I'll second that Rainbow Dash's arc is a bit odd in that the transition to the final stage of acceptance and moving on... feels rather rushed? You get the idea that Twilight is supposed to be a factor in it, but there's very little affection between them and even Rainbow's confession doesn't necessarily feel like it lessens the gap. Moreover, there... is a little bit of discomforting squick when the thematic of suicide, relationships, and replacability is mapped over it. But yeah, the big issue here is I really don't buy Rainbow's epiphany with Twilight.

Beyond that, I think there are some notable issues with the world building. Early on there is a definite issue with feeling things out (took a while to both put together that Cloudchaser was not a "real" thing and Rainbow Dash was). In addition, there are some other little things that read weird (e.g. supercomputer having that much time scheduling issues, bureaucracy in a place ruled by a supercomputer having extended timelines, systems not having a "terminated" status for ID to save trouble, etc, etc). Basically, I think you pushed the setting a little too hard to the point where it distracted a bit from the overall narrative and consumed space you needed to smooth out Rainbow's arc. For example, the Cel Est Iea stuff ends up being only very tangentially related to the core themeatics (and is also a bit odd that Rainbow is THAT ignorant of their own society).

Stick to the core narrative here and make sure what you pull from your world to really detail -also- adds to the narrative.

I'm going to guess the X axis was meant to be       terahertz   , possibly reflecting    which colors (or perhaps which other ponies) each pony likes   .

The thing that's preventing me from seeing this as Moondancer the most, more than the obscured cutie mark, more than the lack of glasses: the absence of her freakish eyebrows.

You really, really should not use super similar names, especially names that can be merged into a portmanteau themselves. Paint and Pot were hella hard to keep apart at the beginning. Distinct sounds are important.

I will say that I actually did not like this twist. This kinda reduces to Sombra to the most pathetic sort of villain. I'm all for petulant and petty origins for villains, but there are really fine lines in cases where it works and where it is just kinda... laughable, if that makes sense? Not to say that these aren't real emotions and that people don't have these sort of strong reactions, but he ends up looking a lot like a doof, and retroactively pretty pathetic. Basically, unlike someone like... I dunno, Persona 4's Culprit, who ends up evil for sort of similar reason but is charming because he's style of evil is a fittingly petty and pathetic sort, this really strong contrast between an honestly sorta goofy starting point and the end point just make him a loser of the grandest sort.

Crack Pot seems to oscillate randomly to advance or unadvance plot as needed. I don't really have a good feel for what he's actually like.

Beyond that, I was actually kinda onboard for the weird gothic romance I thought this was gonna be. I was on the fence, but you laid it on just hard enough to get it to be appealing and even have me a bit rooting for Paint and GothLuna. The idea of Loveless' place was super cool and you do some great tone setting there. I just didn't end up liking what you did with it in the end.

EDIT: Also, I need characters to fixate on something not pony butts. So much pony butts lately. <<

EDIT 2: Also, just cut the parentheses and go pure free indirect speech. You're basically doing it anyway, and parentheses look weird in most narrative.

On a related note, lead section with POV character. Theoretically if you're doing one POV it is fine, but your second section takes a second to adjust to because we don't know you are doing (mostly) one perspective.

On a related, related note, I think you're better off sticking to the one perspective. Given where this story ultimately goes, I don't think you actually gain much from the Luna perspective that would not be better served from seeing it in the Paint perspective since this ends up being almost entirely about how he feels, changes, and reacts, especially given otherwise this is 100% his perspective.

My biggest issue with this piece (as >>QuillScratch revealed before I could) is that your line breaks are almost universally weak. In free verse, there is an importance behind how your break your lines—what word and sound and punctuation ends the line, as well as what word/sound/punctuation begin the next. Line breaks should be purposeful, used to create double meaning, influence pacing to stunt thought or force out assumptions, etc. And yet, your breaks seem haphazard, random, like their only purpose is to exist. As such, your free verse form bores me. I don't see what makes this poem what it is.

Two tiny sections that I particularly liked, however, both for their breaks and sonic quality, were:

Perhaps she would turn her eyes on you, and then
If so
You would know what it is like not to be seen, not to be

There's a great cadance and fearful hesitation with "And then, if so," and the abrupt break of that third line... a direct link between being known and existing. If no one sees you, no one knows you, do you truly exist? A poignant question for Luna.

“You do not know much, sister Mine. Not much! And not enough, not enough

Love the repetition here. Not enough, not enough... crazed, exhausted rambling.

But then, look at a section like this:

She assumes that what works for me will work for you. She assumes that
The numbers add up and that the sentence scans. She assumes.

What's the point of ending the first line on such a weak connecting word like "that?" Wouldn't the line work so much better with That moved to the next, leading to the vertical and thematically relevant repetition and emphasis on "assumes?"

Or, oh man, this one:

But I won’t hold my breath. I won’t wait to see. You’ll snap or I’ll snap.
“Sisterhood, our love and our yoke, is not some immutable thing.

As is, it's just sentences. Remove the line break, and nothing is added or gained. But move "or I'll snap" to the next line? Holy shit! Then the entire thing reads like a fierce threat! "You'll snap" becomes not an either/or statement, but a definite fact, a recognizable threat: "Celestia, I won't wait, you'll snap." And then the second line... but putting in that enjambment, the lines then also read as: "You'll snap, or I'll snap sisterhood, our love and our yoke." What a line that would be!

The narrative itself doesn't jump out to me either—not that it's bad, I think it's a rather engaging look at Luna's psyche actually, but the more archaic tone just isn't one that interests me. I'm sure that'll sit better for others. I largely agree with >>AndrewRogue on the pacing.

Is it Abrol or Arbol? I saw both spellings.

Finally, I think you can format your long dialogue a bit better. While it is correct grammatically, I wouldn't put a quotation mark at the start of every new line. When the first thing we see on every line is the same punctuation mark, it quickly becomes repetitive.

>>horizon
On reading your response, and re-reading the ending of the story, I think I ought to amend my statement of what is the climax: not strictly that last paragraph (oh god why did I say that that's so wrong), but more the last few paragraphs as a whole (particularly, as you note, the third-to-last paragraph, where the revelation that his daughter is more like his father than him comes in. I think when I wrote my review I was thinking of that paragraph and kinda forgot about the two that came after it >.>) But yeah, I think our disagreement comes down to whether Rarity is the main character of this story or a stand-in for the reader in a story all about Gerard, and I will happily agree that if you try to read an arc for Rarity into this story at all it falls somewhat flat on its face. It would be really interesting to see if that could be included, because that would definitely make this a more rounded story, but I don't think it's something that the story needs to stand alone.

First story on my slate, and the first one I've read all the way through. When I opened this page up, there were no reviews! What the hell happened? D:

Anyway... I liked this one a lot more than I was expecting to! Despite how much I write crude comedy, when I saw the title, I was preparing myself for a dumb sex story. Little did I know that I would get cool worldbuilding, a well-written Limestone, and a great interpretation of Sunset! Thoughts as they came to me:

I'm not sure how I feel about the opening. Part of me feels that it's overexaggerated past the point it should be, but I'm sure others will disagree.

I liked Limestone's interactions with her parents, found them funny. Igneous' horror at Limestone's issues got a laugh out of me. I don't agree with others about Cloudy being one-dimensional. Her love for her family is as clear as her prudishness and fury at being confronted. I also like how you can see her parents' affectations rubbing off on Limestone, like at the end when she's in Platinum's and spells out sex.

I didn't like the scene in the start with Limestone's sisters commenting on her. You haven't described Limestone running or anything, so unless her breasts are rocket powered, I'm not sure how her sisters were all immediately aware that she wasn't wearing a bra. Unless waggling eyebrows are a Pinkie Sense...

I thought the conflict was really interesting! Both of them, in fact (the titular bra quest and chasing Sunset). Feral Sunset was a great idea, and a perfect piece of characterization for her. It makes sense that this pampered almost-princess would be totally lost on the street in a new world, betrayed and bewildered by her past.

I don't know what happened in those last few paragraphs. >>MLPmatthewl419's comment and my instincts make me feel like there's some twist I'm not getting. What is Limestone not saying? What's with the weird tenseness between them?

Being the 5th reviewer, I don't have much to add. I agree with pretty much everything that has been said.

However, this story did good for me. Despite the mentionned flaws, I'm still impressed by the worldbuilding, the characters, the consistent tone and the progression of the story. I particularly liked the fact that, the technological setting serves a strong purpose in the story, and isn't here just because.

So thank you for sharing. A very high mid-tier in my book.

Pretty much the same feeling than the others.
It was a rather funny story with a little world building around. Careful with the first sentence though. The "sixteen-year-old" is very jarring anda bit pointless. From what we see later, we understand that Limestone isn't an adult at the moment.

I don't know why, but human Pinkie Pie with braces is fucking adorable. Just like this .

Thank you for sharing

Mixed feelings about this one.

Until the resolution, I thought the story was clearling mocking its characters, being moody teenagers, painting themselves in black because they are "dark, and you can't understand the unsufferable pain I'm enduring everyday and that we call life."

But then, the resolution kicks in and I feel like the story was supposed to be serious. The mixed tones kinda clash with one another, and I don't really how to quickly solve it.

As it is, the story is still engaging. Sombra's origin story is interesting enough. Thank you for writing.

I enjoyed this once I'd gotten going, but I had a bit of a hard time getting into it. The opening especially felt sort of robotic; there was a lot of 'words words comma, words words' style sentences there, and it didn't really have what I'd call a 'hook'.

Getting past that, I found myself somewhat more engaged. From what I could tell, most of the conflict in this story comes from the difference between Rainbow's perception of her uncle and how everyone else saw him. That's good, but I think it might have been better if it came into the story a bit earlier. It was hinted at with Twilight mentioning the Wonderbolt thing, but it didn't really feel like it came into its own until the scene with the grocery teller. Could Spitfire have hinted at it, maybe?

The theme and style here seemed a bit start-and-stop. Like with the grocery clerk bit, or with meeting Rainbow's parents; thing shift mood very rapidly at times, and I wasn't always sure I felt sold on it. From goofy antics to yelling at ponies for gossip... Or, like, the dream bit, with all the 'silver and violet' stuff, when silver and violet don't seem to play a huge part in the thematics before and after. It's not exactly bad? I just think it could be better, if it was eased into and out of a bit more smoothly somehow. Like the scene with the wind and her grandpa, which seemed like it should be really important, but just kinda started and stopped. And the 'key not sword' bit. That seemed like it should get more explanation than it did, judging by the placement and weight of the phrase.

