DemonBrightSpirit here. First up to be reviewed is Shrinky Frod’s No Strings.

Now, to be fair, this fic is based on the comics and the “Triple-D” universe—neither of which I am familiar with. Luckily, this fic doesn’t seem to really require being familiar with either. I’m sure I may have missed some nuanced thing, but, for the most part, this story stands well enough on it’s own.

I will say this much up front, though. That {sex} tag is fully warranted. The ending is salacious enough to flirt with an M rating.

With that in mind, let’s get started.

Narrative:

This is a story focusing on background characters. Specifically, it stars Hayseed Turnip Truck and is told from his point of view. Now, in the series his most memorable moment is when we get to see of him in Canterlot during Rarity’s Sweet and Elite episode. Although meaning well, he humiliates Rarity in front of Jet Set and Upper Crust. Costarring, is Canterlot’s power couple: Fancy Pants and Fleur Dis Lee.

The story starts off at a soiree where Hayseed is lamenting his unrequited love towards Rarity. She is engaged and he has missed his chance. Worse still, despite having become a successful businesspony, he still feels like a fish out of water at this fancy party. He sees nothing but pretentious and petty ponies. This quote from him sums it up quite well:

“Everythin’ around here’s rotten an’ fake. All hoity-toity ponies who hate each other’s guts an’ ain’t got the guts to admit it. Fightin’ like a bunch o’ possums in a silo, all tryin’ t’pull out the same turnip when there’s a thousand more ripe an’ waitin’ t’be picked up. Then when another possum shows up and snags one they ain’t lookin’ at, they’re on him like mud on a pig, just ‘cause he went and earned what he wanted while they was tryin’ to cheat each other out of it.”

He narrowly escapes a faux pas with a little help from Applejack, and takes the opportunity to leave the party. Departing with Fleur Dis Lee, he escorts him home. The entire trip back he continues to lament the virulent poison of the affluent, and how he just might be becoming tainted by it himself.

For the most part, the story made sense and meshed together quite well. The only thing I can say is that there could have been a bit more description in places and even a little more exposition to explain some things. Not everyone is about to remember Hayseed right off the bat, so it would’ve been nice to have some physical description. Especially of him in a fancy suit. That just seems too amusing.

The conflict tripped me up a bit. It starts out being about his unrequited love, but that is traded instead for an inner turmoil about an honest and genuine pony awash in a sea of deceitful and pretentious elite. It almost could’ve had the same sort of story without Rarity being involved at all. Nonetheless, it still worked out quite nicely.

Overall, a very nice representation of a Slice of Life story.

Narrative score: 7/10

Grammar:

Now, this is a surprise. The grammar is pretty good. The only recurring problem is those long, long sentences. Comma splices and run-ons are all too common here. For example:

Couldn’t be cousin Mac, I’d have seen her at the reunion… maybe Ace though, he’d be the sort she could appreciate, or a Canterlot noble who had other plans keeping him away.

I figure this could be broken up into at least five sentences, but it reads as just one. It inflicts a sort of confusion. Periods help chop up the information into easily digestible bites. When you try to cram too much into one sentence… Well, it can be confusing.

Note how I capitalized “Well.” I’m not sure of your style, but your ellipsis is followed by a lowercase letter. That indicates that it is a mid-sentence pause, as opposed to a sentence that trails off leading into a new sentence.

I couldn’t do it, I’d just have to wait until she’d been lured off by somepony else, talk to Fancy, and get the hay out of here.

“I couldn’t do it” and “I’d just have to wait . . .” are both independent clauses and cannot be separated by a mere comma. It is too weak and puny for that job. Personally, I like em-dashes, but other styles can use a semicolon or colon to do the job. Of course, there is always the option of just separating them both into their own sentences by turning that comma into a period.

There were a couple of other typos, but they were pretty sparse. Overall this is very well edited outside of the over-sized sentences.

Grammar score: 6/10

Style:

Well now, let me start by saying that you are quite possibly better at show vs. tell than I. The mood was consistent throughout, and the pacing, albeit somewhat slow, was also consistent. Those long sentences, though, make it sometimes hard to fully comprehend what is going on. Also, there were several instances where you would have Hayseed talking for more than one paragraph, but jump between a one liner, a huge block of text, and back to one liners again. All with the same speaker. It makes it a bit jumpy and hard to follow. I once thought Fleur was talking when it was Hayseed.

