EBlood from a Stone

• MLP: FiM
• Sad

Marble loves her family. She helps them, cares for them, and would never, ever treat them poorly. She can't really say the same for herself.

• Marble Pie

Freglz · 4.3k words  ·  136  6 · 1.7k views

SUMMARY
A story in which Marble Pie contemplates the nature of love and hate and how they relate to her family and herself.

Told from the intimate perspective of Marble, this story takes the reader through an intense collection of personal reflections. It is not an easy journey for Marble as her life has many difficulties in store, especially when it comes to those she loves.

LANGUAGE - 8/10
Style: The style of this story is between that of an essay and a diary, both of which aid in creating an intimate connection with the character. In each scene, the author starts by presenting a key idea then develops this through language that mimics the character's voice. The execution is well done, with each thought flowing smoothly into the next.

Mechanics: No noticible errors. The author uses punctuation and sentence fragments to good effect to influence pacing. My only complaint is the frequent use of 'tis instead of it's; the author is consistent, but words such as this are generally used to suggest a character's accent and as this is the only such word in the story, its use here feels out of place.

Mood and Tone: Frequent repetition of key words, building thoughts, and personal pronouns contribute to the sense that the reader is right with the character of Marble and her most private, emotional struggles. The overall tone, though, is starkly pessimistic which can undermine a reader's empathy with the character.

SETTING - 7/10
This story is a character piece and thus the setting is a minor factor. The primary setting is Marble's thoughts, although the author does well when describing the brief bits of action. The setting for the final scene is well written and is a nice counterpart to the emotion of the characters.

CHARACTERS - 8/10
The treatment of Marble Pie in this story is bold, the intimacy of following her thoughts building a complex characterization of a pony who only appears briefly in the show. The pessimism of the character is somewhat overwhelming, but the rationale behind this outlook is balanced by the character's soliloquies.

The character of Limestone is an interesting counterpoint to Marble and her development contributes well to the overall narrative.

PLOT/THEMATIC DEVELOPMENT - 7/10
The primary goal of the author in a character piece is to prevent said character from realizing what it is they need to know/do about them self. The author does this. The plot advances as the reader sees Marble react and ponder each aspect that has occurred in her life; there is a back and forth dialogue, a questioning, and ultimately a decision at the climax of the story. The author does well to pace these scenes, although the final scene, being action driven, is a stark contrast to the much slower pace of the diary-entry like scenes preceding it.

Thematically, the story tackles a hefty topic - loving oneself and others. The final decision of the main character, though, is not a clear black-and-white resolution of this theme; the ambiguity is an interesting touch of realism.

FINAL THOUGHTS
I enjoy stories that tackle tough topics, something which can be unexpected in the realm of fanfiction about magical talking ponies. There are many aspects of this story that a reader, including myself, can relate to. Indeed, some of the language reminds me of my own style of journal keeping.

I was not a fan of the bits of pessimism in the story which, given the related blog post mentioned in the story's description, seem to be coming from the author instead of the characters. While writing should be a form of expression, we should be careful at how emotionally invested we become in a work (myself included ).

Overall, Excellent story. 7.5/10

7378132
Great review, Clarke!