This is a thread where I post my reviews of Sweetie Belle fics that catch my attention. For the most part it will be for Sweetie Belle fics that I feel are under appreciated. However, if you feel like you want me to review your fic, then I'm willing to do so. While I'll try to be objective, I may withhold recommending it if I feel it isn't that great, but at least I'll try to pinpoint why it isn't that great. So PM me if you want me to review your fic or leave a comment in this thread (make sure it's a response to me so I get the notification)

To start off, let's get this one that I reviewed a little while back:

White Collar Review

So I keep track of just about all the Sweetie Belle fics that come out. And just yesterday I came across this story:
White Collar by: TailsFox 88

The story's blurb and picture were enough to catch my attention, but sitting at nearly 30 000 words, and the fact that it was a crossover with a show I've never seen, I was a little hesitant to start. But I found some time to give it a go and darn I was hooked.

In this story, Sweetie Belle has a very compelling sort of trickster/conmare character about her, while still holding onto the bits that make her Sweetie Belle from the show. Part of what makes her so compelling in this story is wondering how she got to be the mare that she is now in the story. I think that character is perhaps the strongest part of this story, at least that's what sold it to me.

The OC in the story is also very solid as a character, both he and Sweetie Belle create the best sort of dynamic relationships that protagonists can share. And their dialogue is very well executed. At no point did I find myself losing interest with the story or the characters, but instead got more intrigued as I read.

This story also has the hallmark of all great crossovers. You don't need to have watched/read the source material to get immersed with this story and the characters. So if that crossover tag was something that might have dissuaded you from reading because you haven't watched the TV show White Collar, you can rest assured it won't matter.

End of White Collar review.

I'll put it on my read later list. I would read it now if I weren't already in the middle of over 15 other stories. I already have way too many tabs open.

Everyday Review

Here's another older, small review I made for a short story: Everyday by: TwizzleDragon

This is not going to be your usual read. It's a sad story and dark. Bittersweet too (I love my bittersweet). It's repetitive for its 1000 words. But it provides a great example of how effective repetition can be.

Really this story appealed more to my poet's tastes than to my author side (even though it's not a poem. It's prose). This story contains the hallmark of a good poem. It captures a single point and carries through. If you want a look at something rough and beautiful, then take five minutes and read this piece.

While I will recommend it, 'Everyday' is not without it's flaws. You have to give the story a bit of leeway, because this is something that would never, ever, happen canonically, it implies that Rarity is a different character from the one we know through the show. And there are a couple lines where I had to reread because they almost jarred me right out of the story. Almost. Also, the writing is poetic in nature, so if you are easily irritated by poetry, be forewarned.

To Love and Cherish - Review

So, a while back, I came across a certain story with no image, but since then it got one. It had a compelling first-person blurb, which made me interested. The story in question is: 'To Love and Cherish' by: Midnight herald. At 1100 or so words, I wondered how compelling of a story this could actually be, so I dove right in.

I have to say, the first-person narrative from Apple Bloom's POV pulled me in quite quickly, effectively establishing the context of the story and held me captive through the whole story by effortlessly maintaining that this is Apple Bloom telling the story. I might just be a sucker for bittersweet stories, and I'm not opposed to shipping when it's done right, but I found the premise entirely compelling for such a short fic. But what really stands out, paramount in my mind was that To Love and Cherish managed, in so few words, to paint a beautiful picture of a loving and fulfilled life, while keeping the characters in question feeling fully fleshed out. In short, I call this story beautiful.

Needless to say, this story brought a smile to my face, while at the same time I felt my eyes glisten from the presence of happy tears, asking to be shed. While this story probably won't pull you into a bout of tears, it is quite likely to remind you why life is beautiful and meant to be treasured.

I highly recommend this fic for any Sweetie Belle or Apple Bloom fan.

