Read It Later Reviews #42 – Raven, Friend of a Not-So-Different Stripe, Life Amongst the Living, The Contest, Together · 3:56am Mar 15th, 2016
Pardon my dust; it has been a while since I last released a review set.
Hopefully, at least one of these stories will have been worth the wait.
Today’s stories:
Raven by SaintChoc
Friend of a Not-So-Different Stripe by Pascoite
Life Amongst the Living by Kamikakushi
The Contest by Cold in Gardez
Together by Silver Tongue
Raven
by SaintChoc
Slice of Life
6,033 wordsNo one alive today can say where she came from; simply that she has always been there.
And yet, few ponies have had a greater impact on Princess Celestia's life than Raven, her most faithful aide.
Why I added it: It was recommended to me by a bunch of folks, including the Royal Canterlot Library.
Review
Raven is the story of Celestia’s seemingly-eternal aide, a pony who has been at Celestia’s side as long as Twilight can remember. The first chapter appears to be mundane enough – a typical day at the castle, with Luna, Celestia, and Twilight chatting with each other. Raven finds her first gray hair, but all seems well and ordinary.
Needless to say, any story which begins so unostentatiously is either going to be boring, or is going to be about something far more grand. And given numerous little hints throughout the first chapter, that Raven is more than she seems, and that the various things she does through the chapter are lent a certain significance mere mundane words or tasks would not warrant, there must be more.
And there is.
Raven is not an alicorn, but she has been Celestia and Luna’s aide for a long time.
A long, long, long, long. long, long time.
This story is one of those pieces that sets a puzzle before the reader at the start, and puts the pieces into place over the course of the story, as chapter by chapter lends answers to the questions posed before, while sometimes adding a new question to the mix.
It is a very low-key story, but if you like more subtly emotional stories with a gradual, creeping reveal, this will probably be up your alley.
Recommendation: Worth Reading.
Friend of a Not-So-Different Stripe
by Pascoite
Slice of Life
3,946 wordsWhile Apple Bloom works on her potions with Zecora, Twilight Sparkle drops by. The perfect afternoon! The potion dream team, and Zecora even starts telling stories. But with her, a story is never just a story.
Why I added it: Pascoite is a good writer.
Review
One day, while Apple Bloom is working with Zecora on her potion-making, Twilight shows up and has a brief chat with the zebra, while accidentally saying wildly racist things or asking wildly racist questions without even thinking about it.
Zecora then tells two stories in poem form that make Twilight reconsider what has been going on between she, Zecora, and the townsfolk.
The poems in this were okay, though the female rhyme scheme ended up feeling weird to me, possibly because when I imagine Zecora’s voice, she rhymes every time, the contrast between the male and female rhyme schemes ended up throwing me. Though the poems did seem pretty heavily dependent on the rhymes rather than meter and other such things.
Likewise, the odd interruption during the poems felt kind of weird and pulled me a bit back out of them.
That said, I thought that the overall ideas expressed here were interesting, and was rather amused by the implication of the first story that Twilight didn’t seem to pick up on (though Bad Horse already wrote Trust). That said, the story was a bit “preaching to the choir”, but if you’re into slice of life pieces and poetry, this might be up your alley.
Recommendation: Worth Reading.
Life Among the Living
by Kamikakushi
Slice of Life
4,991 wordsIt's been a struggle for Fleetfoot lately. Everything seems utterly pointless to her and she's having a hard time expressing herself. Work and her social life have suffered. She now finds herself asking what it means to live? Fleetfoot tries to answer this question as she struggles to understand how those around her make it look so easy.
Why I added it: The Royal Guard queue, and because Kami has 574 followers and 17 stories and I’ve never read anything of theirs.
Review
Fleetfoot is suffering from dysthemia. Everything she does seems worthless, her life as a Wonderbolt seems pointless, and she is left wondering what it is she’s doing with her life, and what is the point of doing it at all. Why is she even still here?
Moving from a conversation with her psychiatrist, to a party with the Wonderbolts, to another session with her shrink, the story deals with Fleetfoot trying to find purpose and joy in life again while struggling with unhappiness at her place in the world.
This story suffers from some major issues with telliness and repetition towards the beginning, as the story often tends to repeat the same point over and over again – at one point, four times in a single paragraph. However, as the story moves on past the beginning and into the party, it starts to flow a lot better and the repetition and telliness becomes less problematic. As the story flows better, it starts to focus more on the things which matter, and not telling us ad infinitum the same things over and over again, but showing us her reaction to things, as well as the way things keep rolling around her.
The real strength of this story is the depiction of Fleetfoot’s dysthemia, and it does a pretty good job of presenting it on the whole, and allowing the audience to understand what she’s going through. It helps the audience understand how Fleetfoot feels, and why she struggles.
That being said, it tends to tell rather than show at times, which undermines its effectiveness at drawing the reader into Fleetfoot at times.
Recommendation: Worth Reading if being telly doesn’t end up turning you off.
The Contest
by Cold in Gardez
Comedy
6,714 words"It's called 'Shh'," said Fluttershy. "It's a game about who can be quiet the longest. Sound fun? I'm the world champion."
