I've been working on two stories lately, and one of them has been incredibly frustrating. It's a sequel to Mortal set about six hundred years afterwards, and while the general shape of the story has been coming together as well as can be expected, a big chunk is refusing to be non-terrible no matter what I do. I have probably spent a couple of weeks trying to figure this out.

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Every filly wonders why, when her parents describe what will happen on her wedding night, the story eventually becomes vague, and after much clearing of throats, the topic is deftly changed. There is a simple explanation: that is how reality works in Ponyville. Tasteful scene cuts are an ironclad law of nature.

(From a conversation with Baxil.)

This is going to be a disaster. I don't know what Hasbro is thinking. I guess this is what happens when you let the marketing people call the shots. They're trying to cash in on the fad, and they don't care about keeping their brand strong or maintaining loyalty in the fans who got them to this point.

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My reaction to your reactions:

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Mortal is finished. If you were waiting to read it until the whole thing was up, now is the time to do that thing.

(There are a couple of deleted scenes over in my scrapfile, as well.)

Favorites on Mortal have been flying in, lately, and it's given me a reason to reflect on some stuff that's been lying in the back of my head for a while.

Now, obviously, it's pretty great when someone favorites something I've written. It's an acknowledgment that I've touched someone, and that's the reason I publish this stuff in the first place. Still, different people treat the favorite button in different ways, and I pay attention to that.

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Our merry band of wordsmiths has just completed our weeklong ficstravaganza. What happens is, each participant wrote a story prompt. Nines mixed them up and assigned each of us a random prompt. We then had seven days to turn it into a finished story.

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The plan was to make sure this didn't become a Thing. The plan has failed.

Sharing the Night's Favored Child: Three years have passed since Twilight Sparkle's mentor, Nightmare Moon, sent her to Ponyville. Now, Twilight must use everything she's learned about friendship to become a princess herself.

The Three Sisters Doo: The secret origins of Daring, Ditzy, and Chrysalis.

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The Ambassador's Little Dashie: An ancient and terrible dragon happens upon a helpless filly in a box.

Who We Are, The Princesses Would Destroy: One of the main six is a changeling, but it doesn't matter who—any result will mean massive headaches for the civil service.

In Memory Of Those We Left Behind: Twilight forgets about that time her mom died.

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In honor of the holiday, I present an easter egg hunt for any of you who are sufficiently crazy.

Every one of my stories* contains a line from a Gilbert & Sullivan opera. If you find three, I will declare you the Winner of Fanfiction.

*Except Everfree; I couldn't find a good place to fit one in there. On the other hand, Changelings, Changelings, Everywhere has two or three, so I suppose it balances out.