~SilentBelle

The Koprulu Sector - Review:

Alright, I finally have another review. Here's an adventure story mainly following the CMC: The Koprulu Sector. Written by: Unholyheaven. I'm writing this review after only reading half the story (24 chapters, about 125k words), but I do of course plan on finishing it off soon. Still, I believe that at this point I have enough to say about this story in a review.

So, I was asked to review this story, and that's what I'll do. So first off, any Starcraft fans out there? Because this is a crossover with Starcraft, and in a big way. It borrows more from the Starcraft universe than it does from MLP. Fortunately, I have play Starcraft for many years. While I wouldn't consider myself a super-avid fan (in the way that I am with ponies) I still consider myself quite well-versed in that universe, and so I didn't feel lost when I stepped into this fic. Is it mandatory to know about Starcraft before reading this fic? I want to say 'no', and I firmly believe that many of the sharper readers could navigate themselves through the fic just fine by latching onto the characters. Still, a love for the crossover material will certainly help the experience.

The first thing that is evident in this story is Unholyheaven's love for the Starcraft universe, and the way he meshes the two universes together into a believable universe of its own is nothing short of admirable. I think the worldbuilding is perhaps the strongest element of this story. It's very fascinating to see how the two universes have interacted and what the result is. I have always been engaged by any new city, planet, faction, or place that is explored. While you can tell that the story is written very much on a spur-of-the-moment basis (not unlike my own stories), there is an attention to world-building that really makes this universe come alive.

The next strongest point would have to be the characters. Yes, we have teenage CMC that are pretty much the common ground, the characters that the reader can relate to, and what they use to immerse themselves in this story. The CMC are close enough to their canon counter-parts to engage the new readers as the CMC are swept up by the conflict of no less than three (and more) separate factions. Each character has their goals, and they are all going about trying to achieve them. They struggle, many fail, and many adjust their goals as the situation demands. As the chapters go on, more protagonists and antagonists are introduced (much like Starcraft actually, so kudos for emulating that feel).

The only have a couple complaints about characters. I feel like only a few of the characters ever really get to be explored as much as I want them to, preventing me from being as engaged as I could be. And the narrative jumps from one character to another rather whimsically without always giving the readers enough time to actually be engaged by the characters. While this isn't really a bad thing, and keeps the reader on their toes, because they honestly don't know exactly which character is going to be in the next part. But I think that a lot of this could be solved with a bit more showing in place of some of the telling.

Oh, and on the narrative. It's a 3rd person omniscient, for the most part, though it does change to limited every once in a while. The changes can be slightly abrupt, and at times made me frown slightly, but I think it's easy enough to overlook with all the other great stuff going on here.

Plot: The plot itself has a fair number of tropes for their conflicts, but they are pursued in an organic manner that makes the story feel fresh and original for the most part. There are also a lot of plot points. This is a full scale adventure the covers multiple planets and much of space, and there is a lot going on in the words, and even more going on off-screen. The busy plot adds to the feel of just how diverse and expansive this universe really is.

Atmosphere: You also get the whole Starcraft feel from it, more so than the MLP vibe, although the MLP portion still has its presence. It's a dark adventure that explores the characters as they struggle to find their places in the universe and it seems to use these themes to challenge the theme of friendship that MLP carries (and that the CMC share). Whether friendship will win out or not is questionable, but certainly a fascinating struggle to behold.

And now for the thing that irritated me the most: Grammar/Spelling
The story is riddled with numerous mistakes. Just about every paragraph has at least one mistake in it. Luckily, I could overlook this aspect of the story in order to see the real treasure of a dynamic world. To be fair, the mistakes also gradually got fewer and fewer as the chapters went on, but they are still there. ('ally' instead of 'alley', basic mistakes like that, the story is kind of riddled with them and my own inner editor was screaming at me to make a list, but I honestly didn't have the time to do so. You can see what was meant to be written, but it is kind of irking.) I think if Unholyheaven went back through and caught those little mistakes, then we'd have ourselves a fantastic gem of a story here.

