Read it Later (493) · 3:27am Nov 2nd, 2016
Hey guys! I know it's been a while since I last put up a blog. You might be wondering what I was doing in the meantime (all the 0 readers of my blog :P). Well, I graduated back in June and am now working on a graduate degree. It's really less glamourous than I thought, although it's a nice feeling to be respected everywhere.
On the fanfiction side of things, I've been working on character sheets for the mane 6, so that I could possibly get a deeper feel for them. Sorta like method acting, except for writing. I'm gonna see how that works for my next story, which with any luck will be out before the end of the year.
Anyway, onto my review!
I first picked up A Ballad of Eeyup and Nope by ambion when it was in the feature box back in the day. I got to what was then the end of the story, and when no updates were forthcoming, I put it on my nascent Read it Later list. Welp, three years later, here I go!
Conventions: ✓
The style (0) was what drew me in in the first place, when I was just delving into the community. Even now, it's still enjoyable, but I don't feel like it's quite good enough to recommend. The style is functional, yes. Satisfying, sure. But it's not quite graceful, or beautiful.
Theme: 0. The whole story is basically just a jumble of vaguely comedic events lanced together by the challenge in the story, where Big Mac must refrain from saying the two titular words. There's nothing really developed, nothing really interesting, just shallow scenes in a plot best described as desultory. Although, to be fair, I'm not sure how you can stretch a concept like the one in the story to the 30,000+ words without devolving into random uninteresting elements.
That might sound unhelpful, so let me take an example from my favourite story, Salvation by Cold in Gardez. It's 150,000 words long, and it's about Rainbow Dash and Rarity walking around Ponyville in Autumn for their vacation and dreaming. But the thing is, it isn't really about their little vacation. No one could stand to read that for 150,000 words, and that isn't what people are there for. Instead, it serves as a vehicle for the extremely well developed characters and their shockingly mature realizations. The concept being stretched here isn't the vacation but the characters realizing how they've grown up, which positively demands the 150,000 words put into the story. In ambion's work, there is no such deeper undercurrent to carry it.
On the comedy side of things, it is possible to make extended light cohesive (i.e. non-episodic) comedy work. I have an example in John Perry's Trains, Carriages and Airships in my "Favourite Comedies" bookshelf. And there are tons of examples in the literature. But it seems to require a certain skill level for the execution. I'm not sure if there's a trick to it -- if there is, let me know. But I'm not feeling it here.
Overall: 0. There's nothing really special about this story. While I guess it would work as an idle time-filler, there are better stories out there for that.
Next time: Rumble and Tumble, by shortskirtsandexplosions
While I'm somewhat disheartened by the content of this review, I can still thank you for reading the story and taking time to review it. I accept that you found little of quality or interest in the story, but clean sweep of 0's as your reviewing score seems drastically beyond reasonible plausibility. I'll come back to that point, and, this said, I have experience in doing reviews, and know that your format and delivery can be improved upon.
Reviews are easy enough to write, I find. I've half-assed many, done some genuinely good ones, and completely faked some others. With this in mind, I think it'd be helpful to provide something of a working template to consider as you go forwards:
Step one - A brief summary or synopsis. Keyword is brief. Some reviewers, even professionally cited ones, make the mistake of reciting an abridged version of a story and calling it a review. Saying that a miss-matched fellowship must cross the world of Middle Earth and destory an evil ring, while avoiding the agents and armies of its dark lord Sauron is a quick, easy to comprehend synopsis. Saying that the hobbits leave the Prancing Pony having failed to find Gandalf but finding Aragorn only he's called Strider then and they escaped some Nazghuls and Frodo gets stabbed when they show up again and then he's carried to Rivendell where Gandalf s and the fellowship is forming is not a good anything.
The key note is - a brief summary or synopsis prepares the reader for the general overall impresson of what the reviewed story is and is not. Reading the first example again, we understand that Fellowship of the Ring is high fantasy, not crime, sci-fi, period drama or what-have-you.
It's also quite welcome to provide a quick and overall summary of what your review will look like, on the understandng that your reasoning will be delivered later on in the review proper. A classic educational line to this effect is "Tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them, then tell them what it was you told them." In schooling, this would refer the opening paragraph, body, and closing paragraph of a typical essay style assignment.