There were a few odd quirks to the writing, here and there; I had a bit of trouble keeping Wind and Bow apart at times, and this line:

Rainbow Dash turned to go, but halted when Spitfire spoke her name again. “Ma’am?”

Especially tripped me up, because it breaks the 'one actor per paragraph' thing and also uses narration instead of dialogue (spitfire spoke) in the middle of what seemed to be a dialogue section.

On the whole, though, I felt like this had a lot of soul, and that's worth quite a bit. I appreciate the emotion you're reaching for, and I liked the genuine feel of the characters and their circumstances.

With a bit of trimming and polishing, I'd like this even more, but as is, it's still very enjoyable. Thanks for writing.

Genre: Goth Rock

Thoughts: I feel both extremes with this one. Let's start with the good, which was mighty fine indeed:

I really, really loved the first half or so... basically everything up to the point where Homeboy blacks out and wakes up with his buddy dragging him home. And a lot of the reason is how it builds to the encounter with Loveless. The Loveless character is brilliant, creative, menacing, seductive... utterly perfect, and deserving of more screen time in some other fanfic somewhere. Seriously, that's the kind of character who could support her own series or something. I adore the worldbuilding around Loveless and her bar and the various races that go there. I thought it was a great and natural progression for Crackpot to think of dragging Homeboy there, too, as it gave us a really clear view of who these two guys are and what they're willing to do either for each other or for their goals. TBH their names hadn't seemed all that compelling up to that point, but in that scene we saw a great set of reasons why they should be what they are.

The second half didn't move me nearly as much. I almost felt like Homeboy became a different character after his blackout. Now I get it that he changes, and that's a key moment in his arc where he's supposed to change, but I didn't feel like the story gave me any kind of transition through his change--he just suddenly was Homeboy The Red-And-Black Destroyer Of Worlds, where a few paragraphs before he was an underage kid scamming drinks and getting in waaaay over his head. That feeling of sudden change was reinforced by Crackpot's absence from the second half as well (granted, he might appear once or something, but his presence doesn't really feel like it matters from that point on). Then, honestly, I felt even further disconnected by the jump out of his perspective and into Luna's. It's not that it wasn't well written; it's just that I felt like it reversed the dynamic of us following Homeboy's growth as he learns about Luna (which, granted, may have been the very thing that the Author was going for at that point).

I guess what I'm saying is that the story starts out with an exploration of some OCs interacting with some canon characters, and it's just when the OCs are starting to come into their own as fully-fleshed characters that the rug gets pulled out from under them. I feel like this is loaded with potential for further development of those characters, but right now I don't feel like this coheres into a strong set of character arcs as it stands.

Seriously though, Loveless is one of the coolest things I've yet seen in the fandom. We need more Loveless, people!

Tier: Keep Developing

Oh, yeah. I can see the potential oozing from this story. Even though the begining didn't really catch me, I got more and more invested as I read on. Ultimately, though, too much is left up in the air for me to give it a high rating. I can see how this can be the jumping point for a bigger and better story, but right now it isnt there.

Okay. I'll be back in a while, because Christ there is some shit in there that needs proper unpacking, and I need a coffee with extra whiskey.

---

And we're back. Okay.

Rereading this was a treat. Little clues that I didn't quite catch the first time, because I'm dumb. The staircase that leads to nowhere is a big clue that little Adagio is into some heavy shit. My gut reaction was that she was pimping herself out, and wasn't quite wrong, but not nearly in the way I expected. Hot damn.

Building off of that, I always enjoy stories that paint the Sirens as real sisters. Bitchy and mean to each other, perhaps, but when push comes to shove any one of them would torch the world—or themselves, apparently—for the others.

The price of the rescue was perfect.

The bit with the unicorn does confuse me a bit still, but on second reading I think maybe she's a trap for Sunset. My case:
1) The unicorn glows in the same manner described by the vagrant in the beginning, meaning it's probably something from that mirror[1] world
2) It follows (heh) her around, its hoofbeats tempting her attention away from the mission at hand
3) Dale makes it very clear that the ring isn't for her, so it's clearly not some projection or manifestation from herself.

Case against: The Fireman asked Dale to help, and for what reason I can't quite say why. Also doesn't make sense in the context of Aria receiving a vision of how to find Adagio in the first place, but... so maybe not. I'm stumped. Still cool and weird.

I also don't understand the deal with the creamed corn. At first, I thought that's what was left of Adagio and they were rubbing her in Sunset and Aria's faces (makes sense given Ara's revulsion), but then it's just... corn.

I had a really good time reading this, twice no less, even if some things still don't make a whole mess of sense.

[1]Given that everyone native to the dimension speaks and laughs backwards, I'm guessing there's some mirror-logic going on.

My #1 art pick. I love seeing comics show up in these, and this is sad and well-done and the alt text makes it just that much more poignant.

My #2 art pick. Very sweet, good execution, nice use of the medium, and good use of the alt text.

My #3 art pick. I love that it's hand-drawn! I like the way that the concept of the piece works with the title. And buck it all, I certainly can't draw that well.

I'm on the same boat with the others, here, and see >>Cold in Gardez's comment. The different tones don't really mix with each others very well, especially the first one.

Among the questions unanswered, I wonder how Death could be trapped in his own realm. His magic doesn't work (that's a bit convenient), but what about his wings? Or was it just a test for Twilight? We don't know.

But as it is, it still has some compelling scenes and interactions. With some rework, I'm sure you can get rid of most of the problems.

Thank you for sharing.

Genre: Octarine

Thoughts: I hate to say this, but I find myself wanting to like this more than I actually do. So on the plus side, the story sells me on the central concept of Pinkie wanting to spread happiness through a new color, and her journey makes sense. Structure is probably the story's strongest element apart from Pinkie's wish itself.

I regret to say that the story ends up losing me due to two main issues: length/density of exposition, and character voice during dialogue. For the latter, I think the issues were biggest with Discord and Celestia; I simply couldn't picture those characters saying most of the dialogue they were given. Celestia's line about dropping it to avoid being miserable was the biggest but not only example. I'm cognizant that there's some personal taste here, but this is the mare who told us "there's no wrong way to fantasize" earlier this season. And just overall it feels like both Discord and Celestia know something about new colors but want more than anything to keep it under wraps and won't just be straight about what they know.

The color trip scene was cool and interesting though!

Tier: Keep Developing

I'm torn between my general Kierkegaardian distaste for the idea that certainty is a thing we can have and chuckling about "no gods, no masters". This was pretty enjoyable.

I love the whole angle of the expectations vs. reality regarding Sirocco. I'm a sucker for domestic stories, and a story essentially about family is pretty much right in my comfort zone.


There's a serious pacing problem in the first 1-2K of this story, however. Sorta loses me, which is a shame because once you get going you really get going. Like others have said, there are some really great moments in here and there's an earnest heart to this that I can't help but love. Serious work to make that opening less disjointed would do wonders for this story. You might also consider expanding it so that you aren't cramped with tons of characters in a small space.

I love this, and it tops my initial slate. I don't know what it is about this alternate universe, sci-fi AU (or maybe it's the same universe in the distant future?), but it absolutely lands with me.

I think I'm a little iffy on the Twimiliar's characterization; she comes across as detached and emotionless at first, and the transition to being open and warm with Dashie feels improperly paced (though I love the touches of personality she gets in her first scenes, particularly her little passive-aggressive coughs). And I second the criticisms of this story's pacing at the end, though I suppose that's often inevitable when you're dealing with a low-ish word ceiling.

But the overall package and the quality of presentation make this a success to me.

If horizon didn't write this, I'll eat Zaid's hat. Again.

Snerf. Limestone-centric EqG comedy (with Posh-pandering!). I could read an entire anthology of this and not get bored; it's terrific all around.

...But I kinda don't get the family dynamic that you're putting on display here. Apart from Cloudy's archaic mores regarding sex and nudity, and the thees and thous and permeate the elder Pies' dialogue, this doesn't feel like the kind of isolated, home-schooled family structure you're trying to convey. I can buy Iggy being a fairly open and progressive father, but the scene at the dinner table (for example) just seemed like an average, modern family in an average, modern home, in terms of the family dynamics on display.

Does that make sense? This story is otherwise excellent; I just feel like the family's behavior is inconsistent with what you're trying to say about said family.

>>Dubs_Rewatcher

I don't know what happened in those last few paragraphs. >>MLPmatthewl419's comment and my instincts make me feel like there's some twist I'm not getting. What is Limestone not saying? What's with the weird tenseness between them?

I interpreted it as Limestone trying to distract her mother from Sunset, knowing that, if she knew Sunset were still in the store, her mother would want to go after her. Cloudy, for her part, can see through Limestone's ruse, but ultimately decides to indulge her. I take it as a sign of character development, and of progress in their relationship; something between them has changed just enough for her to give in to her daughter a little bit. On this, at least.

A cute, fluffy bit of popcorn reading.

The biggest problem is that the mystery is pretty weak, all told. There is exactly one clue that we are given (which is kinda a weird one - if I wanted to blackmail >>CoffeeMinion I certainly would not use, like, arogue@taviscratch.com to do it) and the characters miss a really obvious candidate (seriously, why are the sirens not the FIRST consideration?). Like, the library is kind of a weird pacing fake because nothing actually happens by visiting it. It does not contribute to plot advancement at all. It is just scene filler until the S word gets dropped.

If you want to frame it as a mystery, you need to have a little more... well. Mystery! Not just "Oh, right, the villains were the villains. They basically emailed us from their personal email address."

Last scene is super sweet, though.

Harry Potter reference is weird.

Beyond that, this delves into personal territory, but I'm actually not a big fan of the shipping here. Crushes are intended to be cute, but here it feels really overwhelming. It feels like Sunset can't do anything without it being wonderful or amazing or attractive. Just fuck already and get it out of your system! :p

>>Posh
Getting horse sized hats is not cheap, you know? >:T

And here I'd been sitting on the octarine comment since the very beginning of the story and you go and make it for me. I feel cheated.

Another rather cute and sweet story.

