within three hours I went from feeling totally fine to shivering uncontrollably, my head, shoulders, and arms aching, and a 102.8F fever which persisted for two days, along with some wonderful intestinal symptoms.
And then, today, I felt way better. Go figure.
Oh well, onto the pony fanfiction!
Today’s stories:
Farewell by obabscribbler
X is a Changeling by Minds Eye
Experience by Bad Horse
For Ages and Ages to Come by Jade Ring
Shoots and Roots by Bachiavellian
Farewell
by obabscribbler
Romance, Tragedy
2,709 wordsGoodbyes are hardest when you see them coming and can do nothing to put them off. That doesn't stop Rainbow Dash from trying when she has to say goodbye to her very special somepony much sooner than she thought.
Why I added it: I read it before I started doing reviews and liked it.
Review
Rainbow Dash flees from Applejack’s funeral while thinking about how unfair it is and how much she loved her.
This is a nice little sadfic. In it, we see a lot of emotion out of Rainbow Dash about the loss of her wife, a flashback to Rainbow Dash insisting that Twilight do something about it, a neat bit of worldbuilding about relative lifespans, and thoughts about their lives together, all wrapped up in under 3,000 words.
I liked this story a fair bit, but I suspect that it might not do quite so well with people who aren’t fans of AppleDash; while it does a solid enough job of putting us in the moment, I’m not sure if folks who don’t buy into AppleDash intrinsically would buy into it quite as much.
Recommendation: Worth Reading.
X is a Changeling
by Minds Eye
Random
1,266 wordsA changeling is on the loose in Ponyville, and Sweetie Belle won't rest until he's caught.
Why I added it: Minds Eye is a good writer.
Review
Sweetie Belle spotted an X in one of the books that Rarity borrowed from the library. A typo, Rarity said, but Sweetie Belle knew it couldn’t be so. It could only be a changeling, posing as a letter, so it could absorb the love of ponies reading the book!
Turns out, she was right.
This is definitely a story that earned its random tag, but it feels more like a silly idea than a “real story” to me, as in the end, it was all kind of pointless.
Recommendation: Not Recommended.
Experience
by Bad Horse
Slice of Life
1,289 wordsCelestia is thousands of years old, and has experienced almost everything the world has to offer. But there's one ordinary thing she's never experienced, and she's determined to ask Twilight about it.
Why I added it: I read it before I started doing reviews and liked it.
Review
This is a well-written little piece which is a good example of showing. The visuals of the scene are described in a very pleasing sort of way, and Celestia’s interaction with Twilight, simple as it is, is also very pleasing and feels marvelously in character. Clocking in under 1,300 words, it is a nice, compact little story which does exactly what it is trying to do and then gets out of the way. If you want to read something that conveys all its ideas by showing, not telling, this is a great example of what such a piece might look like.
EDIT: Many years later, I still find myself really enjoying this story.
The more I read stories, and the more I think about stories, the more I realize that some sorts of stories are really hard to write. I've read a lot of stories that have simple ideas like this one, and almost all of them botch it, because it turns out writing a story like this where so little happens and the whole thing hinges around one thing is actually really hard for most people, and yet, I sort of take it for granted. This story is structured exactly how it needs to be, but so many people don't do this correctly. It ends on the climax, which is how it needs to end, as it doesn't need anything past that point, as it tells the whole story by that point.
Recommendation: Recommended.
For Ages and Ages to Come
by Jade Ring
Slice of Life
4,726 wordsSince time immemorial, the Grand Council of Immortals has watched over all aspects of Equestrian life. They determine the destinies of all things on the mortal plane, both great and small. They convene once every one hundred years, and the Immortal who plays host to the gathering is permitted one request.
This century, it is Princess Celestia who will host the meeting... and who will ask for an unprecedented gift be granted to the newest alicorn princess.
Why I added it: It is a story about immortality that was recommended to me.
Review
The immortals have gathered for their once in a century meeting. But before they begin, the host is allowed to make a single request, despite the fact that such requests have been abused in the past by the likes of Discord.
Celestia uses her request wisely, though – she seeks to grant the Mantle of Immortality, a one of a kind magic item, to Twilight Sparkle, who is dying from magic overload, because Celestia believes it is Twilight who is destined to bear the mantle.
Frankly, this story felt like it was trying a bit too hard to be epic. The various immortals are introduced, but I felt like there were too many of them, with too many unusual names – I couldn’t keep them all straight, and their strangeness ended up feeling like it was trying too hard to introduce a bunch of wonderous things all at once. It just didn’t work well for me in terms of my mind’s eye. One or two fantastic beings is alright, but a full table of them? It ended up overwhelming me.
Moreover, because I had no real attachment to them prior to the story’s events, nor any real idea of their personalities, the whole meeting – and the debate amongst them – didn’t feel like it had enough weight, because I had no idea what they were like, what they valued, or how they thought.
