Read It Later Reviews #31 – Hello, My Name Is; The Great and Showerful Trixie; Living Forever; Aftershock; Splinter Cell; Something Like Laughter · 9:50pm Sep 21st, 2015
One other interesting aspect of the Royal Guard queue is that it encourages me to read stories I’d been putting off reading; if a story I’ve been putting off reading ends up on the list, I’ll frequently end up checking it out to see what I’ve been missing. A number of today’s stories came up in this very way.
Today’s stories:
Hello, My Name Is by LoyalLiar
The Great and Showerful Trixie by Pascoite
Living Forever by Whateverdudezb
Aftershock by FanOfMostEverything
Splinter Cell by Horizon
Something Like Laughter by Dubs Rewatcher
Hello, My Name Is
by LoyalLiar
Comedy
5,824 wordsLimited Liability is a changeling with a very routine life. He works at a bank. He lives with a marefriend. He goes through every day making sure he isn't discovered.
At least, that is, until the day that the hive has planned to invade Canterlot. On that day, his love runs out, and his disguise fails. Trapped in public with a chitinous body for all of Equestria to see, Liability has to find a way not only to survive, but to avoid ruining an invasion years in the making. Along the way, he learns a very interesting lesson about the ponies around him.
Why I added it: The Royal Guard queue.
Review
Limited Liability is a parasite on society, a creature which feeds on others, spreading misery in his wake. He belongs to a highly hierarchical organization, where his boss doesn’t even need to look at him to know his place or whether or not he’s doing what needs to be done.
Oh, and he’s a changeling.
The story of a changeling who runs out of love during his day job as an investment banker at J.P. More Gain, today is the day of the invasion of Canterlot, and he’s in the wrong city, stuck in an elevator with his boss, and worst of all, without any love, he can’t even maintain his disguise. He needs to get to Canterlot to deal with the invasion, but more importantly (at least, according to his boss, Mister Gain), he needs to get to Canterlot to deal with Princess Luna, who was one of their earliest investors. And with a promised 12% per year, there might be a small problem with her account now that she’s back…
A silly piece full of a changeling observing, insulting, and misunderstanding pony society, as well as an explanation of just what Luna was up to during the changeling invasion and pony investment bankers, this story is full of wry humor and amusing observations about pony society from the standpoint of an evil banker changeling.
If I had a complaint about this story, it is that the ending just didn’t really thrill me; once the protagonist got to Queen Chrysalis, the rest of the story just wasn’t as good as it was before, and the very end of it just didn’t satisfy me all that much. I was kind of hoping for some sort of evil banker joke somewhere along the way – that they didn’t care that he was a love-sucking parasite because, hey, they’re bankers, you gotta do what you gotta do – but it just didn’t feel as funny at the end, sort of petering out without many strong jokes, and there was never any real payoff for Luna’s ridiculously large sum of money in the bank.
Still, it didn’t spoil my overall enjoyment of the piece.
“Oh, you’ve had your hooves lacquered…” The little black dots of the boss’s eyes, squeezed between his cavepony brow and the bloated fat of his cheeks, swept up from my forehooves to the little nametag hanging from my lapel, now thoroughly damp with sweat. “...Limited. Though it looks like you’ve got a pretty bad chip there.”
I wanted to wipe my brow off, but I couldn’t risk drawing attention to my face. “I’ve… uh… got an appointment to take care of it on Tuesday.” I almost slapped myself when I realized what I had said. That ‘appointment’ was actually for the complete overthrow of the Equestrian government, though if my boss decided to look away from floor-indicator in the elevator, the plan would be in terrible jeopardy.
Maybe I should start at the beginning.
Hello. My name is Limited Liability, or at least it has been for the last ten years. I’m a changeling. My real name is something closer to the smell of hash browns that went down in a ship’s galley forty years ago, but I know you ponies don’t really do pheromones, which is unfortunate. I mean, seriously, I don’t know how you do it. Matching names to faces is so hard―and how can you even tell who’s related to who, or what their caste is?
Alright, to be fair, I’ve gotten to the point where I can usually tell you ponies’ castes apart by smell. The rich ponies always smell like rotting flowers and musk, and the poorer variety usually come across like fermented wheat and dried mud. In my time as a pony, I started as the latter, but I was slowly growing more and more accustomed to the former.
Before I was Limited Liability, he was a schmuck: an alcoholic bank teller who was struggling to make ends meet and had a bad habit of betting his paychecks on the underdogs in the B-list Wonderbolts races. And, to be honest, he was about as thick as a good milkshake. It takes a particularly stupid pony to look at a letter from a Zebrican prince pledging an enormous gift in bits, and―I kid you not―actually buy an airship ticket to Zebrica. And don’t think he’s the dregs of your society, either. He worked for one of your biggest banks, scowling at high society over a discrete flask. I’m sure he’s having a fantastic time sobering up and enjoying his new job working for those pirates on the Congallop River…
Probably dead though. I mean, let’s be honest here. I’m already telling you I’m a changeling, so why pretend?