Anyhow, this story is kind of an odd duck. It reads a lot like a children's story in tone and cadence, with a pretty fair amount of repetition of ideas and actions within the body of the story, and the characters exist as vehicles to say why she cannot have more colors. This is really hard to explain, but hopefully you can sort of see what I mean if you take a look back and read it?

If its intentional, I think the story ends up far too long and dense for that sort of thing. If it isn't intentional, I think it detracts a bit from the reading experience. It is pleasant sounding, but not necessarily something I want to read.

When you do things, you should consider why! The gap between visiting Fluttershy and Discord is odd, and I don't think it really adds a lot besides slowing the story down, which I don't think you need to do.

While I like the final message and the idea for how it works is cool, I find myself agreeing with >>GaPJaxie that this feels like a bit of a broken aesop. If you have to have magical acid trip induced by the god of chaos to start appreciating things again, I'm not wholle convinced it is going to work for everybody else!

I think you stand at an interesting crossroads, where you need to pick one of two directions for the story, and settling that question will result in a pretty solid piece of fiction.

Largely agreed with >>AndrewRogue; there's just two points that I want to expand on slightly.

1) In terms of deepening the mystery and giving the library scene more of a purpose, how about having them start out examining opportunity, rather than motive? If Sunset starts the discussion with a comprehensive list of everyone who's had recent contact with Flash Sentry (which the ultimate perpetrators aren't on), then it makes a little more sense why they run into such a wall, and then the breakthrough can accompany Twilight realizing they should be thinking about people with motive and figuring out the details of how it was done after they assemble their suspects.

2)

I'm actually not a big fan of the shipping here.

Twilight's crush didn't bother me quite so much as Andrew. However, this is very much textually presented as an unrequited crush by Twilight, and the plot really makes a point of revolving around her secret one-way longing — except for when it's not:

“I wasn’t ‘sitting about’,” Sunset spat, and Twilight instinctively recoiled from her right as Sunset slapped her hand across her mouth. The two girls stared at each other for a moment, and for the briefest of moments Twilight could see her own fear of rejection reflected in Sunset’s eyes.

And, just like that, Sunset’s lips pressed against the top of Twilight’s head, and Twilight was almost relieved that her mind went totally blank in response. Sunset, it seemed, didn’t notice, and gave Twilight a quick, affectionate nuzzle

I just feel like these are not ways that not-in-love people act, and if you're trying to draw drama out of an unrequited crush, it helps if it's actually unrequited.

I mean, sure, mutual crushes are a thing, if both parties are too scared to admit it. But that's a very, very tropey thing to do in fanfic romance, and typically involves a lot of idiot-balling. The cliche here feels like it's dragging down the plot.

Anyway, I did enjoy the core mystery, and the neat subversion at the end of the next-to-last scene. Enjoyable stuff, but the romance (and the construction of the mystery) could use some polishing. (As ultimately ridiculous as the e-mail clue was, it definitely had its heart in the right place; maybe it just needs to be a textual clue rather than an e-mail address one? Like, maybe, it's the computer name in the EXIF data added to the JPEG when the sirens scanned and saved the pics?)

Tier: Flawed but Fun

Who would've thought that some of the best stories I'd read this round would be stories focused on Dash. This is earning one of the two top spots of my ranking, I haven't decided yet.

Anyway. While I mostly agree with >>Not_A_Hat on that this could use some tightening. Here and there were a few scenes which could use some ironing, mainly the intro and a bit of expansion of unicorns and earth ponies reactions to the Severe Weather would be appreciated as well.

Nevertheless, this managed to connect with me, and I really got a feel for Dash's motivation, because who doesn't want to truly feel alive every once in a while?

Still, I thoroughly enjoyed this and further editing can bring the story to even greater heights.

I continue to struggle with how to rate this one. The strength of the writing is top-tier for sure, but the head-trippy/Twin Peaks-y stuff is just such a curve ball.

I *think* I'm putting this at the top of my slate based on the quality of the writing. However, I actually very much hope this gets discussed on the upcoming Radio Writeoff episode because I could benefit from hearing some other people analyzing it in detail.

One last thing: is Dale a past-version of the central little dude? And is the head-tree a future version of Dale? I don't know for sure, but something that the backwards-talking dude said made those possibilities jump out at me during my last read of this.

>>CoffeeMinion This should answer most, if not all, of your questions.

https://youtu.be/e82MTFSxz8Y

:trollestia:

As usual, I don't have much to say. You already had strong and smart reviewers pointing out some of the small problems.

What I want to say, however, is how unsure I am about what this entry is about. The two main focuses are the mistery and the romance part, but none felt more important than the other, and, in the end, the resolution doesn't feel strong enough. As mentionned, the mistery sounds a bit weak, so when it is resolved, it isn't that satisfying. On the other hand, Twi's crush isn't resolved. She doesn't tell her feelings to Sunset, so it's not that satisfying too.

Moreover, we have that meta reflection on what we, as fanfictions authors, do. And, while it is presented like something a bit silly, the overall depiction is quite endearing.

I'm not saying that these three parts can't, and don't, mix together well, I just think that it needs more room to breathe in order to tie everything together. Spending more words on the mistery may probably be a good step in that direction.

Anyway, that being said, this was a very nice and cute little story between Sunset and Sci-Twi. Solid writing and smooth pace. Thank you for sharing.

Epistolary stories:

Are hard to do, though I'd say you've gotten the hardest part pretty well handled here, author. The individual letters and reports for the most part read like individual letters and reports. The only one that really stuck out to me was Shining Armor's letter to Cadance. Would he really stop on the way to the hospital to write it? Maybe after he got there and has seen Twilight unconscious, he can be sitting dazed in the waiting room and putting a letter together.

But that also points to the part of the story that I'd say needs more work: if you introduce Shining Armor into the story, you need to resolve his arc. What happens to him after he gets replaced as Captain of the Guard? What happens to Spike now that Twilight's in a coma? Why is Moon Dancer even here since all she does is give us the same info we've already gotten from Spike? And what part do those condolence letters to Twilight's family play in pushing the story forward? 'Cause you've gotta be ruthless in writing short stories: everything has to serve a purpose.

For instance, Shining Armor asking Cadance to come to Canterlot made me think that the piece would end with a message from Chrysalis, already disguised as Cadance, telling the changeling hive that she's moving the invasion plans up a bit to take advantage of the situation. As it stands now, though, she's just another dangling plot thread. I like hearing the various voices in the letters and transcripts, but once you bring a character into it, make sure we get some sort of closure on what happens to them.

There are a few other minor bits--newspaper headlines tend to be written in present tense, so it should be "Explosion Shakes Royal Castle on Summer Sun Celebration Night"--and Cadance's name is spelled both with the 'ance' and the 'ence.' But you've definitely got some good bones here, author. Flesh 'em out, do a little trimming and reshaping, and you'll be set!

Mike

Let's see if I can do this right. Mashup Time!

For The Luna, Upon the Silva - Drying Paint may be shy and a bit of a loser, but he's determined to conquer the heart of Princess Luna, but will she enjoy this unassuming unicorn's penchant for freeverse?

Don't Leave Me With Garmonbozia - Sunset Shimmer and Rainbow Dash embark on a journey into Sunset's subconscious mind to face their worst fears. Unfortunately, they both fell asleep while watching Twin Peaks reruns. Will they be able to defeat the accursed nightmare creature and keep their sanity? !tuo dnif ot ni erutnev ot evah ll'uoY

A Hurtful Spectrum - In her quest to achieve absolute colourness, Rarity asks Discord for help, only for her perception of reality to be altered beyond her equestrian bounds.

Familiar Violet - When Rainbow Dash's uncle dies, she orders a replacement from Cel-Est Iea

Blackmail Quest! - Down on the dumps, the Sirens resort to blackmail Limestone Pie out of her bra money, only to get a kick in the butt as payment. (Hosted off-site on Twilight's livejournal account.)

I don't think you need your horizontal breaks, nor the very final line.

That was... interesting. I'm not sure I could call it engaging or impactful, but interesting.

I feel bad for not saying much, but there's not much here. It's just Luna waxing poetic for 2000 words. Maybe instead of having her talk about all these broad philosophical arguments, she could offer concrete examples of the destructive people, the selfish rulers, what knowledge she and Celestia are burdened with?

I'm... not sure about this one. The meta angle is a good approach in my book, but what you do from that starting point is more questionnable.

I mean, sometimes you approach some interesting questions, and other times, it feels like overly pretentious, and not that smart. The formers don't have the beginning of an answer, and the latters, well, they feel like you're trying too hard.

However, the pace sounded good. I tried to read some parts out loud, and damn, felt like "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" at some point. Same for the overall prose.

Anyway, I commend the attempt. Even if what the story actually tells is hard to grasp at its core, that's the kind of experiment I like to see popping during Writeoff rounds.

So thank you for sharing. (Let's hope others would be able to come up with things to say on this one)

>>Zaid Val'Roa

Dammit you made me snort my soda up my nose.

A friendly reminder for all the reviewers out there, even for those still hiding in the shadows.

We have one story with three reviews:
Friendship is Strawberries

And six stories with four reviews:
Wasting Time
Blueblood's Greatest Love
The Truth Hurts
Copenhagen
Don't Leave Me With Myself
Lights Sparkling in the Night

Let's try to shake things up, and put these entries with at least a quarter of the number of entries. I'm counting on you (and me), to bring joy to the authors with the little notification bell, before crushing their hope by a destroying review. We have less than 48 hours.

>>GaPJaxie
I'll take that as a sign of a job well done.

>>Posh
*watches clip*
*watches next clip of woman saying she'll see a guy in 25 years*
*screams in terror*

>>Fenton

However, and without dismissing that fact, I think Fleur could be as bad as Blueblood. I mean, we learned from the very beginning that she defines herself with makeup. Even with Fancy and her close friends, she uses some tricks on them, both to please them and to put herself in a good light. Moreover, we learn that, when Blueblood is eyeing her, she usually don't mind stallions looking at her beauty and her body (only Blueblood's look disgusts her), but she can't stand her husband agreeing with Blueblood on mares being compared to lands to conquer, or fights to win. I don't think I'm overinterpreting when I said that she sounds very superficial, and a bit of a hypocrit.

