• Member Since 22nd Apr, 2013
  • offline last seen Aug 16th, 2013

Toodle Flip


E

The colt Vanilla lives in Canterlot but has never learned to fly, his wings always clamped to his side, often feeling dead. He spots a filly in the Upper Districts of Canterlot, and from there, he falls in love. This is his story of searching his feelings and for his love, and their fateful second encounter.

The story is based off and made around the song Vanilla Twilight.

Chapters (1)
Comments ( 6 )

I am sorry unnamed user for failing you. I have done wrong in your eyes, and therefore, have failed myself. What can I do better?

At first, I was afraid that this was a stereotypical OC self insert being shipped with one of the mane six. But it was different, which is good.

Here's a few comments and criticisms. I hope it helps.

Watch your verb tense. You started in past tense and then switched to present. Pick one and stick to it.

Pausing for a moment, I pause and look around

I move towards the bed, only desiring to think of her. I lie in bed, thinking only of her, and how I miss the sight of that first magical encounter. ‘I don’t think I will ever forget that moment…

I feel something embrace me from almost every direction. Recovering from my shock I see her hugging me. The embrace was so much different from anything I have ever had. It wasn’t the gentle embrace of my parents.

I bring the note into a tight embrace, and close my eyes. On the note I could almost smell and feel her, as if we were still trapped in that magical embrace.

There are some instances like these examples where you repeat a certain word several times in quick succession. Don't do that.

‘That was close. Singing never seems to end well with me, always seemingly causing hours to pass by in the blink of an eye. I want to make today worth it.’

‘I know they would drag me home for sure this time of night. While my parents may not mind me wandering around, they won’t be so happy to see me with the guards dragging me by the ear home.’

Why do you have random thoughts in single quotes? The quotes are entirely unnecessary. The whole story is a series of the narrators thoughts, so there's no reason to set aside thoughts in quotes. Most of these fit in the story just fine without the quotes.

seemingly

You use this word far too often. It's all over the place, and it's almost never necessary.

Her voice echoed throughout the house as if to mock my silence.

This was rather startling. I'm not sure what you were trying to get across with this line. It's rather creepy.

“Now I will never be able to get this book home without wrecking it! I’ll be a failure!”

This is excessively dramatic. It's just a book. it's just rain. "Oh, darn," Twilight said. "I guess I'll have to wait for it to stop raining." Yeah, Twilight is panicky, but this seems a bit silly.


So he passes out when she hugs him? Was that to imply fainting? When people faint, they regain consciousness fully in just a few minutes. It would make more sense for him to just decide to take a nap there because it's raining and he's tired. Then he can oversleep as needed by the plot.


Your moment to be dramatic is when Vanilla's parents tell him that they're moving. Dive into his feelings there. You moved through that section way too fast. I'd describe it as a gold vein that was uncovered but not mined. All the ideas are there, you just need to explore them.

My fill smile returns

My full smile returns

I write, ‘I sent you a postcard because I wish you were here, Vanilla.’

He wrote a note to himself. Fix that. I'm sure you meant Twilight.

The building was not match fore me, nor the vigilant eye of the guard.

Well, this sentence is a mess. There's a few ways you could fix it. It's also randomly in past tense.

The building is no match for me. I scale it while avoiding the vigilant eye of the guard.

This time however, the song coming on was melancholy a piano almost playing in the background, an unknown myriad of instruments going about their bridge to the verse again.

Song? What song? How do pianos "almost" play? Also, you need a comma before "however."

Time passed,

Random past tense shift.

She is pretty, but her beauty isn’t anything like the one of twilight, let alone her. Her friend, Fluttershy talked with me a couple of times, before being dragged away by the rainbow one muttering something about ‘icky colts’.

A few small grammar errors, and more verb tense issues.

She is pretty, but her beauty isn’t anything like Twilight's. Her friend Fluttershy talks with me a couple of times, before being dragged away by the rainbow one who mutters something about ‘icky colts’.

I look around the empty room adorned with various posters and knick-knacks

Please explain to me how a room adorned with all sorts of knick-knacks can still be considered empty.

but without her, her presence, or even her smell, I feel empty

There's some other small issues I didn't bother to put in this comment, like missing punctuation. You should try to find a proofreader who can check grammar for you. The Proofreader Group. There's no harm in having a backup editor.

It should only be a two day trek to Canterlot

Time seems to whir by as I move closer to my goal, my thoughts only on her. I gain scuffmarks on m coat from various things, whether a bramble, dirt or anything like that. The occasional downpour seems to clean me though, so it isn’t so bad.

