BPC III: Maud Contest Results - Bike's Personal Contests

Bike's Personal Contests
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Bicyclette

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Bicyclette #1 · Apr 29th, 2022 · 2 · ·

hoowee! i am very embarrassed by having blown past yet another pre-announced results deadline. i hope you all didn't mind the wait too much, and that you accept my greatest apologies for it. i would like to give my greatest thanks to all of you who have written a story about Maud for the contest, for i have enjoyed and been honored by all of them. i would also like to thank all of you who have ever written any story about Maud at any time, for the more stories the stoic grey rock pony appears in, the better, in my opinion!

as mentioned last time, i am sticking to my pledge of not giving awards to more than half of the entries received, even if this means that i have to actually make difficult choices on good stories possibly not getting prizes. i mean, what am i, a judge or something? haha! here are the prizes:

Runner-up: $15
First Place: $35

and here are the results!

First Place: Metamorphic by Gnarlwood

Metamorphic is a story about Maud in the purest sense, in that a cutie mark story is supposed to be a formative experience that tells a pony everything about what that pony is. Maud's story does not disappoint in this.
we follow Maud during her fillyhood, really getting into her head as she grows up in a world that is not quite built for ponies like her, in multiple ways. the story renders in a way that feels too real the different way her mind works from most ponies, and her resulting social isolation. but as she grows and moves through the world, she collects insight and understanding on how to better live in it all the same. these ways are, as expected, somehow related to rocks, but not in the one-note-joke way that so many treat her character as, but rather in a profound way that i loved.
this is illustrated best by my favorite part of the story: her father Igneous taking her down into the caverns of their rock farm to pass down the story of their family, in a rite of passage on a different track from that of the cutie mark. not only is it a great exploration of the Pie family's unusual place in the world of Equestria, but it gives both Maud and the reader an appreciation for a perspective that transcends the mortal pony's timescale. Maud may be strange to the ponies around her, but it is her connection to something deeper about the world that matters in the end, and makes her who she is. when she gains her cutie mark at the climactic final scene, it is nothing more than a triumph that is fully earned.
--Bicyclette

TMetamorphic

What goes through Maud Pie's head when she has to answer a big question? That little pause holds much more than most creatures think.

Gnarlwood · 7.3k words · 16 1 · 264 views

Runner-up: Of Rocks and Gems by Snow Quill

Of Rocks and Gems is everything a short, fluffy shipfic should be! Maud is every inch the stoic earthmare that we know and love, quietly observing her marefriend Rarity on a tranquil evening together. there are only three lines of dialogue in the entire piece, which makes it all the more impressive just how complete of a picture of their chemistry this fic paints in its short running time.
the overdramatic gem-lover with an aesthete's keen eye for subtlety and detail, and the laconic geologist with so much depth underneath her still surface. the two mares just fit together perfectly! but the fic does more than simply tell us this. we see it ourselves, through Maud's quiet exploration of her own feelings for Rarity, which first express themselves through art, and when they progress to being just too much to bear, through those preciously rare spoken words. augh, those three lines of dialogue! the little kiss! the only interaction the two characters have in the fic, so weighted by the words behind them. if i did not already ship these two before, i would do so rabidly now.
--Bicyclette

EOf Rocks and Gems