Superficial, yes, and even a smidge hypocritical, but "as bad as Blueblood" is going too far, considering what we learn about Blueblood over the course of this story. This is the a tale of Blueblood recounting the time he raped and impregnated the teenage sister of his girlfriend. Whatever Fleur's personality flaws may be, they don't compare to Blueblood here. I'd go as far as to say that she's a much, much lighter reflection of the kind of traits we see his character display. No further than that.

Anyway.

I think that this is a solid story, on the whole, with kind of an old, gothic flair to it. Its biggest advantage is that its meaning is conveyed subtly; you piece together what happened, and the depths of Blueblood's own depravity, more from context clues than from the content of his story. He's ostensibly telling the story of his failed affair with Rarity, yet he focuses on Sweetie Belle more than anything else, and alludes to an attraction toward her in veiled terms multiple times. What he omits from the telling matters just as much as, if not more than, what he says as he's telling the story.

And even if some, or most, or even all, of what's in the story is made up, the fact that he'd even weave such a complicated, and deeply disturbing, anecdote says a great deal about his character -- again, without making it explicit.

The style does that story a disservice, however. I said it has kind of a gothic feel to it, but the way the story was written feels less like genuine gothic, and more like... like, an imitation of the style the author was going for. It's still fine; it delivers its meaning well (chillingly well), but the style doesn't serve that meaning as much as I think it should.

All that said, I think I'm going to abstain on this one; it's a good, stomach-turning read, but the subject matter and the implications it raises are all too much for me to really get past. Sorry, author.

>>CoffeeMinion What's funny is that the clip which followed the one I posted might give you some context for the events and imagery on display in the story.

!regnagleppoD

Well, that was a serious story of serious seriousness.

On the subject of this story's execution, I have nothing but praise. It managed to jump back in time with grace, it has the right atmosphere for Season 1, all the ponies feel in-character for the season, it was well paced, and god-damn, I think I have diabetes now.

However, on the subject of the story's substance, there just isn't much there. It was cute, and warm and fluffy, and that's about it. That isn't necessarily a bad thing, but as stories go, this one's scope is pretty unambitious.

Still, ambition isn't everything. If this was on my slate, it would be very near the top of the ones I've read so far.

>>Posh
Yes, actually it did, it really, really did. I won't pretend to understand the full context but HOLY CRAPAPPLES BATMAN does the story line up with the milieu there.

So then the Sunset-horse must be some kind of... evil reflection? Like Sunset's past dragged back up to the present and sent to torment her?

Dag, yo. Now I've got a craving for some black coffee and creamed corn.

Preface: I had fun and enjoyed my stay in the Strawberry Hill.

Maybe it's just me and my headspace being what it is, but I kept expecting a sudden dark turn. Twilight not recognizing the wild strawberries threw up warning flags in particular. Granted, I know wild and domestic fruits often look very different, but nowhere is it indicated that these wild berries are in any way fundamentally different from the kind she's use to; merely better.

Anyway, once I let go of my expectation of cosmic and/or bodily horror, I really enjoyed everything. Fun, season 1 (good job!) slice of life bit. In particular:

A tension that could have cracked the world was unwinding with every giggle or stolen berry, leaving Twilight transfixed by the sight.

Was a fantastically descriptive line, for me, and really drove home the rebonding that Celestia and Luna doubtlessly had to do (and then do again later, because learning is hard).

To quote myself:

I'm kinda glad I wasn't the only one who thought mutating magic abilities was a good idea. This looks better than mine would have.

I was correct. This is a great adventure through and through, and the background quips about the romance really stand out as humorous relief to the otherwise pretty serious nature of the piece. Hell, the echo of shipping was awesome, and how Flutteshy just drops the punchline willy-nilly and it takes a second for everything to sink it. Hilarious!

Dash's real fears, Sunset's past coming back to bite her in an unexpected way, and the fighting in-brain were great. For all her bluster, Dash's fears are very real and relatable, and I was pleasantly surprised to see Sunset's post-rainbow laser "kill them all" memory. Seeing a harder bump on her journey to reformation via intruded memory was brilliant.

It's a strong contender for top 3, at the very worst.

Genre: Social Horror

Thoughts: I came here to answer the call for more reviews. This isn't on my slate. Lo and behold, I hit "add another" and it popped up after all.

On the one hand, the tale being told is absolutely awful. I don't buy the "sitting in a chair" thing one little bit; I see a much darker explanation as being more likely.

However. However however however.

The first line warns us what we're in for. Everything from the title to Fleur's thoughts contributes to that warning. And in a way, what we get is somewhat analogous to a horror story, where we shout at Fancy to stop pushing because the "monster" is lurking right around the corner. Blueblood's dialogue is every bit as seductive as it should be, and includes these dark little asides that don't quite make sense (like the fourteen despite being innocent thing) unless you put the worst possible interpretation on them. The net result is precisely what we get at the end with Fleur: we need a shower, and possibly some bleach, and we never want to see that monster again.

But at least for me, the story is deeply evocative of that set of emotions, and so I judge it as successful in pursuing its goals. I totally get that this might not be everyone's cup of tea... heck, I had serious problems with a story that explored somewhat similar themes in a recent past Writeoff. (Also the "cult" thing just feels out of place even though I think I see what the story is going for with it.) But I think the difference here is that there's no ambiguity about whether the bad things going on deserve praise or celebration; Fleur is our guide through Blueblood's badness, and helps us to achieve catharsis by witnessing her reaction--again, almost as a horror story might bring us to catharsis.

Tier: Strong

Immediately, we're treated to a paragraph via enormous run-on sentence. This, and subsequent paragraphs coupled with the fact that these sente-graphs are still fun and easy to read, tells me this is an intentional authorial style choice, and I dig it.

Rainbow Dash's desire for exciting weather is intriguing, but not surprising now that I've seen it happen. She's "Danger" Dash, after all. The couple random dives into sexuality are weird at first (though I guess I'm okay with Flitter being ravaged on a cloud, if need be later), but as a segue for rediscovering the fundamental passion Rainbow's been missing it's a great narrative device.

"And the unicorns do something too, I guess." - Nice shade you're tossing out there, Thunderlane. Living up to your species.

<wall of meteorological science> Good job Rainbow. I'm impressed.

Okay, now if Dash and Flitter don't bang during or on top of a tornado I'm going to be upset.

...

I'm upset. Maybe you ran up against the word ceiling/time limit and had to wrap up, but it feels like a tourniquet rather than a proper ending. And that is, happily, my only real complaint. Introspective Dash is new but still feels in-voice, cranky Twilight is fun (would like to see her ride a storm though. Maybe loosen up a bit), and all around the constant "why exactly am I doing this" nature of the piece was great.

Pol has a lot of insight into the situation that goes beyond the stories her grandfather used to tell. I'm not sure where all that comes from; she instinctively seems to know that the Shiny/Candy statues are... uh... actually them, as opposed to just being statues. And I'm not sure how she knows what to do with the Crystal Heart, or what its importance might be. Stuff like that kind of comes from nowhere.

Other than that... it's certainly a compelling story of man pone vs. nature, if one that feels incomplete at present.

Drop the perspective switch at the end; it's jarring and unnecessarily repeats a moral that the rest of your story conveys just fine.

I have little to add beyond that. It's a cute Pinkie tale with a cute little moral, and I give it eight invisible-to-the-naked-eye colors out of a possible ten.

If I take this as a complete package, it's pretty great. Solid prose and great interplay between the characters, and they're all pretty well-voiced, to boot. Some great moments, particularly with Fluttershy; she's the unsung star of this whole story. Love the repeated gag with the handmade birdhouse; that was terrific.

Elements of it feel either unfinished or contrived, however. I don't buy the antagonism between Sunset and Rainbow Dash; some tension between them is understandable, since they're both totally intense, A-type personalities, but this is post-Legend of Everfree, and they're just at each other's throats like they're still feeling each other out after EQG1.

They don't even seem to like each other here. Until the end, their friendship moments seem... perfunctory. Rote. And I'm not sure I see that as in character for either of them.

I also agree that more should've been made with Fluttershy, but I don't mind her not having some kind of an arc. Really, I was expecting her peek into Sunset's closet to present some kind of a twist at the end, but it just ended up being an extension of the gag with the jacket. And it was hilarious, don't get me wrong. It just seemed like wasted potential, regardless of the comic value.

(the part at the beginning was also super infodumpy)

I criticize because I love; I loved the way this story played out. Thanks for the laughs, guy who is definitely not Oroboro (I was so sure this was Oroboro who wrote this, but his name isn't one of the options on the guessing page...! Grr)

I feel like there's a lot of meta in this story; I read it as being heavy on meta-commentary. Can't help but feel like "Drying Paint" is a criticism of Sombra's staying power as a villain. And Luna's goth-bitch persona, which I think is (or was, at least) a common fanon portrayal of her, being entirely affected, feels like commentary on the way the character's frequently handled in fanfic. So, I enjoy it on that level. And I enjoy it as a straight-up teen romance, too.

You lose me towards the end, though. The plot of this story was Drying Paint trying to win the affections of Luna; he gets them, for like, the end of a single scene, but neither they, nor we, the readers, get time to savor it. Whatever secrets they exchanged, and whatever they did together, goes completely undepicted and implied.

Now, I'm not necessarily complaining that we didn't get a scene of bony, gangly, sweaty, awkward, adolescent, heavy-pony-petting. But the payoff to this multi-thousand word love quest is a moment of tongue-kissing on the floor of a goth club, and an awkward morning-after conversation where Luna dumps him and sets up his villain arc for the show proper. And that's just insufficient, to me, from a narrative standpoint.

On that note, Luna's explanation at the end of the story seems... suspect. So, okay, I can buy that her goth-bitch persona is an affectation, but if her issues with Celestia were so easy to work out that a simple heart-to-heart was enough to unravel them, then one wonders why Nightmare Moon ever came to pass in the first place. Once again, it's an essential character moment that goes undepicted, one which solves her personal conflict offscreen, and winds up torpedoing the resolution to the love story that drove the plot in the first 3/4s or so of the story.

And I'm like, if it's that important... why didn't we see it happen? Especially in light of the perspective shift to Luna toward the end of the story. We should have remained squarely in Sombra's perspective for the entirety of the story; I think that would have justified keeping Luna's thing with her sister away from the reader's attention.

IMO, anyway.

...Dammit, just...

