Help wanted: Editing The Eternal Gift · 5:14am Jan 23rd, 2012
Hey Everypony,
For those of you who have read The Eternal Gift, thanks a lot for your support! It really means a lot that you all love the story so much.
I recently submitted my fan fiction to Equestria Daily to see if it might be posted as well as to have it critiqued. The editor that read it was kind enough to lay out every issue that he/she believed would hold it back from being published. In the editors own words, the issues were as follows:
1) Lack of formatting. You have no formatting whatsoever. No paragraph indents. No spaces between them... nothing. It makes it very difficult to read. You'd be rejected on this one point alone.
2) From what I could read, your transitions are abrupt. You're shifting around in time rather quickly, and at times, it's difficult to follow.
3) You never really explained how and when Rarity and Spike became an item. That kinda came out of nowhere.
4) You lost a lot of emotional impact describing the death of Spike's loved ones in the most passing of terms. Dig into it. Develop it. Flesh it out, and make us FEEL Spike's heart breaking.
5) Not quite sure about this whole 'Gift' thing. Dragons having a choice of being immortal or not? Dunno... it seems to fly in the face of canon. Perhaps you might consider making it some sort of magical McGuffin that could grant Spike immortality instead? Just offering an idea.
So, going through these methodically, I'd love help from all of you guys. I'm correcting the formatting problem as we speak, so that will be a non-issue quite soon.
Addressing the more in-laying problems, it's needless to say that transitions are important. That in mind, if you could all message me/comment to let me know which transitions you felt were abrupt and suggestions on how to make them more fluid, that would be wonderful.
Secondly, I want to correct any issues of clarity about Spike and Rarity's relationship blossoming. While I had thought it was understood, it's clear from this EQD editor that the event wasn't clear enough. So, if you have any suggestions for making this occurrence more easily understood, that would be appreciated as well.
The fourth item on the list is something I can understand quite easily; I realized that while I presented the emotions of all of the characters in each situation, I didn't get too in depth in Spike's take on the events. Since he's the focus of this story, I realize the problem here and will be correcting this issue as well. However, if you have any burning suggestions as to how to improve his mindset after each death, please don't hesitate to contact me.
Finally, I realize the point the editor is making when talking about how the "gift" might not be believable. If you have any recommendations for what might be realistic when thinking about Equestria, please comment.
Thanks so much for all those willing to help! Please assist me in making this the best story possible!
I believe it I always thought dragons were long lived not immortal the immortal part should be a gift but his life span should be quite a bit longer than just a ponys lifetime