Review of "In Need of a Hand" by Armid · 1:03pm Jan 24th, 2022
Today, I will be reviewing “In Need of a Hand” by Armid.
Being a short story, please note that there will be spoilers. You may skip to the stance on the final verdict which has minimal spoilers.
Summary
Sunset's hand has been badly sprained after her last encounter with Flaming Star. And even though she says she doesn't need help, Applejack realizes her friend is in need of a hand.
Content/Flow
From a cursory glance, this story was precise in what it wished to convey and how it wished to convey that message. It was clear that the author had developed an outline before delving into writing this story. In this case, the story intended to show how, after the events of the last installment of the series, Sunset was trying to hide her injury from her friends so that she would not trouble them. Her job at the Sushi restaurant, coupled with a terrible boss, sought to show that she needed her friends’ help.
However, this story suffers from a few hiccups in its writing which holds it back. I believe the portrayal of Sunset’s injury would be a logical starting point. The story starts with this to describe Sunset’s injury: “[Sunset’s]...hand hurt that morning. It was bruised on the wrist and moving it around was a little hard but…[Sunset] thought it was normal after what had happened last night.”
Being explicitly stated, it is difficult to empathise with Sunset on how painful that injury was. In this case, the information that Sunset was injured is simply given to the reader. Notice that the author did not go into how Sunset grimaced, or how the injury looked; we are only aware of the fact that she was injured. Granted, this was likely described in the previous installment, but showing how severe the injury was would help readers relate to her pain. This is especially the case if the injury failed to heal significantly after a day’s rest.
Being a key point in this story, a sharp portrayal of the injury would be necessary as it is central to the conflict of the story. And even though the injury was later shown to be inhibitive to Sunset’s range of movement in her art class, or at work, its severity was only indicated by how the art teacher, or her friends reacted to it.
Word choice also had a part to play in this. For instance, when the easel was knocked over by the art teacher, Sunset instinctively caught it, causing her to “groan” in pain. Clearly, this is a rather weak word to use in this context, particularly as Sunset had sprained her hand.
Next, let’s consider why Sunset would be so fearful of exposing her injury to her friends. In the story, it is stated that, “They would probably get worried over something that shouldn’t be their problem, not to mention I still thought my wrist wasn’t a big deal.” In this case, I wish that there was further development in why Sunset would be feeling or thinking in such a way. Was there a past experience in which she felt that her friends had cared about her too much that she felt was unjustified? What, did she think, would be the consequences? Would Sunset think that her friends would have looked at her differently over this incident?
This, in part, is also due to the fact that there was little description on how fearful or perhaps anxious Sunset was in exposing her injury to her friends before. I would say that Sunset would, internally, be fearful of showing it to her friends, even though she might be strong on the outside. Therefore, sprinkling some thoughts and emotions with respect to her constant avoidance of the subject of her injury would help in building that connection between the reader and Sunset. Readers would be better able to view Sunset’s perspective and understand her emotions.
I can glean that the author had attempted to show how Sunset was feeling at specific junctures through her actions when engaging in conversation. However, as these actions accompanied short bouts of dialogue, conversations were developed through many short paragraphs. While this is not inherently a bad thing, my greater point would be that they give little time for the reader to take in the emotional undertone beneath Sunset’s actions.
Perhaps introducing some paragraphs that discuss Sunset’s inner thoughts and emotions would help to strengthen the scene, especially during points where a pause would be appropriate (when Sunset could be seen to be hesitating over her decision, panicking or worried). I like how there was a reflective instance on Sunset’s part at the end of the first chapter, but I wish that Sunset could have been more introspective of what she had to do to avoid confronting herself with Applejack. She could have weighed on whether that was a necessary evil she had to do for her sake, and to protect Applejack from feeling overly concerned over her injury.
Her job in the Sushi restaurant was more relatable; Salty Sushi had been portrayed well to be a horrible, almost obnoxious individual that was calling the shots as her employer. Personally, I felt that Sunset’s complaint of her handling of the menial labour to be silly. After all, she was being paid for her job. Perhaps she was underpaid.
Fortunately, Salty Sushi’s pragmatism of customer satisfaction above all else and lack of compassion over Sunset’s injury were nicely conveyed through how Sunset was treated throughout the entire restaurant service period. For example, her employer believed that her injury was all but an act for Sunset to skive and she still expected her to perform optimally in spite of her condition. Sunset’s hatred of her employer was nicely portrayed here. The thought of Sunset “karate kicking” a customer in the Sushi restaurant, or even her boss was rather hilarious.