Guys, I'm voting with my gut on this one; it made me laugh. It made me laugh a lot. I can't say much more than that. It might not have the artfulness or substance of some of the other big contenders in this contest, but it made me happy in a moment where I really needed a good laugh.

This'll ride out the prelims near the top of my ballot, I think. Thanks, author.

This was wonderfully done. The—what did Baal call it... Epistolary!—form was a great choice. Since the only pony who really knows from the outset what happened is unconscious, letting us explore the mystery from reports and memos helps keep a sense of urgency as events are analyzed. Moreover, handling the Nightmare Moon problem solo feels like exactly the sort of thing Twilight would try at this stage in her social development. Perfect chance to save the world and, more importantly, get a good grade.

Nothing could be more tempting to our lavender academic.

I ended up really liking this. To be honest, the beginning kinda put me off. The weird 'I'm telling myself I'm not stupid to reiterate that I really am' bit with Dash in the beginning, and really all the pegasi early on, really irked me. (That was a word she knew because she was a smart pony too.) Then the fact that the... eighth paragraph, one of the longer ones in the fic, was only two sentences bothered me a bit too. I just didn't see any reason for it.

I think, though, that this fic just took a bit of time to get rolling. Once you hit Dash's pitch everything started to click. I loved the passion, I loved the introspection, I loved the descriptions of ponies playing in the storms, I loved the budding romance and the willful ignorance. It almost felt like watching the writing of Dash grow up a bit. She went from angsty teen in the beginning to contemplative and self aware at the end without losing the core of her character that she was perusing. Nicely done.

I lol'd. I really dig the idea of Crystal magic/tech/magitech being pantemporal. There's a lot of fun that could be had there. This whole thing reminds me of when I used to have to tell the students, "No, the spinning hourglass means to wait, so stop clicking. You'll only make it worse."

Thinking about it now, dear author, you could add a bit of foreshadowing by making the "cutie mark" spin. Would be cute, maybe? I don't think it would be too obvious.

Well, I wasn't in the mood for this fic when I started reading, but it won me over by the end, so that's something. </review>

More seriously, it is a pretty solid piece that executes well, particularly on the surrealist horror stuff. Which is good, because while I might not be feeling grit or EqG right now, I'm always up for a bit of surrealist horror.

At the same time, I am put in a bit of an awkward spot. I never actually proper finished Season 2 of Twin Peaks (and haven't watched 3), so being so direct with your riffing is a bit awkward since it opens up the question of "am I missing something in the story, is it left intentionally vague, or is it just stuff from TP that I don't know?" Similarly, it also interferes with me trying to decide how impressed I am with your ability to do the surrealism stuff because I don't know quite how much is a direct TP lift and how much is "you" if that makes sense. In a lot of ways, I think this would be more satisfying had you simply used TP as inspiration rather than actually use it.

Coffee line is too on the nose.

While Sunset's sacrifice is notable, there is something to be said for the fact that Sunset and Aria are basically led through all of this and don't actually have to do much. A little more work on their end (or at least a little try/fail cycling, since that idea is stuck in my brain right now) would probably help that.

I was not expecting this ride to take the track it did, and nothing really disappointed me. My sister is... of Limestone's similar persuasion, shall we say, and has often complained about similar issues. My mom isn't a homeschooling Petriculturist, so her problems were easier to resolve. 7/10, would play this EqGRPG again.
>>Dubs_Rewatcher
I think the linked elbows is "inappropriate touching" by the elder Pie standards. Seems consistent with their Puritan real-world counterparts/inspiration.

This is a simple enough story, but you've woven something meaningful into it in a way that feels genuine. I found myself more intrigued and invested in the story within a story told by Gerard, like he's really the main character and Rarity's POV is just setting up his tale. I don't see anything wrong with that (if that was indeed the intent) but I agree with other reviewers that Rarity's character could be polished to a matching shine.

The story really pulled me in around the time Gerard started talking about his travels and about Giselle. The paragraph about the wedding and how it restored their home to something of its former glory was the most moving section for me. I would love to see more like that earlier in the story, but I'm afraid I don't have much specific advice in that regard. I do think some flow and mechanics-focused editing throughout would help to tighten it up.

I can see how Gerard views his daughter as a living legacy to his own father, and to Griffonstone that was. That connection is why the coat is so important, but it does seem rather understated, taking place mostly at the end. I know the narrative sort of naturally flows that way, but it could perhaps benefit from earlier/more direct glimpses at Gerard's ideas about it.

I don't have much to add at this point in the way of constructive criticism; folks above covered the bases pretty well. I liked the same stuff that >>CoffeeMinion and others talked about liking. Really enjoy Twilight's characterization, both her formidable intelligence and her adorable nerdiness. And this made me laugh. I would definitely read any expansion on it, which could only make it better. I'm not that familiar with the world on the other side of the mirror, but you got me to like and care about the people in it. Well done!

When the story here is on, it's on. The first scene does some lovely character work to sneak in the establishing exposition. The sequence about Applejack's denial was great, and the subdued narration on the revolution (and Black Bloc Dinky) was beautiful. My main hesitation is that, well, in the last scene I think you kind of broke your moral.

The story sure seems like it's setting up a stark dichotomy between the two far endpoints of the objectivity vs. subjectivity argument: when objective metrics are applied to personal preferences, that gets taken to its logical end of forcing everyone into a one-size-fits-all "optimized" model, and in doing so deconstructs the objective utopia. Along the way, it skewers people clinging to personal preferences for objectively bad reasons (see: Applejack), and really seems for a while like it's satirizing both extremes and steering toward a (predictable but) reasonable lesson about how treating objectivity vs. subjectivity as a dichotomy is gonna wreck your crap.

And then the last scene just veers completely away from that into ... I'm not even sure what even:

“Hey, if you’re going to be my guest for a few days anyway, you want to just take a trip to Canterlot until this all blows over? I heard the palace now has the most objectively comfortable beds ever constructed.”

“Oh, certainly!” Rarity said. She refilled her and Twilight’s glasses of wine, and they clinked the two together. “That sounds way better than self-expression. Cheers!”

And it really was.

Because the final scene explicitly frames a philosophical discussion about exactly that question of preferences, this is a direct commentary on the argument just presented:

Oh, we didn’t measure it with machines, but it was never really that subjective. There was and is such a thing as good and bad taste. But even if I could somehow get away with it, I wouldn’t tell every customer in the boutique what they have to wear. Because it’s not just about objective beauty. It’s about […] Self expression. It’s not about what clothes are best. It’s about what the clothes say ..."

So when the narrator harshes on self-expression at the end (on the grounds that people's tastes are awful), the story rejects the compromise position quoted above, and stakes out a position for hard objectivity and a dismissal of personal preferences of any kind. And, well, I feel like this would be a more effective moral if it wasn't arguing for something which the first half of the story already deconstructed and skewered. :V

And yes, this is an aggressive character-breaking comedy and I'm probably overthinking it, but again, this is the narration taking a stance at the end, and a stance which leaves a sour taste in my mouth. It wouldn't bug me quite so much except that the self-destruction of the story's theme here is entirely unnecessary — just walking back the last few paragraphs a bit, and especially keeping those judgments in character where the reader can more easily disagree, would go a long way toward fixing that.

All things considered, though: as much as that bothered me, the core structure of your story is sound, and I'll try not to penalize it too heavily for that ending slip.

Tier: Strong

Awwww. This is a really nice, warm, picturesque little slice of life with big feelings. It's well written and left me with a good feeling. One of my favorites so far. Thank you. :)

I have very little idea why any of the things that go on in this story happen.

I think it started at the beginning, where Sunset's motivations feel kinda opaque to me. There's this vague idea that Aria coerces her, or she pities the sirens, but... she seemed awfully uncaring, and then she helps out for some reason? I dunno. It felt weak.

And as the story got weirder, the feeling got more intense. Sunset and Aria are basically totally reactive for the rest of the story; they don't make any choices as the story goes on. I felt like I got more and more distant from the narrative, until the very end, where she fights the other unicorn (her doppelganger?) and I basically abandoned hope on gleaning any understanding of what's going on here and gave up trying to connect with the story at all.

Her visit to the sirens at least gives Adagio some rationalization, so that was nice. I have no idea why Sunset would visit them, though, considering her 'who cares' attitude.

Urgh, those backward sentences. :/ I will say, though, that the line about the pale horse is pretty brilliant.

The opening scene, especially with the pills, seems entirely pointless to me, as far as the contents of the story goes.

Skimming through the other comments, it seems like this is fanfiction with other influences? If so, I don't think it works for me, as someone who hasn't seen whatever 'Garmonbozia' is from.

Here's the thing, I think; I want whatever goes on in the story to affect the characters in the story. There's a lot of weird stuff that goes down, a lot of strangeness that happens, a whole bunch of things that should be earth-shaking, soul-scarring, mind-numbing, but... in the end, Sunset and Aria seem... barely changed. They treat each other the same, they act the same, they seem to think the same. As such, none of this really seemed to be worth the while. Maybe I missed whatever emotional climax is supposed to be in it for Sunset; she seems to be feeling something about the time of the fight with the other unicorn, but it didn't seem to be meaningful in more than a 'of the moment' way.

Maybe for people who've seen whatever the other thing is will find more to be entertained by here; whether it's clever and subtle references, or whether it's whatever this means for the cop and the fireman and the guy with the creamed corn, I have no idea.

The prose is clean, the descriptions are bright, the character voicing is clear, the weirdness is interesting on some level... But this story just didn't do much for me.

I haven't had a ton of time to read a ton of stuff this week, but I can certainly mash up the things I've read!

For The Moon, Garmonbozia: Things get even weirder for Drying Paint when Loveless' place turns out to include a dark and dangerous gauntlet of changeling doppelgängers that torture the patrons for her amusement and the patrons' unexpected gratification. Then things get awkward when Luna tells her would-be liberator Paint that she's into that sort of thing. Unprepared to take up the dom life, Paint decides to take a step back and reevaluate his goals, eventually becoming the North's premiere maker of fine "King Sombra" brand coffees, which are widely acclaimed to be "damn good." But in the back of his mind, Paint still wonders if he made the right decision... and somewhere in a hidden little bar, Loveless sits back to enjoy a heaping helping of creamed corn.

Blueblood's Greatest Time Waster: On second thought, let's skip this one; I have a feeling it might just descend into absurdist (literary) masturbation.

