With her reputation in tatters after the Ponyville incident, the Great and Powerful Trixie has been reduced to nothing more than a wandering vagabond. Broke and homeless, all she can do now is wander from one back water tavern to another telling the old stories and legends she's learned during her travels. So weary traveler, fill up your mug, pull up a chair, and stay a while and listen, as the Great and Powerful Trixie shares a story or two.
Side story to The Great Slave King Saga
Book One The Great Slave King
Book Two The Book of Water: The Marriage of the Slave King
Cover Art Misty Peak Tavern by Stoyan Stoyanov
Chapters (2)
Now this I can get into.
1961394 Thanks for your comments gentlereader, anything in particular you like about the story? I was originally going to do this after The Book of Water completed, but the contest prompted me to try my hand at it. Hopefully it's well received.
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I guess I like how it's told. It's half story and half short story.
That and world building. I freaking love world building.
1961419 Yes, I'm fond of telling narratives within a narrative. I plan on showing Trixie's life as she goes from tavern to tavern trying to make a living. While expanding the Slave King Saga universe with little tales, for example I have the true story of how Zap apples and by extension came to be. Another Story might expand upon characters like Sir Stouthorn from the Great Slave King and how he first became a knight, etc. I hope this series gains enough traction, and the readers make requests for things they might like to see in future chapters.
yes
another story when r u going to come out with the next chapter
1962095 Thank you for your comments gentlereader, I'm about half done with it. The latest chapter is taking its time. Sometimes I can bash out 10k words without hardly any effort, other times It's a struggle to just write 500. The funny thing is I know exactly how I want chapter 8 to go but 7 is being a pain in my backside due to it being a segue way chapter. Sorry about the wait I hope to have it completed by this weekend.
Great chapter hoss. This I could see getting into, but not taking the place of the Great Slave King. I agree with ISKV, world building is somethiing I enjoy. Something I would like to see is how the lesser domains came to be, I.E. deer, minotaur, goats, whatever man. Good chapter and good job bud
1962695 Thank you for your comments gentlereader. Yes this series is designed as supplemental material for the Great Slave King Saga universe. Basically a way for me to tell one shots, but will have an over arching story to tell regarding Trixie and the towns and pubs she visits. If you want to lean more just put it in the comments like you did and I'll see about writing it up. Funny you should mention the minotaurs goats etc. They are all part of the Domain of Spring and Lady Minoa will be featured in the next chapter.
This deserves to win. Simple, yet wonderfully told. Kinda reminds me of Just So Stories, or maybe Tales Of The Early World. Well done sir.
1963307 Thanks for your comments gentlereader, was there anything about the story you found wanting?
1964655 Hmmm. Hard to say, considering I don't have much experience as a writer. You handled all the elements of the story well, kept me guessing right up until Luna showed up. Not really, no criticisms.
Of course, my opinion may be coloured; I grew up with the book Tales Of The Early World, by Ted Hughes. This story is evocative of his style, as I think I mentioned in my first comment. So it might just be the rose-tinted glasses of childhood marring my vision, but I found it to be fantastic: Not too short, not too long. It hit just the right 'Goldilocks zone', for me anyway. Racking my brains to think of something helpful to say, but honestly I think your skill is beyond mine to criticize. I'd advise waiting for someone like Wanderer D or Csquared or Plum to help, as they are far better equipped than I to help you out here.
In any case, kudos, and good luck with the contest!
Felt alot like the beginning chapters of the Silmarillion.
Very good :D
A nice little story, I dare say! I did find a fair amount of errors, though...
Since this exchange is occurring in the past, the actions should be "she had said" and "he had said and "she had looked", to help denote them as memories, and differentiate them from the current action.
..."as possible"?
Lots of little things like that - a few missing commas, here and there. I also would have preferred slightly more description of the living dead when we first see them chasing the mayor out of the mine.
Something that I've found helps tremendously for editing is to read the story out loud to yourself, once or twice. Sometimes, when reading silently, your brain can glaze over certain things, but reading out loud forces it to pay more attention. If something sounds weird to you, it'll probably look weird to your readers - likewise, if you find yourself pausing naturally in your speech, and there's no comma or hyphen there to denote it, add one.
A bit of spit-polish, and I think this could definitely place in the contest. (Although, to be fair, you don't have any competition as of yet.
)
2068194 Thank you for your comments gentlereader, I suppose the errors is my fault for posting so early. Thank you for your critique, I'll make a few more passes for errors later.
I found myself enjoying Trixie's bits a tad more than the story she told. Still, a solid tale overall. Well done.
