Fic recs, May 28th! · 12:29pm May 28th, 2020

Got a review milestone in this one. :D

H: 2 R: 3 C: 1 V: 1 N: 0

Big Mac Needs a Flu Shot by Chuck-daddy
Reading by TheLostNarrator, MagpiePony and PegasusPitchVA
Genre: Light Comedy
And he doesn't want one.
Almost two thousand words of Big Macintosh being afraid of needles and resisting getting a flu shot may be relatable, but it's very thin on comedy. Or, really, anything at all. I mean, this could have had merit for parents of needle-shy children, but aside from not providing much in the way of reassurances, there's the punchline. I'm not gonna say skip it, but I guess I just wanted it to be a little more than it was.
Vaguely Recommended

Friendship Is Optimal: Broken Bird by Eakin
Reading (part 1) by Scribbler, et. al.
Genre: Horror
A young Amish girl meets a Pinkie Bot out in the woods.
This story answers a question that I don't know anyone in the FiO continuity ever asked: Bringing people to Equestria is all well and good, but how do you upload everyone when some people systematically refuse to use technology? The answer is pretty good, though I did not expect the twist ending of the first part. Granted, it also is predicated on an action our main character takes that doesn't make any sense in context. Thankfully, the second part helps bring everything into focus, and I'm sad it wasn't included in the reading, because it's pretty necessary. My only other complaint is that this is fairly short. The signposts for the story about a young Amish girl befriending a Pinkie Pie robot are there, but the story doesn't pass them all in turn. Also, I don't actually know enough about Amish culture to know how realistic this is, but that's a question for others. As a surprisingly dark and creepy entry in the Optimalverse, this delivers.
Recommended

Gestalt Trace's Last Stand by Wanderer D
Reading by Death Light Productions
So this one's confusing. The channel was next in my reader list, but came with a note: "find something complete and not Gestalt Trace". Given there was no onboarding in my review notes, I have to assume that the original reading of this story was so bad, it wasn't worth mention, and I wanted to see if he had something else. Thankfully, he redid it! And, well, everything about the reading is good: pacing, volume, sound effects. He even made an attempt at voice acting. But his voice… He sounds like Snagglepuss. I'm sorry, it's true. And it also kept me from being able to concentrate on the contents of the story instead of how he was reading it. This is apparently just his natural mode of speech, so he's not going to be useful for my needs. That said, I wouldn't say not to check him out; he's nearly through an audiobook of Austraeoh, for example, though he hasn't been active since last April, which might not be a good sign.
Genre: Fallout: Equestria Sidefic
This is very much a first FoE fic, the kind of story that tries to fit in a lot of action and gore and sex and so forth while simultaneously expanding on and avoiding the main story canon. Being written by an author who actually knows what he's doing, it's got a good story-within-a-story setup, though it could stand another editing pass. Moreover, I have to say that what's going on in the framing story was kind of confusing? I certainly don't know what I was supposed to get out of the ending, for instance; it feels like a chapter in a longer story. While the inner story is, well, it's all dialogue minus some clunky descriptions, and involves the title character saving an Enclave soldier, getting into an argument with him, and then having sex with him. I dunno. c.c You could do worse.
Recommended for Fallout: Equestria fans

The My Little Pony Ride by Opium4TmassS and MisterNick
Reading by TheLostNarrator, et. al.
Sequel to The Truth Behind My Little Pony
Genre: Horror
In a few days, the ride will be closed, its memory forgotten.
Oh wow, not only has it been a while, I never realized there was more to this series. :O You know, I met Opium4TmassS at Bronycon last year. Non sequitur, but still. Anyway, The Truth Behind My Little Pony has like seven sequels, what the hell. c.c And this one is quite the improvement! It's doffed the more familiar creepypasta trappings, and the journal format is a good bit more believable than how some of the other stories were written. Granted, I'm not sure how likely it would be that Disney World would carry an MLP themed ride, but where the verisimilitude shines is in the ride's description. At the very least, the authors have watched as much Defunctland as I have, but it really seems like a real amusement park ride. At least, the way it's supposed to work does. And when it goes wrong, well, it's certainly unique. I actually had a good time with this, though I daresay the audiobook is the best way to experience it, because Lost has gone all out once again.
Recommended

The Price of Salt by RoMS
Review #6500!
Genre: Sad
Discord visits Cozy Glow's dream.
I love the way this is written, yet that is also its greatest weakness. The prose bears a ponderous weight, but the dialogue is approached with the same style, and it just doesn't work for someone like Cozy Glow. Still, I like the prose, the very real metaphor that they're both aware of, and the reveal near the end, for all that the final line does not feel like a final line. There's a two-line exchange in here that hit me really hard, too.
Recommended

never forever by The Red Parade
Genre: Character Piece
Lightning Dust will never be a Wonderbolt.
Okay, this ships Lightning Dust with Fiddlesticks, and I have to give it major points for that. So just when I was starting to get tired of the "never be a Wonderbolt" mantra, this did something amazing: recontextualized first the mantra, and then the entire scene. I could have seen it coming, but I didn't, and it was fantastic.
Highly Recommended

Three Second Chances by TCC56
Read by Fimfiction
Genre: Far Future Fic
Discord takes it upon himself to reform the Terrible Trio.
Two stories about Discord reforming Cozy Glow back to back? O.o Huh. Anyway, this is one of the absolute best villain reform fics I have ever read. Ever. If nothing else, it's a must-read for chapter two, the one covering Chrysalis. TCC's approach to her reform is so good, so unique, that I absolutely refuse to acknowledge any other way to do it. More than just reform the villains though, this excels at showing the passage of long stretches of time, as ponies (and others) tell stories about the legends of the trio's statue, among other things, and they evolve over the course of generations. This was really stellar, I hope everyone checks it out.
Highly Recommended