Nonetheless, I had initially questioned why Sunset would be willing to suddenly see the light and resign from her job after talking to her friends. I felt that it was convenient that she would decide to quit after reconciling with her friends about the truth about why she would hide her injury. I believe that the author could have shown that this was the last straw for Sunset, that Salty Sushi was simply too much for Sunset to bear with to resign.
To be fair, the pet shop scene was supposed to help in this regard. Corroborated with the prospect that Salty Sushi had probably intended to fire her in any case, I could see this happening.
The final part where Sunset had a conversation with Applejack and Pinkie to realise what friendship meant in terms of caring for one another was interesting. It shows how Sunset just had to be reminded of what she had done for others to show that she was deserving of such treatment for herself by her friends as well.
There are good morals to be had here. Sometimes, you just need to be reminded that you should feel free to share your pains with your friends as they truly care for you. And friends seek to reciprocate what you have done for them, for you.
However, I wish that this sudden realization would have been developed more deeply. Beyond the joy and that “heart-warming sensation within”, what was Sunset thinking? Did she regret her decision earlier to hide from them? Did she feel that she wronged them, or even herself? I also feel that the emotions portrayed from her seemed disproportionate to what she would have felt. This, in part, could be attributed to the short paragraph devoted to her reaction to Pinkie’s and Applejack’s words.
Before moving on, one can notice the many scenes being illustrated with many time skips to facilitate the outline the author proffered, separated by horizontal line breaks. This was more of an issue in the first chapter, since immersion and development would be diluted over the four separate scenes, but was fortunately not a significant problem in the following chapters. Perhaps it is a symptom of following the planned outline of the story too closely.
Language
Punctuational errors were relatively abundant in this piece, though there were a few spelling errors. Let’s take a look at a few examples to illustrate this.
“Hello Sunset,” Twilight waved back when she saw me approaching.
“Hello Sunset.” Twilight waved back when she saw me approaching.
If a dialogue tag (such as said, acknowledged, or muttered) is not employed, then the dialogue should end with a period, not a comma.
“But I didn’t get Sunset’s opinion on it darling!” she pointed at me.
“But I didn’t get Sunset’s opinion on it darling!” She pointed at me.
If a dialogue tag is not employed, then the following would be a new sentence. Therefore, the first letter should be capitalised.
Pinkie stepped forward and pushed Applejack aside. “OH! OH! I came up with the new recipe for a new cupcake that will BLOW YOUR MIIIIIIIND!” She said, wiggling her fingers.
Pinkie stepped forward and pushed Applejack aside. “OH! OH! I came up with the new recipe for a new cupcake that will BLOW YOUR MIIIIIIIND!” she said, wiggling her fingers.
On the flip side, you do not have to capitalize the first letter of the proceeding clause after the dialogue if a dialogue tag (in this case, ‘said’) is used.
“Look, sugarcube” She rubbed her neck, “Ah know you didn’t want us to interfere with what you were doing and how your hand got like that but.” Her green eyes dead focused on mine. “I couldn’t help not to worry. Are ya alright?”
“Look, sugarcube.” She rubbed her neck. “Ah know you didn’t want us to interfere with what you were doing and how your hand got like that but”—her green eyes focused on mine—“I couldn’t help not to worry. Are ya alright?”
Spelling errors were also present, such as the following. The misspellings of Applejack and Rainbow Dash (not quoted below) were likely just keyboard fumbles.
This time a bit more familiare sounding.
This time a bit more familiar sounding.
“Hurry! Table three. Table five.” Slaty said as she dropped two more plates on the counter, soon as I came back.
“Hurry! Table three. Table five,” Salty said as she placed two more plates on the counter, as soon as I came back.
The choice of underlining words to emphasise them is refreshing, though not necessarily ideal. Italicising them might be a better choice, since it would not hinder the flow of the sentence by distracting the reader away from the rest of the prose. The underline draws a lot of attention to it before one even gets to reading that sentence.
Stance
In Need of a Hand is a simple story that seeks to showcase Sunset’s struggle to get better at friendship, in the context of what has transpired in the previous installment of Armid’s Equestria Girls series. Unfortunately, the story focused much on the raw events, rather than Sunset’s own reaction to these series of events, which made it difficult for readers to relate to.
Content/Plot: 3.5/10
Flow/Communication: 3/10
Language: 2.5/10
Overall: 3/10
Verdict: Needs Work
