Zero Blogs: Equestria Daily Again · 8:36pm Jan 5th, 2016
So I tried submitting Shine to EQD again.
Didn't work out.
Here's what they said:
Thank you for submitting your story to Equestria Daily, but, unfortunately, I cannot recommend posting it. Due to the high volume of stories we receive on a daily basis, we cannot give specific feedback on why. Our Editor’s Omnibus contains a thorough list of the issues we look for in our reviews, and also contains resources for finding proofreaders and editors. Give it a look and ask the linked reviewing groups for help, as they will go a long way toward improving your writing! This is not a strike.
Below are some of the issues that stood out to me. This is not an exhaustive list, but those that stood out to me or were required to give another point in the list more context. Some of these issues are not independent, but dependent upon others. Some, like telling, can clear up issues like pacing and vice-versa, and firming up the perspective may help resolve the tense issues.
Telling
A
great deal of emotion is told to us, as are events or the consequences
of events. Very little time is actually spent exploring the scenes,
leaving the story as a whole feeling extremely rushed. A few items where
telling is used to the detriment of the story:
The appearance of the Dazzlings
Literally
their appearance, as in their clothes, hair, accessories. More detail
is needed to get a good picture of them. True, this is fanfiction, and
it’s generally assumed the reader will know what they look like, but the
paragraph (two, actually) describing them, lend more credence to this
being an important thing in the story, and something the reader should
get an idea of.
This
also ties into the perspective issue below. From whose perspective is
the first paragraph being told from? It’s not from Sunset (unless it is)
as she’s not present.
Sunset’s reaction to the letters in chapter 2
We get told that she’s feeling again all of her feelings from the night before. Which
Retelling the impression of the Dazzlings from the end of chapter 2 in the beginning of chapter 3.
This is directly stated to the audience by an omniscient narrator, then retold from Sunset’s perspective in the very next scene.
The various confrontations between Celestia and Sunset
Many
of these directly state emotions. What about the moment - from
thoughts, actions, or even silences - makes it sad, happy, thrilling, or
scary?
The appearance of Celestia before the girls the first time
What
about her clothes, stature, and walk make her seem so different from
Principal Celestia? We’re told that they are different, but there’s no
detail there to create the mental image.
This
is also a root cause of the fast pacing making the beginning of the
story, up to just before the final battle, feel extremely rushed.
Editing mistakes
"I...um...made Fall Formal more exiting?"
Missing commas - these are scattered around here and there, but aren't too noticeable except where they're because of:
Misuse
of semicolons. Many times, I noticed that either a period or a comma
would work better where a semicolon was used, or where a semicolon was
simply misused. There are a good number of each scattered throughout the
chapters I went over with a finer comb.
As
a note, semicolon usage can be a stylistic preference when used right,
but to a lot of readers, semicolons are the sauce on the story steak.
Used right, they can really make an important part of the story pop, but
used too much and they become so much noise and their impact is
lessened.
Fast pacing
In
chapter one, we go from Sunset Shimmer in trouble with Principal Luna,
saved by the girls again, and in trouble with Principal Luna again, and
then Princess Celestia shows up out of the blue.
The
action inside the scenes, aside from story pacing, is also lightning
quick. There’s very little time spent setting the scene and letting the
situation sink in for the reader before that scene is done and the next
drops in. The issue with pacing continues through about midway into
chapter 7.
Inconsistent Pacing
However, the pacing throughout the last few chapters wavers between fast and slow, lingering in some places and speeding up in the next paragraph by glossing over some action, then slowing down to focus on another. This can be done to great effect when there is
Word/phrase choices
The pupils had been unusually quiet that day.
Whose
perspective is this from? Context clues in the following sentence lead
me to believe it's from Sunset Shimmer’s perspective, but not many refer
to students as pupils - not even teachers. Administrators, possibly
researchers. If this is a more common usage elsewhere in the world, I've
not seen it in literature that often except in extremely formal
circumstances. The word choice sets this line apart from the rest, and
suggests that it’s from a different perspective.
"Let's see," she talked to herself, "the Musical Showcase
This
is similarly an odd choice of word. “she said to herself” is a dialog
tag. “She talked to herself” is an action tag, and implies action at a
distance without knowing the exact content of what she was saying, but
it’s used here as a dialog tag.
Tense or flashbacks?
A
good portion of the beginning of this story appears to be told in
flashback fashion, with an introductory paragraph in past perfect,
followed up by a section in simple past tense, but doesn’t seem to break
back out of the simple past and back to the present action at any time
that I can tell.
If
this is being told in simple past tense, it may be best to keep it in
simple past tense and let events flow as they will. If the story is
being told as a series of flashbacks, then it would be better to start
the story in simple past, lead in with the premise for it being a
flashback, and then break back out periodically with a past perfect
transition paragraph, letting the reader know you’ve broken back out to
the ‘present’ story.
Perspective issues
Large
sections of the story are told from an omniscient observer perspective,
with no internal thoughts being presented to the reader. However, there
is the occasional group-consciousness though told the to the reader, as
well as the occasional personal thought presented in italics.
The latter stood out to me most in chapter 5, Fading Away, with this line:
Oh no. They've divided up the whole school and made everyone start fighting. That's just like what I used to do.
This is also a case of direct audience exposition via thought. Sunset doesn't need to think that explicitly. She knows that's what she used to do. This happens a few other places, but is inserted as narrative instead of direct thought.