He oughta be grateful anyway. See, after I became Limited Liability, his whole life turned around. He sobered up, cleaned up his act, and met a nice mare from Neighples. He started showing up to work on time, he shaved (mostly because I’m no good at shapeshifting into facial hair), and he smiled when he helped the mares and stallions of Manehattan with their finances. The bosses took notice, and soon he found himself rising through the ranks. First a junior loan administrator, then a branch manager, and then all the way up to the headquarters in Lubuck.
Of course, things weren’t all perfect. The mare from Neighples didn’t really love Lubuck that much, and it came between us. We argued. She filed for divorce. She stopped loving me.
That’s where the real trouble began.
Recommendation: Worth Reading.
The Great and Showerful Trixie
by Pascoite
Sex, Romance, Sad, Slice of Life
1,290 wordsThe Great and Powerful Trixie has so many admirers, of course. In truth, she only wants one, but maybe that can change.
Why I added it: The Royal Guard queue.
Review
Trixie returns home to take a shower with her lover.
This is a twist-centric story, but it didn’t really do a whole lot for me; the final reveal was meant to be tragic (though some folks might find it more of a tragicomedic moment), but the problem is, there isn’t really anything else. There was a great deal of focus on the physical, but there was little on the character level, exacerbated by the fact that the story was playing very coy with who Trixie’s lover was. The net result was that Trixie remained pretty flat throughout, and her lover was a non-entity; all I really got from it was “Trixie is lonely, friendless, and pathetic, and is sad about it”.
All there really was for me was the twist, but I saw it coming from very early on in the piece, resulting in the rest of it being me thinking about how it was referring to what it was referring to. But even if you don’t pick up on the twist right off the bat, I think all this story is likely to invoke is something along the lines of “that’s clever and a little sad”.
Recommendation: Not Recommended.
Living Forever
by Whateverdudezb
Slice of Life
4,480 wordsDue to an editing/publishing error, all of Twilight's friends have now 'officially' died of old age. This leaves an immortal Twilight to grieve over the tragedy of how she outlived all of her friends and will continue to do so for the rest of her eternal life.
Seeing the obvious pain that this news is having on Twilight, Princess Celestia moves to console her with the help of her supposedly-but-actually-not-really-deceased friends.
Why I added it: Singularity Dream recommended it to those who liked Dying to Get There.
Review
This is a bait and switch story which, alas, gives away the bait and switch in the story summary – the story starts out as if Twilight is looking up at the stained glass window of her friends MOURNFULLY, and Celestia comes in to comfort her… before Twilight sarcastically remarks that it isn’t actually funny, because, of course, she knows full well her friends aren’t dead.
She’s the one who wrote the book that said they were dead, after all.
Bit premature, that.
Labelled a comedy, this story just didn’t make me laugh. It felt like it was trying too hard to me; I just couldn’t get into it. The bait and switch might have been effective had I not known about it going into the story, but the story summary gives it away, and thus “Twilight’s friends aren’t actually dead” isn’t a surprise, thus removing the possibility of the scene actually being funny.
Indeed, I went in expecting to find out that Twilight didn’t know they were still alive, so the whole thing ended up a bit anticlimactic, and it never really recovered for me. I didn’t end up laughing at the jokes at the end of the piece, and her friends’ general sarcasm and laughter just didn’t do it for me. And for a comedy, that’s pretty rough.
In the end, this is really a slice of life piece which is a bit fluffy, especially at the end, but even that didn’t really give me the warm and fuzzy feelings it seemed to be hoping for.
Recommendation: Not Recommended
Aftershock
by FanOfMostEverything
Human, Crossover, Slice of Life
1,809 wordsPony Rainbow Dash wants to meet human Rainbow Dash.
Why I added it: It has a sequel in the Never the Final Word collection. Aftershock itself is part of a short story collection.
Review
Pony Rainbow Dash is very eager to meet her human counterpart. She doesn’t like it very much in the human world; while Twilight is used to not having wings, Rainbow Dash is having flashbacks to the hedge mage with Discord. But there’s something she needs to say to her counterpart, however uncomfortable it might be to be here…
This story feels like it wanted to be a part of a larger piece. Human Rainbow Dash shows up, pony Rainbow Dash delivers her message, and then Twilight drags pony Rainbow Dash back into Equestria and won’t let human Rainbow Dash follow, no matter how cool it would be to have wings all the time.
Much as I liked the overall idea of the piece, it simultaneously felt too long and too short; the actual meat of the piece is fairly short, but the idea behind it – the idea of the pony and human versions interacting and what differences there might be – is a big one and a kind of fun one to play with, and yet the story doesn’t really go anywhere with it. It wasn’t bad, but it just kind of ended without really going much beyond the basic idea.
