Hap Reviews: Contest Entries 8 · 9:31pm Jul 20th, 2020
Howdy howdy. Still me, still here, still kinda miserable.
In-between reading endless papers on ultrasonic propagation I managed to slide in a few chapters of some more stories from the Right Back at it Again contest, which took me a bit by surprise. I reported last review yesterday that I was feeling very tired, and I still do, but I regardless managed to put together enough of the following stories to review 'em. This time I didn't pick them at random so much, and made an effort to look at some stories I figured I'd find interesting. And they were, so let's get into them!
Project Rita, by Muggony
I specifically targeted this one due to its concept, which frankly sounded pretty damn engaging. The story is about Vinyl, using a machine to view the future of her relationships, which is a fairly nifty, sort-of sci-fi, sort-of magic wacky concept in my opinion. I happen to have a bit of a thing for romance stories set in alternate timelines. The story itself clocks in at a fairly chonky 12.5K words, which I found to be pretty winding to get through for reasons I'll get into in a bit. Divided into five chapters (four plus an epilogue), the story follows Vinyl using the machine, which is part of Project Rita, and seeing an alternate timeline where she has a relationship with Octavia. It's a pretty melancholic and heavy story at times, and leans a bit into dream-like sections where time skips forwards or things change.
I frankly think the concept and the machine were executed fairly well, and found myself not having that much of a hard time keeping up with the shifts in time and other shenanigans. I also found myself reasonably invested in the (minimalistic) plot, which involves both seeing what might have happened between 'Tavi and Scratch, but also investigating the machine. I wish I had a bit more conflict, or a clear goal for the characters, to sink my teeth into properly, though, given the length.
I think that this was a bit of an issue I had with it; it didn't really lean into any kind of conflict or anything other than just pretty much present what the alternate reality would have been just 'cause, and the actual mystery (the machine) was a bit haphazard and quite rapidly resolved. Usually in a concept heavy story I don't mind a relative lack of plot, but given that this was 12K+ words, I did find myself slogging through some of the bits. The resolution doesn't carry much weight and is fairly predictable, I felt, and I wish the concept and premise was more heavily tied into how Vinyl resolved her internal struggles and stuff.
What would have been epic would have been Vinyl using her future knowledge to recreate the perfect events in real life, and then that backfiring as stuff turned dark! But that'd have been a different story. What we have is still a fun exploration of an idea, though, and perhaps it could get built on further by the author in future work? Regardless of what this story does, the concept is still exciting to me, and I kinda hope we might see a bit more of it in a more conflict-heavy story.
I'm probably not really discussing the sadness present in this story, but that may largely due to me not doing emotions well. I read some comments saying they found it really sad, though I personally just found it mildly melancholic. To each their own!
Who would enjoy this? The story's draw, in my opinion, is it's premise and concept, with a side of dream-like sequences that are pretty okay. Other stuff is serviceable, but is in my opinion being carried by the premise instead of working with it. The writing is also okay, if a teensy bit janky in places. However, I'd say if you want to look at a more sci-fi-y concept in a heavier piece, you'll be happy with it, I believe. I would say I enjoyed this, even if I would have liked it to try to do a little more with what it was putting down.
Scry Guy, by TheBandBrony
Hey hey, it's Spitfire! I hunted her down in a story since I included her in mine, and also in a previous story about the Wonderbolts, and wanted to see how she was characterised here. In this story, she's been in an accident after being told to perform a (stupidly) risky manoeuvre by her superiors. It goes wrong! Who'd a thunk it?
I think this is the story I've read from this contest that reads the most smoothly. It's mostly dialogue and Spitfire thoughts, which is pretty slick, but the description of the tricks and figures they perform is also nice. The story is a bit divided into two halves, with the first being the trick set-up, then the second-half being the fall-out of the failed stunt and resulting discussion.
It's a nice story that was partly damaged for me by the whole 'five-percent' talk about 'acceptable risk'. I know this is based on a cartoon, but the story takes a bit more of a realistic vibe in parts, and five percent risk of 'catastrophic failure' is pants. That means you're expecting to have a catastrophic event basically every three weeks if you perform the action once per day (including week-ends). Supervisors in risk management that I know super well are given guidelines to (statistically) only kill one person every ten or hundred thousand years. If the statistics are saying that once a month someone is going to a hospital, that's frankly awful. How are the Wonderbolts going to even break even whilst crushed under all those hospital bills?