So, yeah. I recommend this fic. If you like Starcraft, then I highly recommend this fic. It's ambitious, crafted with a skilled eye, oh and it updates fast. Seriously, this guy pumps out around 7000-8000 words a week, from what I've seen. It's pretty much as big as my own SoC series, yet he only started this 20 weeks ago. Kind of puts me to shame, heh.

Plus there's some fantastic art in there by Rameslack. Seriously. I had seen a few pieces of this art before even reading this story, so it is awesome to see what story it was drawn for.

And, of course, because Sweetie Belle is awesome, and ghosts are probably my favourite SC unit:

I look forward to reading more of this story and seeing its eventual conclusion. Seriously check this story out, if just to see how to go about doing some fine world-building.

Thanks for reading,
~SilentBelle

Drama King - Review

Alright, Drama King, by LuminoZero, is a short Romance, Slice of Life, and Comedy story that I am reviewing on request. It's recommended that one have knowledge of the 'Button Mash's Adventures' animation prior to reading this (there's a link to it in the story description).

I felt the first half of the story, the setup for the whole situation, was decent, and Sweetie's character is established quite solidly. We get an understanding of how she regards her sister and sees Ponyville. Pinkie, on the other hand, performs some slightly questionable actions, making me wonder what she wants out of the situation by playing matchmaker.

Once Sweetie and Button Mash start interacting, we get a fun look at how Sweetie perceives the situation that Pinkie has gotten them into. Her view offers as much insight on how she sees Button Mash as how she sees her own relationship with her sister. The story also fills in the blanks of how Sweetie and Button Mash ended up on that date in the animated short, and gives believable reasons for how both characters act.

I rather enjoyed the story up to this point, but then Pinkie appeared once again. And I still don't really understand Pinkie's reasoning for it. I guess she just likes to play matchmaker a lot, but it felt kind of out of character for her. It seemed almost as if Pinkie was taking on a bit of the author's will and that was the reason for her actions, instead of having reasons of her own. The brilliance behind Pinkie Pie is when you realize the method to her madness, the reason for her actions. She's a character driven generally by simple objectives, yet she often achieves those objectives through fairly convoluted means. So I think that if the story coalesced by having Sweetie's own actions more obviously aligning with Pinkie's own objectives, then the story would have ended great. But as is, I felt the ending was kind of forced in a way. (Why does Pinkie want to ship these two?)

Sweetie Belle's action at the end of the story seem not to coincide with her already established character. One might argue that it is because she is flustered and not really knowing what she's doing, but I honestly don't really know why she did act like that. To me it felt forced, and because of that, it drained the comical punch out of the ending for me.

Overall, I think Drama King is a pretty decent story, it has a solid enough start, is well paced and gives reason for the characters to have acted the way they did in the animation (as a world builder, I really appreciate stuff like that). Unfortunately, I found that the end fell apart for me and left me wondering at the actions instead of laughing at them as I was supposed to. I have to wonder what other people might have thought about the ending though...

That's my review of Drama King, by LuminoZero. Thanks for reading. Now I'm going to be prepping myself for some binge writing (NaNoWriMo, that's 50 000 words over November). Looks like about 7 chapters between the two stories over the whole month.

Here's to writing,
~SilentBelle

2065562

I really appreciate the critique you gave me. I'm still working on how to characterize Pinkie, and it seems I was wise to do a 'test' run before my big project. She's a tough pony to get down. I think my intention at the start was to have Pinkie coming off as somepony who just wanted to make everyone friends, but I guess I got a little screwed up in my presentation of that. The way I viewed it, it wasn't until the end when she saw how BM was acting around Sweetie that she started 'shipping'. However, what I intended and what the reader sees are two very different things. The burden lies with me to reconcile them.

It is always nice to get a view that isn't "This is great, do more." but actually explores the ups and downs of the story. I see what you mean about the ending, and I will work on that in the future. It seems I still need to study my CMC a little more before I can be confident in nailing them down.

So, once again, thank you very much for the review.
-Lumino