Fertile Ground: One week later.

I wish I could link bigger images in here.

What is it about the Flower Trio that makes them so awesome? Why do I pick on those three terrified mares so much? I guess I've just always been a sucker for clop with a streak of desperation to it, and those three are defined by fear and desperation on FiM. Roseluck is one of the prettiest color combos on the show, so she gets it the worst of the three.

Fertile Ground is doing... decent. Okay. Not changing the world or anything. I realize that a good part of Fimfiction considers 15 votes on a story to be a lot but I'll admit, I was hoping for 100 likes within three days like TSoP got. I'm greedy. Over clops that released within the last seven days, it did come in fifth overall in views, so that's something. 96 likes, 12 dislikes, 1648 views. That is an absolutely appalling ratio of likes to views! Makes me sick just thinking about it. Perhaps view totals are inflated by non-fimfiction users viewing anonymously? Either way, it makes my stomach churn.

Good thing I enjoyed writing it! Seriously, this is the most fun I've had writing anything. TSoP only took a week, but I was writing for 12 hours at a time. Ugh! Lily Valley Goes Shopping was in a constant state of rewrite due to it being my first edited story. I was still pretty awful at writing even after TSoP. A Gentleman's Price had its moments, but I felt like I was "on the clock" trying to get it written before it became completely irrelevant in the minds of those following it. Which in sense, it... kinda did. To this day, there's a huge gap between tracks (favorites) and likes. The Siege of Cancelled Harmony was pretty fun at times, but my lack of experience and overall lack of reader interest just made it a job I wasn't being paid to do...

Fertile Ground? This is my favorite story of all time. It's the only story of mine I actually enjoy reading. My other stories have their moments, and a great deal more dignity and respect, but FG is just... perfect! I looked forward to coming home to work just to write a paragraph or two. It went through some rough patches, the tentaculous drew some fire from my editor for being contrived; it still kinda is but I at least gave it a decent reason to exist. Firesight added quite a few of his own lines to the Roseluck/Lily Valley scenes, including the whole "tell me you're a fillyfooler" part. I'm really not clever, Firesight just has a lot of great ideas to make what I write a lot better than it would otherwise be.

Next story? Probably something Daisy-themed since she got so much character building in Fertile Ground. I've got a couple day off work to throw together ideas and see what sticks. I've also got a few more story ideas: Pinkie Pie clopfic set in the Gentlemanverse, a macro pony clopfic set in ancient mesopotamia — yes, really — of course, there's also the Siege 2.0 story concept. I got a lot of ideas, I'm just not feeling the inspiration just yet.

Until then, I'll be doing my best to proofread other people's work. I encourage anyone reading this to give of your time to be a proofreader, if nothing else, for a friend's story. Often, it's not a matter of being a better writer than the person you're proofreading for, you're just another perspective for the writer to take into account. It's like getting a helpful comment on a story, but without all the negative comments from nitpickers. It's entirely constructive, and you make new friends, which is always good!

Until next time.

Comments

[Firesight]

Thanks for the shout-out! I tend to do more than most editors and usually can't resist adding touches of my own, like you noted, but ultimately I'm just taking what you've got and smoothing it out/dressing it up a bit. My ultimate expression of that was Turnabout Storm, for better or for worse. But make no mistake--the core of these stories were yours. The ideas were yours, the characters are yours. You've got a good imagination, you're writing has steadily improved, and I look forward to working with you in the future and seeing what you come up with next!