It was a bit of a shame that I kept grappling with this recurring statistic, because the rest of the story is really nice. If you're a man less grumpy and bitter than me, though, you will do well to ignore my nitpicky side. I decided to get through it by assuming they were exaggerating by a hilarious amount.
Spitfire is nicely portrayed here. She's fitting firmly in the 'stern but competent commander' interpretation, which is generally the most common one seen in the fandom, and it's competently put together here. She's pretty fearless but also fairly reasonable (bad risk management aside). I was quite invested in her whole stunt problem, and the description of her accident, paralleling it to another past accident described in the early story, I thought was a very nice touch.
I was less into the romance, mostly because, well, it was a bit weak, being largely set up through a piece of fortune telling, which straddled the line between charmingly weird and a little forced. Romantic drama never really came up that much, and the relationship with Braeburn was, to me, a bit ambivalent as to whether it was romantic, platonic, or even just Braeburn being weird (he does apparently do fortune telling to strangers after all), and whilst I liked his characterisation, I wasn't especially sold that there was an attraction there between the two characters. It doesn't do much with it at its resolution, either, treating this as the beginning of an exploration of romantic attraction, so I suppose it fits. I wouldn't have minded a bit more oomph, though.
The story resolves itself fairly nicely. A little anticlimactic, perhaps, but I dig it.
Who would enjoy this? I think this is a good short semi-romance centring around Spitfire. I think the characterisations are good and the writing efficient and elengant (a set-up, conflict, major event, strong dialogue and resolution in just under 8K words? I'd say that's pretty tight). If you like Spitfire, you will likely enjoy most of this and if you like romance but are looking for something lighter and less overt, you'll probably get a good fix here too, in my opinion. Enjoy! Just... don't think about the statistics too hard.
That's all from me today. Hopefully I'll be able to get around to a few more, but I'm becoming increasingly aware that the judges will probably drop their results soon. It's very awkward to review stories from a contest you participated in after the judges have already made their final decision. As always, if the stories looked like your bag, check them out (I'm sure the authors would appreciate it) and have a good one.
Cheerio.
No link to the second story? :O
5317087 There is now!
This is why I should just embed the story using the new function. Automatically includes the description, too, and is way harder to miss by accident.
5317092
I tried that once and didn't like the way it turned out. But then, I tend to include a bunch of other info before the review, so it might work better for yours.
5317095 Well, it'll be something to play with, at least. There may even be a wacky bbcode shenanigan I can use that'd look great on PC but horrible on a phone (like maybe formatting an embed on the left with text on the right, but that collapses into the same space on a phone resolution!).
Might not be optimal but I'd be having fun, at least.
5317108
How it appears on phone might be another issue. I wish I could remember what blog that was now... D:
Honestly, I disagree with your review in that the story didn't hold much conflict but I won't argue. I wanted to tell a personal story and did exactly that. Glad you enjoyed it nonetheless.
What part was predictable btw? Someone else told me they couldn't predict what would happen next.
5317906 The whole Rita thing, and the potential relationship turning sour. Wasn't sure whether Rita was going to be either a lover or daughter (I was going for daughter, personally) and I admittedly wasn't 100% certain how the potential relationship of Octavia and Vinyl going very wrong, but I was pretty sold that it was going to go pear shaped.
It was fine. Conflict, in my mind, is great for a story because it pretty much generates investment, but for concept heavy stories or shorter stories, among other exceptions, I've found that in practice the main draw of a story can be anything. It's fine to disagree, though.
Hope you enjoyed writing it! It was certainly a nice concept, and I kinda wish there were more stories out there that at least tried some more out-there stuff more often.
5317910
I mean I thought I was making the whole Rita thing obvious lol. But yeah, it was fine to write. The fun part was having to fit together a bunch of small details and having them payoff.
Also, 100% on some parts feeling jankey. I made the mistake of pushing this out without giving it a thorough look. After the contest is over I hope to give it a proper run through.