Lights Sparkling In A Speculative Spectrum: Curious to know what Pinkie saw, but picking up on hints about the danger, Fluttershy asks Discord if he could guide her through the experience. He agrees, and they share a vision quest adventure through what looks like a white frozen wasteland shot through with occasional bursts of inexplicable color. Eventually they reach a symbol of a shattered heart, and realize that together they can make it whole again... And so the next day, fully lucid once again, cleanup from their little "adventure" is rather a pain, but they know things have changed between them, and their only regret is that it took an out-of-mind experience to finally get them there. (Because Fluttercord. The End! ^^)

This was a lot of fun to read, but it felt kinda... whiplashy to me?

Some of that was maybe conservation of detail stuff; when Paint and Pot are introduced in the same line as Professor (which is a great name by the way) I for some reason figured they were all teachers, especially since the introduction is to 'the Academy' not to a class.

Then I missed Gilt's name, because it was hanging out at the end of a paragraph, and wondered if you'd misspelled 'guilt'.

Then he addressed Loveless as 'ma'am', when I didn't see any clues as to why, and I wondered what that was about.

But even besides that... A lot of the shifts in here came really suddenly. Alright, the crush you can get away with. But things like Loveless going from being just a server to being someone wise and powerful, how he buys into this subculture so fast, the way he acts with his new facade, how Luna just goes home; I was originally also convinced that this was a caricature, set up to mock angsty teens, because the whole thing just felt kinda... farcial to me. The story is constructed like a comical lovestory kinda sorta, and then it just swerves into basically tragedy at the end.

I dunno. And what's even the point of Pot? Does he just drop his scheme? Did he help with the paint? Or did he just drop the whole thing after finding the club? Is he just a plot device in the end?

That being said, there is a lot to like here. Your characters are endearing, and the scenes are clearly described. Despite feeling like the pacing is a bit odd, I was never lost or confused as to what's going on. The ideas here are interesting and original. There's a lot of good stuff here! I just didn't quite clinch it for me, for some reason.

>>Rao
Not what I meant. I'm referring to Cloudy's repetition of "Daughter..." and Limestone's pleading with her.

>>Dubs_Rewatcher
That'll be Limestone wanting to move away before Sunset comes into sight to help Sunset out, if I'm reading it correctly. The tenseness comes from Limestone's sense of urgency at seeing "a ripple in the curtain of beads".

Most of what I want to say has been said already. I'll say it again anyway, because I'm cute.

The moment in the beginning where Sunset snips at Twilight and the two immediately regret it feels extreme. Sunset didn't say anything harsh to Twilight... at least, not harsh for words between best friends. Twilight's reaction signals less to me that Sunset was mean, and more that the two of them aren't very familiar with one another.

My biggest issue with the fic is that the investigation feels very one note. The bulk of the story is spent with Twilight at the computer, vaguely selecting network lists—a task that isn't very tangible or understandable to the reader. Rather, it seems to just be a vehicle for Twilight's self-doubt, giving her an easy task that she can keep failing at, so the story can double down on how useless she feels. I'm all in for a bit of Twilight angst, but this section goes on for too long. Rainbow's appearance seems like an attempt at breaking the monotony, but she comes and goes so quickly, and is so inconsequential to the story that it doesn't work.

Not to toot my own horn, but in my fic Sunset Sleeps With the Fishes—a story that has a similar plot and tone to this one—part of the way I constructed the investigation was by giving it multiple stages, where each one led into the next. I'd like to see an investigation with consequences here. You can still keep Twilight's brain blast—I thought that was really fun—but let it come at the end of a longer investigation.

The Harry Potter reference doesn't sit well with me, especially considering you've already included another piece of fiction where all the characters have pony names.

There's a moment near the end of their investigation where Twilight feels so guilty for failing Sunset that she breaks down, and Sunset has to comfort her. Did this scene feel sorta backwards to anyone else? If anything, Sunset is the one who should be getting the comfort and reassurance here; her nudes are about to get plastered everywhere! I think instead of indulging in a pity party for herself, Twilight should be the one taking the initiative to comfort Sunset. That'd be a much better way of showing the affection between them. Sunset could lean into her touch and everything, maybe drop her Confident Girl mask for a second...

When they bust into the Sirens' apartment, Sonata straight up says that the pictures belong to Flash, not Sunset. Isn't that already an admission that they know about the pictures and took them? Why is Adagio denying it like a minute later?

(I really did like this story. I think it's a fine addition to the Sunlight canon. 😃 But there's just some stuff that's not jiving with me.)

Genre: Experimental (Non?)fiction(?)

Thoughts: This is another that isn't on my slate but is low on reviews. (Come on y'all, keep the review train rolling!) It also seems to not be resonating much with people, which is a bummer. I'm not going to say that I agree with everything that Luna says here, but I think it's excellent to see this kind of heartfelt and passionate defiance of our expectations in a Writeoff round.

"But CoffeeMinion," I hear no one say, "it's just metafiction that hews to an overglorified message of can't-we-all-just-get-along! That's so lame! And the story even lampshades how it isn't really a story!"

All true. And yet, as I've grown and gained responsibilities in life, I've found a deep resonance with the thought that many things are essentially a fiction that we create as we go along--which I take as a call to try to make be a fiction worth believing in. (And I don't go all the way down that road either, though I think I see the good intentions that it represents.) The fundamental thing you know (unless you want to go all the way deep philosophically) is that you exist; the rest is stuff you get to make choices about. But what kind of choices will you make, and why? Especially as a leader of something (anything really), the only thing you're guaranteed is that your thing exists (at least at the time you come to lead it); it's up to you to advance a vision (a fiction, if you will) about what kind of organization you're leading, and then to try to influence your people to help believe in that vision and take action to make it reality.

For making me reflect on all that, I give this warm regards. As far as being an actual story goes, I think this succeeds pretty well, though not for immediately obvious reasons. This doesn't offer a clear arc or conflict per se. However, it does take us through the journey of exploring what if Luna was real and could get a message to us? How could that be possible, and what would she want to say?

In the end, I feel oddly glad that I don't strictly need to fit this into a tier and rank it against other stories. Its goals seem orthogonal to pretty much every other story on here. But that doesn't make it bad or unworthy as an entry here; quite the opposite, IMO.

Tier: Orthogonal ++EDIT - I eventually "add another'd" my way into having this on my slate. I ultimately kinda put it in my Almost There tier, which put it in the upper-middle.

>>Dubs_Rewatcher
Oh. In that case, what Quill said. Limestone, somehow, seems quite forgiving given the circumstances, but doubts her mother to follow in her footsteps. Lead the cat away so the mouse can escape.

>>Rao
I get that now—I was thrown off by Cloudy starting the ominous "Daughter" repetition before Limestone even tried to get her away. I guess the explanation is that she saw the coupon and thought "How did she get that" but even that explanation doesn't 100% work for me... she already knowingly sent Limestone into Platinum's. How weird is it really that she'd have a coupon?

My initial impression of this story was basically exactly >>Not_A_Hat's "I have very little idea why any of the things that go on in this story happen." Learning that it was a Twin Peaks crossover at least explained where some of the elements came from, but I had to do about half an hour of research into Twin Peaks to understand why your story's biggest emotional beats made any sense.

The titular garmonbozia, for example, is never explained. The only time you ever get close is with a line in the final scene:

“…Pain and sorrow,” she rasped. “It’s easier to find out there than adoration. My sisters and I can’t eat it, can’t survive off it, though. But those things… they can.”

But if you haven't watched Twin Peaks, there's nothing in the text to connect that to the creamed corn. In fact, since Sunset Shimmer drinks the coffee and remarks specifically on it, it would make more sense for a reader coming in blind to draw the conclusion that it's the coffee that's plot-relevant! (Especially since the Dazzlings are now subsisting on negative emotions, and the coffee in their apartment tastes vile ...)

And if you have watched Twin Peaks enough to know what garmonbozia is, the thing you reveal at the end is crystal clear halfway through the story. By adding context at the end, either you're leaving Twin Peaks fans in the dust (by spoiling an important late revelation) or leaving non-fans in the dust (by not giving them information when the rest of your audience picks it up).

That's the example it's easiest to talk about, because garmonbozia is easy to google and read up on the context of. But there's a double handful of things here that just have no emotional resonance for me, and probably a bunch more that I don't even know I'm missing. Why is it important that the fireman wants to help? What's with the ongoing motor oil theme? Why-- other than following a TP plot beat -- does Sunset Shimmer get a doppleganger in the weird-other-world-which-I-gather-is-the-Black-Lodge? Given that Dale is literally the one helping guide her through, why doesn't he have a doppleganger, which was a major element of the show? And why would the gold ring be important to Sunset, especially given that I still don't know why it's important in the show?

Basically, the story veers straight into Twin Peaks logic from the time they enter the Lodge -- not the internal logic of your story so far, and certainly not the standard logic of MLP. If you don't care that your story is inaccessible to non-TP fans, then fair enough, but you're gonna lose me and a lot of Writeoff readers. If you want to make this accessible to a Writeoff/FIMFiction general audience, then you have to remember that MLP logic is the only logic you can rely on your readers knowing -- and the exact same thing is true for your protagonists. When Dale tells Sunset that the fireman wanted him to help, her response should be the same as ours: "What the eff? Who the hell is the fireman and why am I supposed to think that's important?" And if Dale can't explain that in under a paragraph, then maybe it shouldn't be a major plot point.

The good news is that when you're not leaning hard on your crossover, your character work feels solid. The Sunset/Aria bickering is the most consistently strong part of this, and I do appreciate Aria's arc of moving toward grudging acceptance here. Unlike !Hat, Sunset's acceptance of the mission didn't bug me (she's trying very hard to be a Hero and that's what Heroes do), and I can buy her visiting the sirens at the end, but like him, I just couldn't follow any of their decisions within the Lodge. Despite the text lampshading a few times that they feel in over their head, they aren't asking the very basic questions that someone truly lost -- i.e., us, the readers -- would need to ask to understand things; they just sort of flow with the Peaks logic and leave us behind.

I'd suggest rewriting the middle section for a general audience and using the ignorance of your characters as a way to bring the rest of us up to speed. I certainly hope to see the entire thing brought up to the quality of the first half's character work and solid hook.