Step Two - The Metrics - What I here am calling the metrics are the individual scales or measuring systems that you as a reviewer are using and bearng in mind as you review the story. In your review, you use two - what are called Style and Theme. I personally don't think two is quite enough, and typcally between three and five is what is used.
Youtube Anime reviewer Glass Reflecton has a very formulated review process - his metrics are (always in this order iirc) Plot, Character, Animaton, Sound, and Ending. His reviews are preceded by an opening statement and closed with a final statement.
Reading your review, I do not really understand exactly how you mean by style. Are we talking setting? Narrative prose? Use of imagery, metaphor, fallacy? Dialogue and action?
This statement is somewhat confusing at both ends. Firstly, as was said, there isn't really a definition here of how "style" is being used. On the latter half, I'm given more bafflement by the words graceful and beautiful. These are buzz-words, certainly they sound important, but I am unable to pin them down as having any definite meaning here. Particularily for a story that is silly and slice of life, calling out a lack of grace and beauty seems quite the non sequiter.
Particularily in this stage of a review, it is very important to explain what your measuring stick is, and what it is you are measuring for. Draw specific (non-spoiler, or spoiler-flagged) examples from the story that highlight and best define the successes and short-comings you are basing your assessment on. Ballad has many moments that would work very well as the basis for a negative review, and this is the author saying that. One might as well use them. I'll come back to a related point, ie - proof of readership
Before that, though: On theme - More of this review is spent talking about other stories than the actual one in review. The word desultory was used, and, well, the review here seems rather directionless and whimsical in its own right. As more of a personally held opinion, I'll say that there is a fixation and belief on emotional depth and/or complexity (read: convoluted) equating to overall quality. The statement isn't wrong, per se, but it can lead (and I have seen it done) to the assumption that A) - because something is emotionally deep, it must be deep in quality also (this is where Angst-driven stories draw their motivation from, and teenage poetry.)
Good stories can be emotionally deep and comples, or not, and bad stories can be emotionally deep and complex, or not. The slice of life genre, sit-coms and The Sims would not exist if this statement was false. As such, I am saying that in this instance, it does seem you have chosen an inefficent metric.
Also... why Salvation? To get back ontopic about good review format - making comparisons to other works is fine and useful, but typically the compared works need to have something in common that can be used for the review, and differencs highlighted. Ballad and Salvation have...next to nothing in common. Ponyville, and... that's about it. Using Salvation as a measuring tool for Ballad is like deciding if the music on an album is good or bad based on how shiny the CD is. The old saying about Apples and Oranges springs to mind.
there are better stories out there for that. - you say, and
so, why not use those?
As a last note to step 2 - 0 out of what? 5? 10? You're not grading a review in binary, are you?
Step Three - Conclusion. Recap the key notes of the review. Simple stuff. I'm going to skip writing it here, actually.
Additional things -
Proof of Readership Deceptively important. I mentioned using examples from the story (censured for spoilers or flagged at least) and the benefit to this practice - besides the obvious - is proving to the audience you've read the story and have qualifaction to talk about it. Ass-pulled reviews exist. Having worked in radio, I can say it is actually riddled with fake reviews (most typically the movie-review guy) from people who are either googling other reviews, or straight out bluffing. We do it for time constraints, or lack of energy or interest, but it is done.
If I asked you your thoughts on Discord's appearance in the closing act of Ballad and his brief role in the story (admittedly ham-fisted and deus ex machina'y) would you be able to talk about that, or are you forced to recycle what I've said here (ham fisted, deus ex-y) and play it back at me?
I am not saying that you haven't read this story - I do accept you have. Only, we must acknowledge, there's no proof of that reading in this review.
Bias acknowledgementt
It's always good practice to acknowledge personal tastes and distastes, for the benefit of the audience of your review. This reminds them that it is them you have in mind, and reassures them that you will be objective as reasonably possible when saying to follow your recommendation.
I have little personal interest in Cross-Overs, but I can own up to that and get on with giving a good review, bearing in mind that some people really love Cross Overs.
