Another Update on Life and Rule of Three · 2:45am Oct 28th, 2015
Right, first things first; I meant to bring this up sooner after my last blog post explained my family situation, but between work, RPing, and writing (which I'll get to in a bit) it sort of slipped my mind. First and foremost, I want to thank everyone who commented on my blog post or reached out to me privately regarding the situation with my grandfather. It was a big help during a time when I was still trying to get my head back on straight, and I deeply appreciate each and every one of you.
I'm happy to report that my grandfather is out of the hospital, and while unfortunately he refused to come home--he just really doesn't want to live with us, for some reason--my mother was able to find an assisted living facility close to home that was willing to take him despite his fear of the silverware, and he was officially moved in yesterday, October 26th. It's a huge weight off of all of us, and he seems to genuinely like it there. So fingers crossed that it continues to hold up.
Now, on to the writing! Because this happened:
And I wanted to talk about it, because I'll be honest, I really enjoyed writing this one.
As I mentioned in my author's note for Rule of Three, Sunset/Rarity was one of those ships that kind of quietly crept up on me as I rewatched Rainbow Rocks; I thought the two had some nice little moments in that film, but nothing concrete really jumped out at me. Cue Friendship Games and, well, that scene, coupled with the fact that watching the movie proper gave my napping plotbunnies a little kick in the behind to get them going.
I'm going to be very boring: the actual idea itself for the fic came to me while I was driving home Monday night, thinking about that scene. The actual story format itself I based off of the old story rule of thumb: if something is important, reference it three times so that it sticks with the readers. There's a whole page on TVTropes dedicated to the concept, and I actually took the fic's name from that page; I was originally going to call it Third Time's the Charm, but it didn't seem quite as fitting. As for the fun part, the part that appealed to me most, I have to admit a lot of it was the character dynamic. A lot of Sunset shipping fics tend to paint Sunset as the one doing the chasing (at least that seems the most common for Sunlight stories; Sundagio fics seem to have Adagio doing the chasing, though Sunset does her fair share of it too in some of them), so it was interesting to do an approach where Sunset was the one being chased and, frankly, didn't know how to deal with it. Honestly, the girl and her self-confidence issues, I could probably do a whole series of blog posts on those.
And of course, Rarity being a forward, shameless flirt was a joy to write, even if this particular story wasn't from her POV.
Perhaps the biggest change from what I originally pictured for the story was in the second scene itself, after the Friendship Games. I had originally imagined it as Sunset actually passing out immediately (or at least very shortly) after her confrontation with Midnight Sparkle, and waking up days later to find Rarity there waiting for her to wake up, possibly having drifted off to sleep herself to get some rest. However, that seemed a touch excessive for how the movie plays the scene, so I ultimately toned it down to Sunset crawling off to the practice room to sleep for five hours.
And to round this off, a short play list: the Love Story cover by Dallas String Quartet was basically on repeat for the majority of the story, though when it came to Sunset's particular mindset I switched over to The Songbird from Bioshock Infinite. I... I can't really explain why that last one stuck with me. At all.
As for writing more of this pairing... I'm open to it. The dynamic was a lot of fun, their potential as a couple is interesting to think about, and I am and always will be a sucker for fluff.
Monochromatic's stuff would be right up your alley, if you haven't read it already.
3501744
In fact, I have! I must say she has an excellent grasp on Rarity, and while RarTwi isn't one of my preferred ships, she writes it in such a way that I enjoy her stories regardless.
3501746
Ah, good. FiM is a lucky, lucky show in that regard - there's enough people posting stories that there's always someone out there who can write a given character well enough to bring them to life in any situation, even when you wouldn't give the idea a second thought yourself.
Rule of Three was a delightful story to read. I'm not exactly sure what you'd call that ship. someone suggested Rarset or something like that in the story comments. But yeah, more stories from that ship would be neat.
3501744
Totally. Mono has Rarity's character down to almost perfect levels.
Glad to hear that things are looking up! I sincerely hope it continues to get better from now on.
Just read Rule of Three; I'm not a shipping fan, but that doesn't change the fact that Rule of Three was indeed very well written. As I always say, you have great skill when it comes to writing characters.
Honestly, the girl and her self-confidence issues, I could probably do a whole series of blog posts on those.
I know right? We could practically have a 30 page discussion about her characte.... oh wait. xD
Also, while a random association, that Songbird track is awesome enough for Sunset.
And Rule of Three has been up there for a WHILE now so extra congrats!!
I prefer Sunsarity as the ship name, since it sounds like sincerity which I feel is a very nice word for their ship. But RariSet and such are all cool. Basically any name for this pair is awesome cuz it means this pair is around ;)
and I would LOVE to see you do more with this pair tbh.
Glad things offline are looking up, and congrats on the feature, Rule of Three definitely earned it
Well, obviously I am in full hopes that you do write more of these two. They can be quite an amazing duo honestly, and she has shown she's in her element giving thought of herself to others when it's not only generous to take it, but generous to be heart felt.