2073930 Thank you gentlereader for your comments, what did you find more compelling about Trixie's storyline versus the story she told?
This review is brought to you on behalf of the group Authors Helping Authors.
Name of story: Equestrian Tales Told by Tavernlight.
Grammar score out of 10 (1 is grammar that needs to be worked upon as basic principles such as capitalization and spelling is an issue, and 10 is impeccable): Grammar receives an 8 due to some punctuation errors. Mostly, the errors were things such as a missing comma or slightly misspelled word. Other than that the grammar was impeccable.
Pros: The characterization in these stories was spot-on and fantastic. The first story reminded me of a fable of sorts a la Lord of the Rings, while the second had me laughing hard at the sheer ridiculousness of Sir Stouthorn and his quirkiness. Trixie and her sections were small yet well-written, and made me respect her and even feel a little bad for how she was treated in Ponyville. The language used in both stories was rich and varied, so much so that I had to, on a couple of occasions, check a dictionary for the meaning of a few words. This had me eager to 'learn' new words from your stories, words that I may eventually use to enrich my own writing. Other pros are how, even though I've never read The Great Slave King series, these stories have piqued my interest as to what those tales hold. For someone who has never read your epic of a story, these tales were easy to get into, and never was I bored or confused.
Cons: Mostly the grammatical errors are the only truly noticeable cons. Try reading the stories out loud, or if you don't have a proofreader, it will benefit any and every author to get someone to read and check your story. This only other con is more of a nitpick, but it bothered me nonetheless. In the Diamond Dogs story, why is Luna the only one to talk with words such as "thou" and "thy"? It was a little jarring after witnessing conversation that never had these words in them to suddenly include them.
Notes: I personally enjoyed the second story more than the first, as Sir Stouthorn and Seafoam's interaction with one another was absolutely, for a lack of better words, outrageous. The mystical tone you gave the first story was intriguing, but the second's comedic, ridiculous tone was deliciously witty. I look forward to reading more of your excellent work.
Yours truly and absolutely,
-Ghost
2159986 Thanks for your comments gentlereader, the reasons for using ye olde English with Luna, is because I find it helps differentiate her as a character. Darkpaw is a rough and tumble diamond dog, and so he has no need for niceties. As for the writing style, the first story was designed to be a simple creation myth. So I didn't really delve too much into the deities personalities (looking at Norse and Greek myths, you don't really see much behind those gods without reading multiple myths). The second story, is more a traditional adventure romp. Unfortunately due to the contests requirements (being under 5k words), I had to trim out a lot of what actually happened as they fought, choosing to end things via deus ex machina. Kind of a lame way to end things, since in the original tale Sir Stouthorn and Seafoam actually faced a neighcromancer. But as Trixie didn't hear thing first hoof, she ended the story as best she could. But thank you for the well written and thought out critique, I'll take your suggestions to heart in my future writings.
I really enjoyed this story, especially how it played with the whole Story Within a Story mechanic. We don't see enough of that in MLP fanfics. I'm faving this so I can stay up to date on where this is going.
2186323 Thank you for your comments gentlereader, I primarily plan on using this side story anthology for the World Building Alliance monthly story prompts. If your interested in reading more about the universe I'm basing these stories from, feel free to read either The Great Slave King or it's sequel The Book of Water: The Marriage of the Slave King. I plan on using Trixie's storyline to tie the entire anthology of dissimilar tales together, culminating with her eventual triumph. Beyond the story within a story anything you particularity care for about either chapter?
That was a very interesting story. Sir Stouthorn reminded me a lot of Dorian from JourneyQuest.
However, you had a lot of issues with commas. There were a fair number of comma splices, for one. Secondly, all direct addresses are surrounded by commas. For example, "Hello Sir Stouthorn." should be "Hello, Sir Stouthorn." And finally, interjections are also surrounded by commas. Same idea as direct addresses.
Ser Stouthorn reminds me of Ser Lancelot from Monty Python and the Holy Grail:
2449964 Thank you for your comments gentlereader, I actually styled Sir Stouthorn after Don Quixote, Brian Blessed, and Aquaman from Batman the Brave and the Bold. If you watch the following clip you can see where I drew some of my inspiration for the character.
As you can see, I wanted to go for the over the top hero who desires to right wrongs, vanquish evil, and quest for his liege's honor.
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Ah. So, does he suceed in where his past self failed, and defeats the fearsome
WindmillsGiants?2450143 The only way to learn Sir Stouthorn's ultimate fate is by reading The Great Slave King. Inside, you'll read about his greatest adventure.
#oldstory