This
is exacerbated by odd phrases or word choices that hint that a remote
third party is narrating the story from some form of opinionated
omniscient perspective (presumably the author). This would be fine if
the entire story were told in this mode. A great deal of classical
literature is told from a distant, opinionated perspective that freely
comments on situations and people. Similarly it can be used to great
effect in comedic pieces (See: A Series of Unfortunate Events, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy)
It’s
far less effective in modern dramatic pieces aside from the rare,
skillful usage of it to emphasize some point or make a point about
something. This, however, requires that each 'voice' or perspective be
distinctly unique and immediately identifiable to the reader - even then
it can be hit or miss, and the voices here weren't distinct or easily
identifiable. In general, however, it diminishes in effectiveness when
combined with close third person narrative mixed in with it, as it
confuses the narrative voice and leaves the reader wondering from
paragraph to paragraph what perspective the story is being told from.
Other issues
Luna’s Dissatisfaction with Sunset in chapter 1
Where
were Sunset’s friends? Why would Luna look at this one girl in the
middle of a pile of produce, and no one else even spattered with juice -
she hadn’t even gotten to return fire yet - and assume that Sunset
Shimmer was the instigator? Secondly, Luna slammed open the door, and
the students were all ganging up on her. They only sat down after
she entered. This seems like an unnecessarily cruel Luna, or a stupid
one depending on the interpretation, that isn’t held up later in the
story.
Plot / Similarity to movie
A
good portion of the first five chapters is spent retelling events of
the movie. There was some additional information added which, if
properly expanded, paced, and worked into the movie's plot, could work
very well. However, the way that additional information is added feels
very much like it was shoehorned into the movie’s existing plot without
reworking the plot to fit in the additional information and additional
character (Celestia).
The
appearance of another Celestia should confuse even addled teenagers,
and Celestia doesn’t appear to be any more capable or wiser than any of
the students. Having been defeated by Chrysalis, as is mentioned in the
story, she felt very reckless and arrogant facing down magic vampires.
When she later appears, her presence in the story feels very weak, and
almost like she is there specifically to be a protector/observer who
does very little and only steps in to save the day later, making her
presence feel somewhat lacking, and her motivations even more so. Is she
singing with the girls? Is she watching? Is Sunset singing with the
girls? These are plot questions that I don't feel were adequately
answered. If they were answered, I may have missed them. The parts where
Celestia would have made an impact to the story in this way are glossed
over rather than expanded. Surely having her there would significantly
alter how the girls approached the situation, and she would have more
information about the Sirens, I would think, than Twilight, as she would
have been able to get (at worst) a secondhand account of them from Star
Swirl.
Which
brings up another plot hole. Star Swirl was able to defeat the three
sirens in Equestria, when they would have been at the height of their
power. But here, in the human world and cut off from countless ponies
from which to draw their power from, they can take down Celestia using
the power of one or two ponies and a few magically empowered girls. How?
Was magic in the past less powerful than it is in the present human
world? Did Star Swirl use some ingenious method to trick them that he
didn't, then, tell Celestia just in case she ran into them again? Or
write it down somewhere?
Similarly,
Twilight’s presence in the world doesn’t ever get explained. In the
movie, she needed the book to open the portal again; to even know that
there was a problem she needed to solve, and in the story, Celestia had
to force the portal open with her own magic. Why didn't Celestia warn
her against using the portal? Presumably, she knew the portal was open
when Celestia asked her to write a letter (if she did, that was glossed
over) How did the Dazzlings know she would appear right then to capture
her? She could have appeared at random and the Dazzlings would be
elsewhere when she did and Twilight wouldn't be trapped and subject to
their power. If the Dazzlings were just waiting there on the off-chance
that Twilight did appear, why? They had other things to be doing, and
all three of them were there, so they weren't off causing mischief when
they were waiting there. One must assume they were waiting there for
quite a long time.
End of chapter 1
The
last sentence of this chapter isn’t well put together. It starts out
following Sunset, describing her actions and feelings, the last two
comma breaks are with Celestia. It took me a few reads to realize just
what was happening. Also, missing comma on 'too'. The 'too' may be
unnecessary, however, if the sentence is cleaned up and expanded into a
couple of paragraphs or by splitting Celestia's part into its own scene
to clear up the confusion of just whom the omniscient narrator was
following.
I'm not sure if I'm going to change this and submit again or leave it and just submit something else. Maybe I need to rethink EQD as my long-term goal and just focus on TV Tropes. Even though most EQD entries also get on TV Tropes too. Hoo boy.
Is this the reviewer who uses ponychan for feedback? If so, I'd really recommend taking that feedback to heart. The act of applying it to your story in earnest is quite a valuable tool for gaining writing experience (speaking from my own experience). You got lucky with this reviewer. A lot of them just say 'look at this doc and fix your story' without any directed feedback (or so I've heard).
I went through the same thing with the first written of my four fics, and the improvement was pretty startling. After applying the feedback, the fic did pass on the next submission, too.
Edit:
One thing that really made a difference with my story in this case was going back and diving my mind into the parts where the reviewer noted that adding more showy/emotional reaction prose would bring the feelings to life. It really did, and I even found myself choking up at a few points re-reading the new additions, heh.
And since it was 'not a strike' as he said - I wouldn't be too quick to file it under "didn't work out". I doubt any fic has made it though the process there without at least some revision.
All that said, I still have your story here on my 'read it later' shelf. I do need to get around to reading it, but still quite busy with RL and other creative projects.
3666515 Eh, I guess it won't hurt to make a couple of changes. And if it makes the story better, then mission accomplished.