Courtesy
A review isn't a fluff piece (there's enough of those out there). Reviews are meant to be fair, and being fair necessitates the option to be hard and cutting. Freedom includes the freedom to fail, after all. That ideal in mind, reviews - particularily negative ones - are about a person's work, and most people have at least some personal investment in their creations. It does no wrong to deliver a fair review with basic courtesy in mind. Acknowledge what positive qualities there are, unless you genuinely believe there are none whatsoever, in which case I suggest you go to considerably lengths explaining in detail just how and why there are no good qualities at all, with supporting points and all. The very first sentence of this very long comment is a fine example of this principle in effect.
I think I had a closing recap sort of thing to say, but I have only so much essay-writing urge in me per day, and I've used it up. I've enjoyed this, and if some bitternes and negativity has creeped into my writing here, I hope you can accept it as the simple natural let-down of a unfavourable review. Hopefully your next reading is more fulfilling to you, and I hope that some pointers from this ad-libbed brief on review-writing is found useful to you. Have a good one.
4282305
Hi ambion,
First of all, thank you for getting back to me, and sorry I've so disappointed you. I'll deviate a little from your recommended style by diving into the deep end first, rather than a curteous acknowledgement -- that will come later
In the introdution to this series, I address some of the concerns you have on metrics. More specifically, I mention that a 0 doesn't mean that a story's terrible, as a 0/10 or 0/5 might. It just means I didn't feel like it was worth a recommendation. (The statistics go from below 0 (which does legitimately imply that a story's "bad"), up to 3 (which goes straight on my top favourites list)). Also, I answer your questions on my definition of style within (Answers, short and long: yes, yes, yes, and yes).
Additionally, although it isn't obvious and I haven't mentioned it anywhere, these reviews are mostly for me to get an idea of how writing works, so I can improve my own writing skill, as I think that picking apart others' stories, good or bad, is the way to better writing. In no way was this meant to put you down or to disparage your work in any way, nor to criticize your work in any way other than academically. I try to focus on the great things about each story that makes them pop out, but the unfortunate consequence is that stories that simply don't pop out are relegated to the bin of "clean sweeps of 0's".
Now, you might wonder then why I am publishing this review to the general public. In fact, it's so that I could have exactly this sort of discussion about what makes stories work. The comments of talented authors like you (and from what I've heard, you definitely have written great stories!), as well as more insightful readers than me -- those are what I started this thing for. Thank you, again, for commenting. I truly mean it.
With that in mind, let's address your remaining concerns.
- Of course there were some good qualities in your work! I could mention how I loved the characters throughout. Or how strangely well it stretched out one solitary day to 30,000 words. Or, more convincingly, how I read all 30,000 words of it. If there were truly no redeeming qualities in your story, I definitely would have dropped it halfway in.
- On metrics, I thought that maybe I could get the space down to two orthogonal axes. Many things collapse onto two axes if you stare at them long enough, and I thought this could be one of them. I think I've found the model useful so far, but I'm not opposed to changing it in the future. You said that bad pieces can be deep and complex. Can they? If so, that definitely warrants rethinking the scheme, which assumes that pieces that are either stylistically excellent or thematically thought-provoking are good.
- As for your suggestion of including specific quotes to prove I've read the story, consider it noted. It seems a little contrived, but if it helps in gaining the trust of potential readers, so be it. (No need to test me about your story that way, just so you know. Really.)
- You are right in that the examples I refered to "in the literature" should be specifically discussed. (I had "Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" in mind, and I'm not sure why I refrained from discussing it.)
- I absolutely am not going to dismiss your comment as some lame kind of retribution - it is genuinely insightful, doubly so for simple revenge ;)
- On apples to apples, that was supposed to be sort of a lead in to my implied question in the next paragraph. I wasn't actually claiming that your story wouldn't be good without some "deep undercurrent" beneath it, hence the following paragraph.
And yes, to address your final concern, I did find the whole spiel useful, in that it has forced me to evaluate what I wanted out of this. Once again, thank you for commenting, and I look forward to reading your other stories. I sincerely hope none of this stops you in any way from writing, for that would be the opposite of my intent.