Fluttershy is not a pony who makes things up. She really is the world champion of "Shh," or The Quiet Game. And now it's time for her to defend her crown, with Twilight Sparkle and Rarity along for the ride.
Why I added it: Because I’ve procrastinated on reading it for three years now.
Review
Fluttershy travels to Canterlot with Twilight and Rarity in order to compete in the championship of the Quiet Game.
This story is a truly ancient piece, dating all the way back to November of 2011. And yet, it has retained its place high on the hierarchy of stories by rank.
At its heart, this is a very silly story. The Quiet Game is obviously a ridiculous thing to compete at, but the contest is made all the more ridiculous by the rules. We get to witness three rounds of the thing, and each round attempts to escalate the ridiculousness of the thing.
That said, I’m not sure if it is entirely successful in that endeavor; the first round is already ridiculous, but the second round does manage to top it via sheer black humor. The third, however, felt like a bit of a step down from the previous two, though it was more intense in its action.
Still, this story takes a truly absurd premise – the quiet game being a real competition – and shows how it would work, and even makes it entertaining.
This probably isn’t laugh-out-loud funny, but you might smirk a bit at this story as it goes on and proves that, yes, it can get more ridiculous.
Recommendation: Worth Reading.
Together
by Silver Tongue
Romance, Sad
1,867 wordsWhile Fluttershy is out doing her daily business, a sudden storm catches her off guard, leaving her at the mercy of a strong air current. With the situation of a weak flyer in the middle of a violent storm with no witnesses in sight, only one thing happens - it leaves her stranded in a deep ravine with only the howling of the wind and her aching body for company.
While the rain pours, she decides to pass the time, and instead begins to ponder her relationship with her blue pegasus companion.
She can only wonder if she'll even have a future with Rainbow Dash if it doesn't look like help is on the way at all.
Why I added it: It is one of the highest-rated FlutterDash stories.
Review
Fluttershy is trapped at the bottom of a ravine after being blown in during a storm. While she waits and hopes for Rainbow Dash to come rescue her, she reminisces about past times spent together.
This is a fluff piece and wears it on its sleeve. The story alternates between Fluttershy’s present despair while sitting at the bottom of a ravine and her past elation and sorrow at spending time with Rainbow Dash and being pulled away from her at times.
This story aims for fairly surface emotions, and I suspect that to a lot of folks who already are inclined towards this ship, it probably hits the major notes they’re looking for – Fluttershy likes Rainbow Dash, Rainbow Dash wants to protect Fluttershy. But the story feels a little bit superficial at times, as while it shows them wanting to spend their time together, it doesn’t really go much beyond that, beyond a few little pokes here and there.
The story also suffers a bit from being kind of purple at times; there are some excess adjectives here and there which make the text feel a bit tryhard in a way, but which don’t end up being as evocative as I was hoping for.
Overall, it is a fairly simple fluff piece.
Recommendation: Not Recommended.
Summary
Raven by SaintChoc
Worth Reading
Friend of a Not-So-Different Stripe by Pascoite
Worth Reading
Life Amongst the Living by Kamikakushi
Worth Reading
The Contest by Cold in Gardez
Worth Reading
Together by Silver Tongue
Not Recommended
Hah, you thought I was going to WR them all, didn’t you?
If only.
In other news, there is a writeoff going on right now in which I put no fewer than three entries, I’m working on judging stories for the Scribblefest, I’ve got some stories I’ve been working on writing sporadically (I wrote several thousand words on Sunday, and my plan for this evening is to write several thousand more tonight and maybe get one of these stories close to done), I've been made an admin of the FlutterDash group by EverHopeful (you can already hear the faint sound of jackhammers in the distance on the forums), and…
Well, there’s stuff. Hopefully, this week, I’ll spend less time trying to psychically influence voters in swing states and more time actually doing productive things.
If the wrong person gets nominated on Tuesday in the presidential race, know that I was doing something more important than making people vote for the right guy (or gal) to be the next President of the United States. It's not like that job is important or anything anyway.
Number of stories still listed as Read It Sooner: 121
Number of stories still listed as Read It Later: 432
Number of stories listed as Read It Eventually: 1865
Correct me if I'm wrong but is this the highest number of worth readings you've handed out?
Hey, I'm glad you liked my story enough to recommend it!
A bunch of folks recommended it to you, huh? Are that many people really talking about it? Man, that's exciting.
3808598
The present record holder is Read It Later #39, which featured five Worth Readings.
Face it, no matter who winds up taking the nomination, most people will think it's the wrong one. And they'll be right.
I found myself trying not to laugh out loud at the Quiet Game. It only made it worse. Most certainly a WR.
Raven was one of those 'Best read cold' stories where the little lightbulb for me lit up around the third chapter, and just kept glowing brighter as I went. It's a royal PITA to write backwards like that, but well worth it when things come together. WR+
3808662
I pretty much guessed what Raven was about from the first chapter, but it didn't stop me from thinking it was interesting. Admittedly, I'm slightly obsessed with immortality, so my brain kind of things along those lines a lot. Also, given how many people recommended it, it was obvious that it had to be something like that, as otherwise, people wouldn't have recommended it so much.
I'm kind of worried I gave away too much in my summary, honestly, even though I tried to steer clear of any spoilers after chapter 2.