5317919
Yeah, I know that feel, boi! To be honest, when there are deadlines for contests, it's better to have a story than none. Mine was pushed out right before the deadline on about 30 minutes worth of rushed editing, and got a bunch of errors caught by some readers, which'll be biting me in the arse soon, I can bet you that. These are just things that happen, though.
Is this a concept or idea you aim on returning to, out of curiosity?
5317927
Not really. The whole concept was based off if you had a second chance to ask out your crush, followed by the harsh reality you might not expect down the road. That came from seeing some of my old classmates and their living conditions after marrying and deciding to have children right after highschool. And since I have never been in a relationship, I wanted to write a story that wouldn't make that too obvious. If I do return to the concept, it won't at all be the same story as I like to change things up with sequels. That all depends if I get a nifty idea to work with.
Also, 30 minutes? Try literally the last second. For the Barcast Horror in April Contest I had to DM Pencil to keep the folder open a little longer because I was having internet trouble a d had just finished the story one hour before the deadline.
5317935 Interesting.
I think that might have played into why I felt the story was either lacking in conflict or, at the very least, conflict-light. It felt to me a bit like you were showing primarily what was going to happen to Vinyl, not what Vinyl was trying to do, if that makes sense. That lines up kind-of with what you're describing, but perhaps I'm just overanalysing.
It's too bad you don't want to continue the concept, or recontextualise it, or whatever. I could see the premise do pretty well for itself with stronk execution and presentation. Or maybe I don't know anything and am completely wrong! Who knows. I'd have been curious, however.
Usually I'm pretty good with deadlines (I actually get a bit nettled when folks extend them, because I've typically arranged my timetable around a set deadline, and my plans get sometimes pretty derailed when it changes, even when it gives me more time), but here, I learned about the contest, oh, about a week and a bit before the deadline, and I was busy with PhD stuff as well and was unable to dedicate time to brainstorming more than the vaguest of concepts. It was actually a bit fun, and minus the minimalist editing I wouldn't mind just blasting away at a keyboard again sometime.
5317946
Vinyl did nothing and Octavia saw to it that she could take advantage. I guess I could have added an extra scene, because it was the brief mention of Vinyl finally thinking for herself that got the marriage to fall apart. If I had added an extra scene on what got it to break then maybe the conflict wouldn't have been as big an issue.
It's always nice to write something. People say it's better to write fluently, but I find it better to wait the idea to come to you. This way when it does, you give your brain enough creative space and you can write the story in bulk. I think this story was written over the course of three days, so even if I don't publish often, I set challenges for myself to ensure I'm producing content.
5317963
I'm not sure. One-scene fixes often help but don't dramatically change how an entire story gets interpreted. I don't especially want to go really super in-depth into the matter, because I try not to do these to be an irritating boi offering pedantic and unsollicited advice to folk who don't really ask for it and instead just lay down what I thought whilst reading, but in a pretty simplistic way, conflict is just what a character is trying to do, what's getting in their way, and finally, what they do to overcome it.
I tend to write my stories in one go, but this often takes me a few weeks for some of them. I generally have to balance writing, adminning TWG, living with family, and a pretty demanding PhD, so I often end up only writing bits and pieces at a time, even if it's for one big project. Shorter stuff obviously doesn't take as long. I've always regretted trying to write multiple projects at the same time, but I'm told there are some who are way better at multitasking than I.
5318006
I'm not sure how much of your stuff I've read. I know I read Weather Pony a few years ago, but I can't think of anything else.
5318114 Well, you know where they are, and without wanting to flex overmuch, a few of them have done pretty well for themselves. I'd argue a fair few of them are aren't that great, though. One of the drawbacks of experimenting lots is sometimes the experiments don't pan out that great. That's part of the game, though.
That's partly why I format my reviews like this (as opposed to say, how I would have done it back in the day on TGB), with one part 'what was I thinking whilst reading' and another part 'who would enjoy this'. I'm a very critical man by nature, but also want to be able to provide a bit of exposure to other stories that participate in contests, even if I didn't necessarily even like them. When it comes to my own stories, I'm fully aware that they're not really for everyone, so when I try recommending stories on these blogs, I try to bear in mind how different stories work for different people, and try to orient the second part of the review towards the folks who would likely get a kick out of a specific story, even if in some instances that person wasn't me.