Someone check that clock for me. What time is it?

Review o' clock, you say? Then it's time to get to work! Kestrel back for more with another review, coming to ya.

Today, we've got a very interesting and different story from anything I've ever read (spoilers for the originality section). This slice of life fic standing at just over 12,500 words stands taller than many longer stories.

I'm talking about this one:

Strap in, kids, cause this one's a doozy. And I'm not talking Pinkie Sense sort of doozy, you've got to keep a close eye on this one and maybe even reread it a time or two in order to fully understand it. I know it took me a few rereads of a few key passages to get the idea.

Anyway, I digress. The story starts off soon after the battle against the Tantabus. Our protagonist, Twilight Sparkle in this case, begins the story in a cold sweat, needing to test an experiment of sorts. What she finds makes her question her own interpretation of everything.

I'll be honest and say that I found the plot somewhat hard to follow in the first couple of chapters because of limited information, which was somewhat frustrating, but everything made sense by the end. The story made for a great read that caters to anyone who wants to think about what they've read.

While it's not for everyone, this story has some great philosophical and scientific reasoning within it.

Grammar/Formatting: Mechanically sound. I only found a few constructions that needed some work for better flow. Other than that, good stuff.

World Building: I have to say that the author did a great job describing his world, from the pond in chapter one to the gardens in Canterlot Castle later on. Everything was fleshed out nicely without detracting from the narrative.

Pacing: Again, I'll say that the first few chapters are kind of slow and frustrating because of the lack of information, but overall, the story was very well paced and felt quite natural.

Point of View: Using the third person limited perspective that is standard with most stories, it doesn't take too many risks, but the POV was done correctly, with a focus on Twilight's perspective. Not too much to say.

Show/Tell: There was a good balance, with good descriptors to show emotions and actions. There still just aren't any things that I can say against the mechanics of this piece. It's very well done.

Now this one was an interesting path to go down. Twilight's character goes through a strange arc dealing with her psyche and how she understands her world.

She starts off like our regular, well-known and loved Twilight, who is skeptical of new things and utilizes her inquisitive nature to experiment and discover. This discovery leads her to start questioning herself and things around her and she goes into a conversation and meeting with the princess of the night, Luna. Her conversation clears up some doubt, but fills her with a sense of dare I say... nihilism. Not quite textbook definition, of course, but she loses faith in quite a bit of things. Twilight goes through a roller coaster of thoughts and explanations during the story, but things come to a close in good fashion.

This was good. One of the most original stories I've ever seen on the website. Black Lotus contains a load of information to take into account. The story is based off of the simulation hypothesis. The simulation hypothesis, paraphrased, states that the entire universe could be nothing more than a mere projection, that nothing actually exists. You have to digest the information in order to really enjoy it, but I think that Winston did a great job writing an enjoyable story based off of a scientific theory.

I personally liked this story a great deal. I am an engineering student in college right now, and I like to know very much about how things work, interpretations of viewpoints and things, and most importantly, finding the answer to the almighty question: 'why'? As a whole, the story appealed greatly to me, and I feel it would appeal to anyone who desires to think while they read.

The story also presented a particular favorite struggle of mine: the pursuit of knowledge. On one hand/hoof, knowing is important and discoveries drive advancement and can help everyone out. But on the other, there are some things better left unknown. Imagine if something unsavory was proven to be true? Wouldn't it cause panic? What if that unsavory thing had no positive effect? Would it still justify telling everyone just because you figured it out? It's a dilemma.

All in all, this story shined very well. I think that this should be a good contender for a EQD feature if I didn't know any better. Just a few changes and some early pacing issues might keep it out of that. Enjoyable character interaction, a good story, and a very interesting subject matter really set this apart from the majority of stories on the site.

Now for what everyone actually wants to read, the score.

Plot: Well constructed and full of good questions and explanations. Makes you think. Requires a lot of thinking or maybe even rereading to fully understand. 19/20
Mechanics: Almost perfect. Just a few awkward sentence structures. Could use a once-over. 18/20
Characterization: Strong character growths and interactions, with minor qualms about Luna's dialogue. 19/20
Originality: Repeat alert: very original. I haven't seen any stories ever that dealt with current scientific studies or philosophy like that. 20/20
Impact: Left a good impression on me and outlined a well done struggle on the pursuit of knowledge. Love it. Though it could confuse a lot of people. 18/20

I had thought not to at first because of the difficult subject matter being a bit of a turnoff to casual readers. But upon further thinking, that really shouldn't be a reason to deduct from it. The story is brilliant in what it intends to do.

Recommended for masterpiece status. Check back for updates on that front later.

Thank you for your submission, Winston. I hope that you learn from this review and continue to improve. Keep on doing the science stuff, man!

See you all next time! Have a happy holidays!

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Be sure to link the review in the story's comment section.

4941870

Ah, didn't realize that that was something we did. I'll get on that.

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Hmmm... Seams to be a problem as of late. Don't worry about it, at least you know now.

Congrats, Winston! :)

Fun Fact: I was originally going to do this review, but I didn't move the story to *claimed* on time. I was 3 chapters in!

4942591 Thanks!