Postponing the Inevitable: Introduction to Project Horizons

It's here.

Back when I hadn't gotten into the swing of things and figured out the basics of what I wanted to do with blogging, I had the idea that I would do chapter-by-chapter readthroughs of fanfiction, as well as books, which I'd already done. Now, since 99% of the fics I read are MLP, this was probably doomed as a long-term project, but it might have been doomed sooner, because Project Horizons was my first choice of subject.

Was I naive back then? Did my lack of knowledge about the story keep me from getting apprehensive about it, or was it the opportunity to write about it that finally got me to take the plunge? I'd like to say both; when I finished volume 1, I was so tired that I switched to The Immortal Game under the pretense of taking a break.

But that break has lasted almost two years now. I kept looking back at this thing I never finished, two similar yet different fears keeping me from picking it back up again. The first was the emotional fear. Project Horizons has gotten under my skin and made me feel dread and despair in ways few things ever have, and from what I'd heard, the worst was yet to come. The other? Well, I'd heard that the worst was yet to come in another fashion entirely. There are a few different ingredients, tones, themes, or whatever you want to call them in volume 1, and they didn't entirely fit together. I loved some of them much, much more than others, but there was no guarantee that Somber-who-was-writing-further would have agreed with what threads to pull. Worse yet, what if she turned against what I thought she did best and

This is all irrational, and I keep telling myself I'm going to have to confront these concerns to see if they're really as big as I've imagined them being. Plus, there is legitimate joy; there might be a few neat ideas, scenes, and what have you that I can take inspiration from; and if I want to make a scene that'll stomp out the reader's heart (and I do), I'm going to have to take notes on the ones that affected me like that. I'd like to write something that touches on the darkness of PH (but more briefly or less intensely). The promise I kept to myself was to say that I would read this story once it hit Fimfiction, because this site is my security blanket and I feel comfortable here. That bought me some time, because Somber said it wouldn't come here until it was done.

So here we are. I'm going to try to evaluate each chapter here as I read them (or reread them in the case of the first seventeen or so). I can't promise I'll stick to a schedule like I did with my Immortal Game posts. Those were already written on Wordpress and reposted here on a daily basis so I didn't overwhelm my followers. Speaking of those, while I have posts for the first volume written out, I don't think I should repost them verbatim in the same way. It would clash with the ones I have to write from scratch. Maybe I'll include them in quotes. So don't expect a daily, or even a weekly schedule, because I have two weekly features on my regular blog already and I don't want to add a third one. I'll read chapters of the story when I feel like it.

Keep an eye on this account for updates, unless you have any trigger ever. I'm giving a blanket warning, just to be safe. If you don't have triggers, but don't want to read this story because you've heard how unpleasant it is, or you've heard how bad it gets and don't want to get invested only for it to break your heard, then you're pretty much my intended audience.