This story is a sequel to Full Friendship's Magic #2 (A Pie's white lie)
Pizza pie got her chance to be different from her Pink cousin. With her new unicorn horn telling them apart. But no chance comes without flaws.
When the beast awakens within, fear its power as it smites in grim. The Pizza is gone and the beast shall take her place. Now it’s ponyville’s turn to suffer the same. The ponies of harmony tries to save the day but the question remains. Would one relative get in the others way?
⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯✶✶✶⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯
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Chapters (1)
This escalated quickly
Me again. Sorry it took so long, but there were other RL stuff I had to take care of. Just want to say first, those last 2 times I commented weren't the full review + feedback; this one is. Anywho, let's get into it.
I'll be blunt and start with the negatives.
It's plain from the start that English is not your primary language, and that's reasonably fine. A lot of native speakers themselves do not even have a good grasp English, which goes to show how difficult it is to learn. And in fan fiction, people tend to be forgiving so long as the story is good. But while I do commend you for your great efforts in writing a story not in your native tongue, it's still going to drag down on the quality of your writing anyway. And the only way to fix this is to get better with English eventually.
Next is your formatting and punctuations, and needless to say, you've made a lot of peculiar choices for the 1st two arcs. Many weird double spaces, inconsistent tense, overuse of ellipses, missing commas, misspellings, and most strange of all, quoting the prose writing instead of the dialog. These formatting issues are lessened somewhat in the 3rd arc, but the problems remain.
These two issues are fundamental, part of the basics. When combined, the strange formatting and your shaky English become a barrier of entry for readers. In the same way professional movies and tv shows are easy to watch because of good camera work & acting, reading a story should be as smooth and unobstructive as possible, because the audience should focus on the story itself and enjoying, not the writing used to convey it. Again in fan fiction, people tend to be forgiving, but with a story as long as yours, readers might drop it anyway because the act of reading itself feels like a chore. And in all honesty, I had a lot of difficulty trying to get through the 3 arcs. Good consistent formatting and command of English makes the difference in making 50k words feel like a breeze or a crawl.
That said, I'm fairly certain that you know that your story has these issues. And I trust that you will improve in time.
Now onto the positives & the story itself. In a way, it's top-notch, which is a surprise.
In spite of all the cons I mentioned above, the underlying story you have still shines through. You have laid out the arcs very well with a clear beginning, middle and end, very good macro planning. But not just that, you even have great planning and pacing in the micro with individual scenes; like when the cousins enter the Custer's shop, hide from their parents, and then sneak back home; Pizza Pie unexpectedly enjoying herself in her run back home; her breakdown during the party and talk with Luna, and many other examples. These scenes come off naturally and don't feel forced. Just as much as your planning, you play well with emotions when characters interact with each other, and it's easy to relate to them. Especially the 1st chapter of the 3rd arc was fun to read, with the 'evil' Pizza Pie antagonizing the Mane 6. I can't stress enough in spite of your strange formatting choices and imperfect English making the reading difficult and shaky, it has a lot of charm and heart and drama and action, all in healthy amount & mix. Pizza trying to please her father, then trying to fit in, then making a big mistake that involves darker forces. For some reason, it reminds me of the season 2 finale with Chrysalis and trying to stop the wedding/invasion. The angle and vibes feel similar to that, and remind me a lot of the earlier seasons. I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say; if the issues I pointed out didn't exist, then a lot more people would have noticed this story and read it. It's a bit darker and serious, but also just as playful and exuberant as the show's own writing. People used to say this about certain story when the fandom was still young, but it feels like this story could fit in with the show itself.
A couple criticisms tho.
The prologue chapter in the 1st arc seems too vague, particularly the identity of the alicorn who accompanied Luna. As it is, it feels like it can be mostly left out and the story still works. That said, it seems like you have something far-reaching planned for this, but considering it could very well end in the 3rd arc, I'm thinking all the background stuff you planned with Luna & Discord & the mystery alicorn might be too much. You might need to add a few more things to make the prologue more specific, so people will relate & get invested more easily.