Tier: Almost There

>>horizon (cc: >>QuillScratch)

On further reflection, upgrading my tier -- because while I still think this story would benefit from centering its main arc around Rarity's decision and giving her some sacrifice to make, I think it could be made to work with only Gerard's arc (i.e., the way it is now) with a lot less editing than I originally thought.

Namely: throw your full focus on Gerard by eliminating Rarity's arc from the beginning.

Don't tell us she accepts the job in your last three paragraphs -- have her accept up front! (You can still have "tell me why it's important" as part of the price; he's just paying along the way instead of up front.) And get the "why me" question out of the way, too: since, as noted, his daughter's identity has basically nothing to do with the importance of the coat itself, there's no reason to hold back on that revelation, and having Rarity know who it's for is an easy way to get her to buy in early. Stripping those away as dangling plot points forces the reader to focus in on the question you actually spend the story answering: why he's willing to spend a fortune on it.

If you still want to add a Rarity arc in after those changes, I can think of an easy one: have her decide not to charge him for the coat after she's put in weeks worth of work. There's your sacrifice, showing a major character choice driven by what she learns about how important it is.

Basically agreed with >>Fenton. It's not that I don't think characters can react to grief by having normal life moments with each other, but that the difference between the grief moments and the normal moments gave me whiplash. In particular, the first scene when Rainbow returned home felt almost creepy to me; the first time that Sirocco is even mentioned, by anyone, is the line:

“You may have got the flying from your uncle,” Windy laughed, “But not the cooking, that’s for sure!” Then everyone was laughing.

In between that and the deliberate lack of pictures -- and Rainbow's reaction before going home signaling that she was deeply and personally traumatized -- it felt like I was reading two different stories.

(Speaking of which, we learn later that Sirocco was a Wonderbolt, and that was common knowledge. Why didn't everything grind to a halt when the news came up? Any Wonderbolt old-timers on the scene sure would have had a reaction! Heck, plausibly Spitfire might have known the content of the letter before Dash even opened it up -- and that could have been a more compelling scene if she'd had to break the news of Dash's uncle's death to her, face to face.)

I think, author, you could have gotten away with exploring the wide range of emotional response if you'd had a smaller cast, where you could focus more in-depth on the struggles of a few ponies with trying to find a new normal in the wake of Sirocco's death. And I think you could have gotten away with the huge ensemble cast if you'd had all the emotions pulling in the same direction. But this ended up a little too ambitious trying to do both at once.

Tier: Almost There

Fifthing >>Cold in Gardez.

Here's a concrete suggestion that might make more of your story align with the ending subversion: How about, instead of needing to convince Death to give Fluttershy back, the rule is that Twilight has to fight Death to the death for her? (And Celestia begs her not to do it because nobody's ever defeated Death in a fight.)

Then, when she gets down there, first of all it lends a little more justification to the shift in tone: we're being prepped for a Super Serious Confrontation but it's apparent from the character introduction that you're going hard subversive and the situation isn't at all what it seems. Second, it helps you set up a sort of tonal balancing act in that transitional section, where it's clear that Death is actually a super chill sort of stallion, but Twilight is dead set on her mission and there's some awkwardness with the whole "yeah one of us has to die in a battle for my friend's soul" thing. And then when you hit the ending, you're doubling down on the subversion, and in hindsight Death's gambit is revealed as him thinking up a clever way for everyone to get a happy ending.

Just a suggestion, of course, but I think it would really juice this story up from its current stagnation amid the unanswered questions CiG points out.

Tier: Needs Work Keep Developing

>>Light_Striker
That ... is plausible with the numbers, but if so, I'm really not sure where the artist was trying to go with it. The Rainbow Dash line peaks at red, Fluttershy at orange, Pinkie Pie at cyan-green, and Rarity blue. It's clearly not their own colors, nor complementary colors, and if you try to go somewhere like "shipping" with it then you get some weird pairings (e.g. Pinkie Pie in love with ... Minuette I guess?)

So, yeah, still trying to make heads or tails of this. Really hoping for an explanation from the artist after voting ends.

If this story weren't trying to be a detective story -- if, rather, it were a dramatic exploration of Sunset as the victim of a crime, of being publicly humiliated by the exposure of these photos, and also a delve into the acidic effects that blackmail has on the blackmailer -- this would be a much stronger story. Instead, all those elements (which are present and just waiting to be mined!) are all subordinated to an amateur detective story that flounders its way to conclusion through sloppy guesswork, incompetent criminals and coincidence.

Basically, it's the wrong type of story. Sleuths are one of the hardest genres to write, and this was a weak example of a sleuth. You need multiple suspects, all with plausible connections to the plot. It can't just be "oh I just remembered the sirens hate you."

So I chatted a bit with GaPJaxie about this one. I think we're mostly in agreement.

It's a nice story. It's heartwarming. It's... pretty soft.

If you had to categorize me as a writer, I think "structuralist" would be a good term. I recognize that stories come in all shapes and sizes, but there are some elements that I think most good stories have:

- A protagonist
- A conflict
- Tension
- A narrative arc driven by the protagonist's choices and actions
- A climax in which the protagonist does something, i.e. makes a sacrifice, a significant moral choice, takes a risk, etc, that resolves the conflict

This is a very conventional, structural approach to storytelling. It's absolutely not the only way to write a story – a lot of the 20th Century's greatest authors and works completely avoid it (e.g. Joyce's Ulysses, T.S. Elliot's The Wasteland, etc). I've written stories myself that violate most of these requirements (Lost Cities, which turned out to be one of my better stories). So they're absolutely not a requirement.

But if you're writing what feels like a traditional story, I'm going to look for those elements. And if some of them are missing, I'm going to think, "It feels like something is missing here."

This story has all of these elements in some for or another. But let's examine the conflict for a moment. As best I can figure, it's something like this:

"Rarity must choose between spending her time and effort on a heartwarming gift for an elderly griffin, or working on her fall fashion line."

In the end, this conflict is resolved by Rarity choosing to work on the gift. That's... pretty expected, isn't it? I mean, she's the element of Generosity. Did any readers really expect this story to end with her saying "Sorry, I've got better things to work on. Best of luck!"

No. None of us expected that. Every single reader knew the moment Rarity pulled out that coat what was going to happen. Unless you wrote Rarity exceptionally out of character, there's no way she couldn't have helped. It would be like writing a story where the main conflict is "Will Applejack decide to sell the farm and move to a studio apartment in Manehattan to pursue her dreams of becoming an investment banker?"

A conflict is only as good as the uncertainty it puts in the reader's mind. Yes, we know most stories have happy endings, but the reason we keep reading is because there's always that nagging uncertainty that the hero will lose. Or we see them in such a difficult situation that we don't understand how they will eventually win, even if we know that they will.

No one who read the Harry Potter series honestly thought Voldemort would win in the end, but we kept reading it because we had to see how Harry would overcome the tremendous odds in front of him. We had to know how he would defeat the antagonist.

I'd love to see a version of this story where the reader had just as much uncertainty about Rarity. Maybe she really needs the fall fashion line to be a success (the whole "Money is no object" line from Gerard badly undercuts this source of tension). Maybe she's concerned her reputation will be damaged if she spends weeks working on some simple griffin coat rather than beautiful pony dresses. Maybe the coat's not for Gabby -- it's for Gilda, and Rarity can't stand Gilda.

This was a short story. You had almost 5,000 more words you could've used. Their absence is telling.

Edit: This is still near the top of my slate. Upper half, at least.

I liked the story. It had heart and some really good moments, but I had a really hard time drawing a continuous line from beginning to end-- in tone, timeline, and setting. Most of these could have been solved, like >>Fenton said, with more words. But I don't think it just needs to be longer.

It seems to me that either we see characters acting or talking. Take for example when Rainbow woke up from her dream. Grandpa is yelling and we get one line about stairs. Everyone is talking and then the grandpa said "Hop to it, lads!” which was immediately followed by “Hiya, Gramps. Good to see ya.” I had to reread the section several times before I understood that it was Dash who had entered and was greeting her grandfather rather than the 'lads', which could have been avoided with a simple "Dash rounded the corner". It was similarly jarring in the market when they split up only for them to 'Reunite in no time flat'. There was no transition, no sense that time had moved, before we reached the next scene.

I also got confused when the Grandpa was yelling at the wind. He just started talking to nothing and then magic windstorm and I was totally lost. Looking back I can piece it together and guess at why everything was happening but the tone and actions of the characters shifted so suddenly and without warning that I had to try and play catch-up.

And Scoots. While I did like how she played into some of the scenes where she appeared, I don't understand why she was in the story. If you decide to keep her I'd like to see her play a bigger part, maybe like >>Zaid Val'Roa suggested. Cause she appeared twice in the last three sections-- and that was only by mentions of her name.

I think that the night scene with the grandfather was my favorite part, although I still felt like I was only getting half the story at times. The grandpa seemed at his most consistent here and I could really get a grip on his character. I could see his care, how he reminisced, and how he understood better than most. This was the part of the story that really sucked me in, which is why I was somewhat crestfallen when the line "The Major stood suddenly, the dreadnought borne moonward on the surging wave" broke me out of it. The suddenness seemed to contradict the mood that had been established. It was like he was angry with the last comment, but that wasn't backed up by the following lines. If he instead "stood slowly, like a dreadnought borne moonward on the rising tide." I think it would have kept closer to the mood you had established. I got a really strong "Second Hand Lions" vibe here and I loved it!

Overall, good job! Can't wait to see this up on fimfic!

Edit: Actually, you fic mirrors Second Hand Lions in a lot of ways. Nice!

Dear god I love this so much.

The story came in like a bull with his nuts in a vice. It crashed into me with energy, style, and pizzazz. I instantly got a picture of each of the characters, even if they turned out somewhat different then I expected I didn't have to think about it, and their reactions felt real too! It did dial back the energy after the first scene and more towards the end but it still kept up a good clip. I will say that the Loveless scene screamed of Chekhov's Gun, and I was kinda curious how you were gonna make that work, but the payoff was so good that I 'aint even mad!

I kept trying to figure out if this was an AU or not, right up until the Sombra reveal, and you played it so straight that it didn't even feel like a twist. I loved it. I will say that his personality shift was sudden (possibly an effect of the dye?) but excusable. Luna's shift was a little more jarring, although I'm not sure how you could have handled it any better.

