About The Sun's End and other musings

Or how I need to practice writing more before I try something like this again.

Writing is hard.

Go on below if you've read my story. If not, well, spoilers are abound.

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So it's been a little while since I posted The Sun's End and, geez, that took its sweet time. Seriously, I've been playing with this story for like 4 months, it's ridiculous.

This thing was supposed to be a simple piece about how I view Celestia trying to do what she thinks is best, but struggling with what that may be. And yeah, that did include some headcanon on the history of Equestria, I can have that, right?

Anyway.

So yeah, Celestia, feeling troubled by ruling, needs someone to talk to someone about... ruling. And since I liked the Reflections arc from the comics, and Sombra is kind of a ruler, who could she better talk to than another ruler?

So off to the mirror Equestria it is, where Celestia is evil, and does what evil beings do best; being evil. In this case, that meant eternal sun, and the drought that comes with it. I think I did all right in presenting that world, the hardships of those that live there, and how Sombra desires to save lives desite that not bringing them any closer to a permanent solution. At one point, though, I started fearing that it took away from what I wanted the story focus to be about: our Celestia.

A lot of the story started to be about the conflict in the mirror world, and Celestia was mostly a spectator to that. Shifting the focus back to Celestia had me drawing parallels and inserting Celestia's thoughts in between. Hopefully, that turned out okay in the end.

I wanted Celestia to not be a flawless ruler, that—even though she ruled Equestria in peace—if Nightmare Moon cannot be stopped in taking everything away, she has to wonder if she's gone wrong somewhere. How much does peace mean, if it compromises safety?

I guess I kind of have a gripe with the show, in how Celestia inexplicably gambles with Equestria by letting the mane 6 handle things in her stead. I think I've found a satisfying answer here, at least for me: Her ponies have to be able to live independently from her, because she's not going to be around forever.

Intents and meanings aside, do I think I did a good job with my story?

Well, I think I did the best I could. My inexperience really showed.
(Though, Crystal's knowledge on ear language already made it much bettter. Thanks, Crystal.)

I recieved some fair feedback on Sun's End privately, which showed I still have a long way to go. And honestly, I, myself, thought that some parts could have been done better. But, that's fine. Nobody is going to be good at anything they do for the first time. It all comes with practice.

If anything, I don't want to be oblivious to my failings.

I do think I tried to do too many things here: Character building, World building (x2), history, location descriptions, and more, all while trying to have a meaningful story on a topic I know next to nothing about. I spent 4 months on this, and simply put, I want to be better than that. At least be able to write more words in less time, that's for sure.

I wonder what kind of 'easier' stories I can write. I still want them to have 'meaning' you know? We'll see.

Writing is hard.