And the 1st arc works so well by itself, it feels stand alone enough that it can just end there. So yeah, I agree with what someone previously said in comments before that it would have been better as one story combined instead of 3, and you can divide it anyway by labeling chapters arc 1, arc 2, and so on. But since you already separated the arcs into individual stories, i guess it's fine.
In conclusion, you've planned and well thought of a very good story and laid it all out excellently with a good flow & pacing. You were able to achieve great impact and appeal despite the weird formatting choices and your imperfect English, and for that great effort I give it a mustache
But you also need to keep in mind, just because the story is great already, doesn't mean you can excuse the flaws in your basics; namely your formatting/punctuation, & english. Due to those flaws it took me a much longer time to read and it felt like a crawl to get through. I can understand why so many people ignore this story or didn't even leave many deeper thoughts or comments. Because nowadays when people start reading realize you don't have the basics down, they will assume that the rest of the story will have the same issues too, or even worse problems down the line. Improving your English and fixing the formatting & punctuation (especially in the arcs 1 & 2) are going help a lot.
In short, your story is already great, but you need to fix the flaws with the basics in your writing so people can read it more easily.
That said, I hope you take all the constructive criticism well and improved your writing. I enjoyed your story and look forward to future chapters.
Hi again, just wanted to clear one thing about the feedback I gave.
So, everything I said about you formatting & punctuation still stands, but I feel i need to be more specific about your English. It's actually fine and perfectly understandable, and there's nothing wrong about using this level of English on a daily basis. But when it comes to writing stories, authors tend to use a different framing or register when conveying what happens on the page. In fiction, that manifests as a particular type of writing that is rather specific and graceful in a sense, but also slightly different from normal everyday English.
Let me try and do that for this snippet from arc 2, chapter 4, 'The Cheated Promise';
That becomes...
And here's another example from my own project in the works. The simple version...
And that becomes the final version...
In both examples, the phrasing is more structured and particular about what happens. And the wording is more exact and precise too. In any case, while I do tend to be more wordy, it is with purpose. It's the type of wording and phrasing that can slice into the mind of a reader and leave a mark. You already have that level of register I mentioned, but when it comes to the command of English needed to match it, yours is not yet at that level yet and feels a bit clumsy to read. Again, it is specifically this that combines with the formatting & punctuation that makes your story a rocky read over all, which is why it took me longer to finish. A story can be great in its plot and substance, but the words of the story have to easy and occasionally fun for readers to read too. It can make 50k words feel like breeze or a crawl.
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I didn't realize you made a long and detailed feedback (which to me is new and much appreciated) I read through it and I'll explain/respond to it as reasonably/smart as I can.
I said before that my writing skills are much less impressive than I can picture. And I do get back to it and see the mistakes and slowly revised it (as I already did at the revised chapters on arc 1). However, given my free time to rewrite/learn new words, has been reduced. (aside from IRL) I also need to be in my mood to try to at least change some words.
I figured I did less of it from arc 1, but I guess I can look it up again after finishing this arc and it's nice there are at least some improvements on this one.
I self-consciously know my skills are not as good as good writers and I'm not gonna lie on it. As I said again, the time and mood I need to write these had become less, and the opportunity to improve them in a faster pace is not going to happen anytime soon. Regardless my effort still stands as I had this OC around since the year I joined the fandom (2011) and am proud of it despite its recolor flaws (hence the first arc explaining it as a lore). Though maybe just maybe I can get a prof reader around here that I can fully trust and or can be a good friend, I will consider working on it more. Again I appreciate the long feedback and the examples you place, I think I got the idea. It's only a matter of how I can think of words to use.
There's one thing I need to ask a favor, would you mind also sending this feedback to my profile comments? there I can at least look back on your feedback more.