I walk through forests, hills, and plains. I walk through the days and nights, relishing in the sunrise and sunset when twilight comes about, and those are the moments I most think of her. The stars would rise, and the sun would rise, but it didn’t make a difference to me. The though of her scared away the ghosties that haunted the forest at night, that made the lights, and it is protected me when my body grew weak from hunger.

I see so many wondrous things, but they don’t appeal to my taste, not as long as I am not with her.

You said it was a two day walk, and then you describe it as a monstrous ordeal that drives him to his physical limits.

The last two paragraphs are rather rushed and confusing. Slow down and describe things more.

Best of luck with your writing. I hope I've helped. Keep at it.

2582040

Thank you, I will make the necessary changes. I wasn't exactly thinking when I had posted this (especially since I wasn't going through an editor, Scintillance was busy so... I wasn't thinking.) On your other point, I try to be original in my stories as much as I can delving away from the usual or trying to take a new spin on something. I'm relatively new to this 'genre' so to speak and to do something like pair a self insert oc with a main would be wrong for me (Plus, considering my OC we probably wouldn't get along at all...)

edit: also, I have a tendency to forget things on the short term, often ignoring basic things for no apparent reason. I can write a word two or three times (sometimes small phrases) and simply move on like nothing happened.

On the note of drama, Twilight can be a bit excessive, especially when it comes to failure. Perhaps I associated this with her earlier years too much, because she, now that I review it much more accepting of failure, rather dying on the inside of embarrassment. Otherwise, as i stated earlier, I was having much better luck with other chapters, and decided to release it before any real changes could be made.

I am sorry to have released this to your dissatisfaction. But if I may ask, what did you think of the ending? I wasn't so sure of it... but I felt that the dramatic irony that appeared earlier was better played.

edit again:

I move towards the bed, only desiring to think of her. I lie in bed, thinking only of her, and how I miss the sight of that first magical encounter. ‘I don’t think I will ever forget that moment…

With that part, I wanted to express that the character, no matter what he is doing is only thinking of her. I will change it so it makes more sense otherwise, or perhaps find a better way to express it.

More or less, I try to keep any inner dialogue and narrating separate. Given, this is my first attempt at a first person story, I did try to keep narration and actual thoughts of the character separate. after all, a character does not think as if speaking to another, telling them their story.

Once again, I was trying to express something and failed. With the postcard, it was supposed to be signed Vanilla, but I will change that too.

Blah blah, I got rid of seemingly (which was used twice)

Yeah, I tried working with dark just before this so... sorry about the creepy.

Spelling errors... spelling errors... wow I really don't seem to notice these (I probably have a few in this comment)

On the point of the walk, this is a small child walking for several days from Ponyville to Canterlot. He isn't getting any sleep, food, or water. It is a bit stressful, as I would imagine. He has no support of any kind.

Also, I usually ask others to say what is wrong. In this case, I didn't run it through an editor, and I have paid the price.

2582083

Unfortunately, because my comment was too long, I felt the need to add a second (However, I do feel shameful that I must pad the comment numbers, along with the same reason I never give a thumbs up to my own stories)

Vanilla is only a colt, and probably a shy one at that (being able to get along with Fluttershy) and so the level of interaction Twilight gives him is a bit too much (that and well, his vision begins to tunnel... but that is probably a magical side effect or something-no-wait! This is wrong! Everything is wrong! I have betrayed myself! Curse me! I broke the one rule. THE ONE RULE! Never, ever use deus ex machina (or at least, my version of it). I ought to simply revoke submission for this horrid breach of my rules!

And... now I feel like a miserable failure.

After finishing this I shall go and sit in the corner because I suck. Wait... I realized... these two dislikes didn't post why they disliked it! Therefore, what they think is irrelevant because they didn't say why, making their thumbs down an unjustified act of disliking. Hooray!

I'm still going to the corner, but is may simply be that ponies don't like the style of writing (that or the story line).


edit:
well, I have cleaned it up somewhat, so it should at the least be tolerable. I have to go to bed at this point, it being eleven pm and all, and there is this spider starting to form inside my computer screen...

I have learned my lesson um...

Dear Prince/Princess [insert relevant name here],

Today I learned a lesson in writing the hard way. My foolhardiness and brashness lead to me posting something before it was edited. This has lead to one pony who was very helpful, but what I would consider very hurtful dislikes. I should have listened to the others, or perhaps waited for my editor to not be busy and rather work on my other projects, like my other two stories which still need serious work. I have shamed myself and disappointed my readers. I cannot think of a better punishment, but also a better lesson than what I have received.

Yours Truly,

Toodle Flip

2582040
This is perhaps one of the most amusing comments I have ever read. Bravo.

Login or register to comment