CCC: cleverpun's Critique Corner #12 — Just A Simple Story · 8:28pm Oct 31st, 2015

I don’t like catering to holidays, but here’s a review for Halloween anyway. Any time is a good time to review Dark fic.

Title: Just A Simple Story
Author: Nonagon

Found via: Nonagon’s userpage

Short summary: Twilight is in the hospital, so Celestia tells her a fairy tale. Celestia is not very good at picking appropriate stories, and elects for one about a rather obscure, violent topic.

Genre(s): Fairy Tale, Symbolism Delivery

What does this story do well?: The opening of the story does a great job of characterizing Celestia in a short space of time. Her actions and reasoning and internal narrative all feel believable. I particularly liked how she comments on Twilight faking her emotions (Celestia would have a lot of experience with that), and how she admits that she might not be the best pony to choose a calming story.

The story is also written well. While there is some passive voice in the opening chapter and odd phrasing here and there, none of it is too distracting. The opening chapter sets a vivid mood. The central fairy tale also does a decent job of setting a dark mood. The two do it in very different ways, but they don’t clash with each other.

Where could this story improve?: Writing a pony fairy tale is tricky (I’ve made two attempts at it, myself). Fairy Tales, as a genre, have a unique sort of logic (or absence of logic). What would be a crippling plot hole in a normal story is par for the course in myth and fairy tales.

With pony fairy tales, this problem is twofold. Not only must the writer write in a fairy tale style, but they must also impress upon their audience the pony cultural context that makes it work. It’s like trying to write a European fairy tale, when one only has knowledge of Mayan mythology.

I think this story does a good job of capturing some of the dark tone of fairy tales. The logic jumps, vague characterization, and casual violence all evoke fairy tale styling. When it comes to context, however, the story is severely lacking.

I often say that good art asks questions of its audience. This story, however, is one of those that is too vague to ask meaningful questions. The context needed to make the story impact the reader is missing, or at least very heavily obfuscated by metaphor.

I think the stronger writing in this story is present in the opening and ending. The parts about Twilight and Celestia use a more normal third person narration, and are more engaging as a result. Perhaps this story was one of those experimental things, and this is to be expected.

Also, the cover is pointless.

In a single sentence: A well-written story that is too laden with symbolism to be a good narrative.

Verdict: No vote. This story is well-written, and it makes a good attempt at translating and evoking the genre conventions of fairy tales. The lack of context and thick layer of metaphor over everything, however, rob the story of its impact. Someone with more tolerance for that sort of thing, or someone with enough background in folklore, would get more out of this story than I did. Someone who likes vaguely unsettling things and doesn’t mind a lack of context might also enjoy this story.

Depending on one's point of view, the title may or may not be accurate.