The net result of this was that I just never really engaged with the story, and the fact that Twilight is dying right at the perfect moment for the meeting feels a bit contrived, given that she is, apparently, dying young and the meeting happens once per century.
Recommendation: Not Recommended
Shoots and Roots
by Bachiavellian
Sad, Slice of Life
6,366 wordsTime alone can't heal all wounds for Carrot Top. Sometimes life simply goes on in the worst and best possible ways.
Why I added it: It was featured by the Royal Canterlot Library.
Review
Carrot Top thinks about her dead husband and taking in Derpy and Ditzy as full-time boarders, and how life can be sad and full of hope at the same time.
Very much a slice of life piece, this is one of those stories which isn’t about telling a story so much as it is about revealing character to us. Why did Carrot Top take in Derpy and Ditzy? What happened to her husband? All of the important events in the story happened in the past, and there’s no real tension as to the question of “what is going to happen”, as the decisions have all already been made. But we still get to see more of a glimpse of the character’s personality, and we see a very mature take on sadness, on tragedy, on moving on, and on building a new life. The whole story has a kind of wistful feel to it, and while a lot of the tragedy is telegraphed, in the end, it hangs together as a piece.
That being said, it is a very “pure” slice of life story in the sense that “nothing really happens”, so if you’re looking for a story that goes beyond that, you might be a little disappointed.
Recommendation: Worth reading if you like slice of life.
Summary
Farewell by obabscribbler
Worth Reading
X is a Changeling by Minds Eye
Not Recommended
Experience by Bad Horse
Worth Reading
For Ages and Ages to Come by Jade Ring
Not Recommended
Shoots and Roots by Bachiavellian
Worth Reading
I sort of cheated with this post a bit, grabbing two stories I read before I started doing reviews, but I felt like re-reading some of them.
Also, I had somehow completely forgotten that obabscribbler is actually a really good writer who also happens to make really awesome fanfic readings which are basically radio dramas. Or maybe the other way around. Anyway, I realized when I looked on her FIMFiction page that A) I liked a bunch of her stories and B) I had somehow forgotten that she had written Playing With My Heart, a story I am anxiously awaiting the completion of.
Incidentally, I was thinking about making a post entirely devoted to children’s story style fanfics. I suspect my inner child is largely dead, given my general reaction to stories like The Mare Who Fell in Love with the Wind, Going Up, and In the Place the Wild Horses Sleep, but I know some folks like such things, and if anyone knows two more such stories I could read and write about for a post about them, that would be awesome.
Number of stories still listed as Read It Later – Important: 75
Number of stories still listed as Read It Later – High Priority: 328
Number of stories listed as Read It Later: 1643
Yikes! I'm glad you're feeling better!
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Thanks!
Now I feel like I have to make up for lost time...
3330279 Perhaps. Just don't rush back too fast. Get some rest and recharge. :)
3330289
Bah! I have anime protagonist superpowers! That which doesn't kill me makes me stronger!
Aww for a moment I thought it was mine XD. I had been wondering about that story though.
Sorry you didn't care for 'Ages.' I'm rather fond of it.
Another review from my favorite metallic reptile? You can put me down as "thoroughly thrilled."
Thanks for all the reviews, lately, TD. I appreciate you taking the time to read my fic, and the fact that you've apparently did it while dealing with intestinal drama is oddly heart-warming.
Take care!
Another review from which to add to my reading list.
Edited: Fixed
3330338
There's more than one story with that name, huh?
3330357
Eh, you win some, you lose some. Ca, c'est la vie I suppose.
3330371
For youuuuuuu
3330427
Whoops! Yeah, I actually have a bunch of backlogged reviews and switched up which ones I was including in this.
3330443 Apparently so!
I've contemplated adding another chapter to "Experience", in which Twilight and Luna try to wake Celestia with the sun, and Celestia has to fix their bungling while pretending to remain asleep. What do you think?
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It sounds cute, but also sounds like a sequel more than another chapter, as Experience is to some extent trolling the audience about the question that Celestia wants to ask Twilight.
It does sound sweet, though.
Damn illness won't keep you from reading ponies will it?
3330587
It slowed me down considerably, though. I was meaning to get a post about Twilight's List done, and I spent two days not even getting more than halfway through the piece.
Wow. Glad you're hale again.
That's kind of a crazy fever.
3330629
It was unpleasant. But somewhat interesting in some ways. My brain decided to start piecing together extremely complex narratives at an extremely rapid pace.
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I've had entire narrative structures hit me upon waking up. A significant portion of the last couple of princesstories I posted came to me through hypnopompic and hypnogogic states, as I recall.
If only I could blame most of TSJ on that. Mais non.
3330713
To be fair, my brain always puts together stories. I am, essentially, always daydreaming, save when I'm reading, writing, or wholly focused on some task.
These were interesting primarily because they were reflective/symbolic of fighting off an infection. I was telling myself stories about it.
Admittedly, I do that a lot, but these were unusual stories for the sort of thing I tell myself.
Thank you so much for the positive review!