Recommendation: Not Recommended.
Splinter Cell
by Horizon
Comedy
209 wordsRainbow Dash tries to use Twilight’s borrowed smart phone to correct the spelling on her Daring Do fanfic.
Why I added it: It was a little coda to Aftershocks, a part of Horizon’s Never the Final Word collection of codas and mini-sequels to other stories.
Review
This is pretty much a very short joke story, which contains a couple of little jokes but isn’t really a story so much as it is a little scene. There isn’t a whole lot of substance to it, and it doesn’t really do much, but there’s a couple little gags in it that… honestly felt a bit obvious.
Recommendation: Not Recommended.
Something Like Laughter
by Dubs Rewatcher
Dark, Slice of Life
4,027 wordsIt's been six months since Tirek was defeated, but Trixie still has nightmares. Nightmares of being pinned down, of the magic being ripped from her bones, of being thrown around like a worthless doll. It's been six months since Trixie has had a full night's sleep, and all she wants is peace.
But Trixie is fine. Trixie doesn't need Twilight. She doesn't need her family. She doesn't need anyone. Trixie loves being alone.
So why can't she stop crying?
Why I added it: It was recommended to me, and was an adaptation/expansion of a Write-off entry, and it was on the Royal Guard queue.
Review
Trixie suffers from PTSD and terrible nightmares. She can’t escape from Tirek – he’s there all the time.
She can’t escape from Twilight. She likes her. She hates her. Twilight is her friend. Twilight is the worst!
And through it all, Trixie’s garbled thoughts run, babbling along in a stream of consciousness as her mind flashes from thought to thought, reminders of the past, reminders of her loneliness, her struggle to reach out for help, and her fears of everypony turning their back on her because the Great and Powerful Trixie is really worthless.
I’ve never really cared for stream of consciousness type stuff; it isn’t really my cup of tea most of the time. It often feels jaggedy an erratic, as things flash from moment to moment. Still, this piece held together reasonably well, keeping focused on its core idea, and things which added to it – Trixie’s internal conflict over whether or not to seek help, as well as her internal conflict about her self-worth.
It is a rather dark story, as Trixie is constantly struggling with her very horrible memories of Tirek’s cruelty to her, or possibly just his imagined cruelty – it isn’t entirely clear how much of what he did was real, and how much of it was what she imagined happening after he sucked out her magic, but the whole thing is awful for her, and the first chapter is full of dark imagery, and a strong thread of self-loathing winds throughout the piece.
That being said, while the first chapter pulled me in, the second and third chapters weren’t as strong as the first, and I didn’t feel a strong sense of relief because I knew that the ending was coming and thus there wasn’t much tension for me.
The only thing I really missed was a rather clever perspective shift – or non-shift – that happened at the end, but it ended up feeling kind of jarring; while I am impressed by the idea, and it made perfect sense, it just didn’t end up feeling like the final line hung together as well as it might have.
In the end, I am left feeling ambivalent about this story – it wasn’t bad, and I actually was engaged, but at the same time I’m not sure that I actually liked it, or even found it to be all that terribly insightful – depictions of PTSD seldom really do a whole lot for me, and I’ve seen a fair number of them over time, so while this particular one was decent, it didn’t feel as fresh as it might have.
Recommendation: Worth Reading if you like stream of consciousness stuff and want to read about a pony suffering from PTSD.
Summary
Hello, My Name Is by LoyalLiar
Worth Reading
The Great and Showerful Trixie by Pascoite
Not Recommended
Living Forever by Whateverdudezb
Not Recommended
Aftershock by FanOfMostEverything
Not Recommended
Splinter Cell by Horizon
Not Recommended
Something Like Laughter by Dubs Rewatcher
Worth Reading
For those of you who don’t know, episode 21 of season 5 was released today on iTunes. For those of you keeping track, it was supposed to be episode 15. Two new pony episodes this week in the place of one!
Now, don't push each other on your way to get out the door to watch it.
Number of stories still listed as Read It Sooner: 86
Number of stories still listed as Read It Later: 340
Number of stories listed as Read It Eventually: 1674
Well, at least you got some enjoyment out of it. I hope you'll read some of my other stuff in the future, too.
Well, it was part of a One-Shotober collection. I may look back on the idea while giving myself more than 24 hours to work with it. Still, good to know I found an intriguing premise. Thanks for giving it a chance.
Well, one at least for everyone to give a try.
I hope you read all of my TRG submissions :D
Is it really a good idea to publicly advertise when stories were submitted to TRG? It doesn't bother me, but I'd think that would be a confidential matter. Some people are nervous enough about submitting to a peer-reviewed group, let alone having everyone know they did.
Sorry you didn't like Living Forever. For me it wasn't the story was a bait and switch, the amusement came from just seeing all her friends reactions to it. Plus the whole evil princess story idea amuses me.