Something that was different was that you bolded emphasized words. A lot use italics instead and still others simply don’t emphasize anything. It was a nice touch and certainly makes things stand out quite well. Something that wasn’t so nice was using “***” as a scene break. While there is nothing wrong with that, you should at least center it. Otherwise it’s just a bit obnoxious.

Something you might want to work on is description. It’s a little sparse throughout. It can really help a reader to visualize what is happening when the scene is set, the pony’s have attributes that can be named, and objects are more than just their base definition.

Barring those hiccups the style is good, and the story really does read like it’s being experienced from within Hayseed’s head. Nicely done.

Style score: 6/10

Characters:

Dealing with underdeveloped background characters is always fun. They can be interpreted in a lot of different ways, unlike those more popular characters.

Hayseed Turnip Truck is quite the character. You get a feel for him right off the bat, and he stays fairly true all throughout. It’s fascinating watching him go through the bumps in the road and how he handles them. He really does have genuine character.

However, as well done as Hayseed is, the rest of the cast is lackluster at best. Rarity, AJ, and Fancy are only around long enough for a line or three, leaving Fleur as virtually the only other character we get to see a lot of. Her character leaves something to be desired. While not necessarily two-dimensional, she just seems quite shallow. It’s kind of like that mud puddle you step in as a kid, only to have the water rush in over your shoe and soak your foot. While it may be more than just a skim of water, it’s not something you can find yourself awash in, either.

Character score: 6/10

Originality:

This story isn’t particularly novel. Some honest fellow makes it and struggles to stay true to himself in a society overflowing with fakes and excess. It doesn’t really have anything to truly make it stand out either.

That being said, it’s not like this kind of story is quite a cliche. It’s been done, but not to death. As far as pony stories go, it’s even a bit rarer. It would have been nice had there really been something that made this story stand out, but, sadly, there isn’t.

It should be noted that, while it does lack originality, the execution was nicely done. It was an enjoyable read. In fact, it was enjoyable enough that I look at the number of views and such and scratch my head going “huh?” This story certainly deserves better than it’s gotten.

Originality score: 4/10

Final Tally!

Narrative: 7/10
Grammar: 6/10
Style: 6/10
Characters: 6/10
Originality: 4/10

Overall Score: 31/50

Verdict: Enjoyable, though it is in need of some housecleaning.

It's Fleur De Lis, by the way. Don't know if that's Shrinky's typo or yours. Otherwise, nice review.

Thanks for the feedback! I'll keep it in mind if I ever come back to continue this piece, and probably revise the first chapter.

This was another of my stories done as an SMP project, and so the time limit on it kinda prevented the editing/elaboration I normally would have done. As for the other universes involved, it's more useful to have read the comics, particularly Rarity's Micro-Series entry. I'm actually surprised, given you weren't familiar with it, that you didn't bring up more objections to Hayseed's characterization. The entire idea of Hayseed as a down-to-earth business tycoon comes out of the mini-story in that issue, as well as his crush on Rarity, and his getting shot down just as he was about to confess his feelings to her.

Not as surprised as you by the low view count though, honestly. Focusing around minor characters, it's going to lose out on a lot of the views that it would get if it was a Rarity-centric piece instead, for example.

3031364 'Minor Characters', as in Fanon small, or in canon small?
some characters are basically flooded with fans, as small as the character may be in the show.(Derpy/Ditzy)
Part of how you post/publish a story makes a difference too, if you find some additional catch to pick readers. is there a group for your event, as example?

3033224
Well, we're talking Hayseed as the primary character, so I'd say both.

3034413 I guess I missed him.
if the character is that small, there's the chance of sliping situations or 'side-characters' in.
just enough to highlight a good story, since we want to see our story as good.

3031054

It's Fleur De Lis, by the way.

I've heard it both ways. I thought it was like Berryshine/Berry Punch or Derpy/Ditzy.

3031364

I'm actually surprised, given you weren't familiar with it, that you didn't bring up more objections to Hayseed's characterization.

Well, like I said early on, I took most of it at face value since I wasn't familiar with the background content. It was easy considering the characters Fleur and Hayseed are such minor characters. It allows for a lot of creative freedom.

3035345
Actually, nevermind. I just looked it up and MLP does spell it that way. "Fleur-de-lis" is French for "flower of light", and that's the symbol that makes up her cutie mark. I only ever watched "Sweet & Elite" once, and I see her name written "de Lis" so often in fanfiction that I assumed the show used the actual French term, not an altered spelling.