Finally, seeing him with the new outlook on life and then being entirely loveless it totally makes sense to me the events that follow the story.

Honestly, I feel like Luna after his poem. Bravo.

>>horizon
Returning to this before prelims end. I'm honestly not certain I can offer anything resembling a review but I do want to get some scattered thoughts onto the page in a semblance of meaningful order.

1.
>>S.K.
Re opening with the direct Caliban upon Setebos quote:
I disliked the line before understanding the reference. Then, on superficial reading about the source poem, thought it was brilliant:

Setebos, Setebos and Setebos!
'Thinketh, He dwelleth i' the cold o' the moon.

I mean, turning that into a direct meditation on Luna? You have my attention.

However, I think I'm wrapping back around the other side to being dissatisfied again on greater-than-superficial examination. Thematically, CuS is about a creation confronting that which he believes to be his creator; LuS ... isn't. Caliban is trying to comprehend, and/or imitate, that higher power he can't comprehend; Luna is having an argument with Celestia over whether they're the same or not, and they're on equal ground. And stylistically, this borrows much more from modernists like Eliot than from Browning (hence my original comment): particularly, this uses enjambments and ragged lines in a way that Browning never did.

And so I'm wondering what, besides a clever reference, this actually carries over from CuS. It's not recontextualizing the original's structure, nor meditating on its theme, nor stealing its style. Given that our first impression of LuS is a title ripped from CuS and a first line directly quoting it, this seems like an odd abandonment of the source.

(That said: This is not a request to change the topic of your poem, which works beautifully without the context of the source piece. In fact I think this works better as-is than it would have been if you'd tried to shoehorn a Luna/Celestia piece into the themes of the original.)

2.
>>Dubs_Rewatcher
I do agree with Quill/Dubs that one thing worth doing here is aggressively questioning your enjambments. To use one is to make a statement about the surrounding text; there are a number of places where that statement seems unclear at best. One random example:

Her hooves are silver, her eyes are dark pools beneath the coldest mountains, her
Steps are measured to plum upon the wild beats of distant paeans. Her lips are wine and
Hemlock, her body is the formless darkness which sits in wait at the base of the skull

Divorcing "her" from "steps" doesn't appreciably change the tone or meaning or context of line 2, and just leaves it a little fragmentary. Separating "wine and hemlock" arguably adds distance between the two, setting up a contrast, and additional emphasis on the hemlock; but there's no greater theme of duality there which drawing that distinction reinforces, and calling attention to that duality therefore seems out of place amid the more straightforward surrounding descriptors. You'd kind of be better off with no line breaks at all here, but if you break at phrase ends, at least you're not throwing in the erratic syncopation of emphasis.

I also strongly agree with Dubs re the potential of playing with the "you'll snap or I'll snap". That's a huge currently-missed opportunity.

That said, I do disagree with the specific example Dubs complained about; I thought it was one of the piece's best examples of effective enjambment:

But then, look at a section like this:

The Sun assumes the world is always a cycle. She assumes all things move from one to another,
She assumes that what works for me will work for you. She assumes that
The numbers add up and that the sentence scans. She assumes.

What's the point of ending the first line on such a weak connecting word like "that?" Wouldn't the line work so much better with That moved to the next, leading to the vertical and thematically relevant repetition and emphasis on "assumes?"

n.b. I'm quoting the entire stanza rather than the two lines Dubs cited, because the first of several reasons that I think the enjambment works is establishing a rhythm to the repeated "She assumes":

(x)...X......
X..........X.
..........X

This lends the stanza a sort of textual balance, whereas totally un-enjambing it (ending at the sentence break) would throw out a sequence of left-heavy repetitions.

To answer Dubs' specific objection, moving "that" to the next line explicitly turns the first sentence of line 3 into a fragment. ... Though, here, on more detailed examination, I realized I was missing the "that" in line 3. I think it's a mistake; "The numbers add up and the sentence scans" is a powerful declarative statement, and "The numbers add up and that the sentence scans" stumbles midway through.

The benefit of trailing off with the "that" in line 2 should be that it leaves you closing the stanza with:
"The numbers add up and the sentence scans. She assumes."
That's big, and shows us Celestia's headspace in a way that the other lines in the stanza only tell or hint: confidence with a hedging footnote. First and last lines should carry that kind of weight.

3.
Why do we have interjections from the narrator, explicit "I"s? This adds an extra layer to the poem that very little is actually done with:

Or, to tell it true,
I do not know where and when they were,
But that there were two of them

(They walk side by side these Two, the world entire, and beyond them
(I think, are other worlds and times, the
(Roiling)

A field in truth a
Shining Plain of Abrol, so they call it somewhere and so I’m told
These Two know it as.such,
Or,
Again--I speak only what I’m told, and have only that to offer--
Or, just so I’m told.

And their talk would pause a moment
--I mean this less literally--

That's literally every "I" in the piece except for the ones in dialogue. Their sole purpose seems to be to ground the poem in a sort of mealy-mouthed third-hand retelling that I don't think benefits it; with those bits removed, the voicing becomes a conceit of the characters having the discussion rather than a conceit of a narrator who contributes nothing else; it would feel more appropriately mythic to me.

Anyway.

I'm kinda firing scattershot criticism here, so I'll go back to my original appreciation of the piece. The slow-motion argument, especially the back-and-forth over imperfect understanding of each other's domains, ties the poem together even as it spins out into long digressions. Taken as a whole, without nitpicking over line breaks, I do like the rhythm of the prose, and I'm catching a number of rich allusions and probably missing a ton more. Poetry cranks up the difficulty in Writeoffs, especially long-form poetry with its 2000-word minimum, and I feel like I have to give this one ample credit simply for on the whole realizing its ambition; just the mere fact of this reaching 2000 (and blowing past it to 2400!) without feeling repetitive or padded is a rare and laudable achievement in itself.

Tier: Strong

Yeah. This ending confused me. The story was good: characters strong, scenes coherent, and tones consistent within the scene. But I do have to agree with the others about the scenes feeling very distinct from each other to the point of near disconnection, and the ending seeming like a cop out played for laughs in an otherwise serious fic.

If he's going to trick her and make her think she dreamed the whole thing or something then what was the point of the deception? I was honestly expecting more of a contract and maybe a token to remind Twilight of her promise. Maybe an IOU that burns up once Fluttershy is saved.

I had a lot of unanswered questions after this. Like how did he build Tartarus without magic, does he send ponies back often enough that he has discussed tricking visitors with his staff, and I'm not sure why the bedroom connected to his office was included. The ending really didn't feel like answered or resolved much at all, and it left me in a weird emotional spot. I'm not sure how I feel about this. Solid writing but... I don't know.

So due to my life situation and general malaise, I wasn't able to type up any real good reviews/comments before the first round of voting happens. However, I've read & voted on all the stories on my ballot, and I definitely plan on writing reviews tomorrow for the ones that advance to the next round.

I agree with >>QuillScratch, this feels like it's meant to be read aloud. As I was going through it and I naturally fell into the cadence of Spoken Word Poets like this guy. I got to the point where I almost didn't register what I was reading and I was just feeling the words beating through my mind. It was almost meditative. Most of it didn't really sink in so much as leave an impression, though that could be due more to my needing sleep than anything else.

Edit: I will say that early on I kept looking for some hidden message in the script. Given the formatting I was trying to put all the first words together to form some message, and failing that the first letters. Eventually I gave up and just let it happen.

Thanks to >>Zaid Val'Roa for getting mashups started and >>CoffeeMinion for playing along! Time for me to join the fun ... ^.^

---

Mashups: Worth A Thousand Words Edition

Don't Leave Me With Copenhagen:

[img]https://derpicdn.net/img/2014/3/23/583459/large.png[/img]

Blueblood's Greatest Familiar:

[img]https://derpicdn.net/img/2016/12/27/1326613/large.png[/img]

A Speculative Ex-She-Demon:

[img]https://derpicdn.net/img/2017/3/31/1400781/large.jpeg[/img]

Garmonboz Mortem:

[img]https://derpicdn.net/img/2012/11/10/147204/large.png[/img]

Finally, a threefer I had to rehost because I can't find the original source and it's not on Derpi —
The Summer Sun, The Night Quest!:

[img]http://tomorrowlands.org/images/pony/get-in-loser.jpg[/img]

---

(And an Honorizonable Mention goes to Blueblood's Greatest Ex-She-Demon, which overlapped two other mashups I did but is too great not to mention.)

Fuck me sideways, what a surprise I didn't even see coming a little bit. But, I loved the blindside. Coupled with Luna being oblivious as to Paint's intentions, there's a recipe for good-bad feelings. Not only that, you tied in the Changelings to the older lore, which is a really neat trick. Seeing some pre-Thorax (by millennia) Changelings getting along fairly well with normal creatures was also a pleasant touch.

I might have enjoyed this more than I should. I kept reading Death with a similar inflection to King Candy from Wreck It Ralph and could not stop chuckling.

The story as a whole had a pretty familiar feel to it, since it's mostly the usual "Go to the underworld and get back a loved one" sort of deal. However, I found Death more entertaining than usual, and only noticed the intentional typo when he brought it up at the end. The final leg of execution really sold me on the whole thing.

That said, the chatter between Celestia and Twilight in the beginning does feel weak by comparison to the rest.

>>horizon

Why are all the images so creepy!?

There is nothing about this I don't love. The world, the characters, the implied horrible advent of AI, Neo-Crystal CelestAI being the humble god.

Ooph, as we sometimes say. The start contrast between the happy, uppity first scene and its final sentence really sets the tone and quality expectation for the entire thing, and dear author, you do not disappoint.

Ooh, Art mashups?

Art Mashups

Blind Wishes
[img]http://i.imgur.com/jZDKSt2.png[/img]

The Blankness of White
[img]http://i.imgur.com/hBZ9bkB.png[/img]

The Mountains of Madness
[img]http://i.imgur.com/bqQh9RM.png[/img]

>>WillowWren
>>Cold in Gardez
>>MLPmatthewl419
>>Zaid Val'Roa
>>Fenton
>>horizon
>>MrExtra
>>Rao

Post Mortem

First off, as per usual, apologies for giving you another disappointing reading experience. :( Thanks to all who read and commented despite the numerous and egregious flaws. I wish I could fbegin by a more positive message such as “I’m happy you all appreciated this piece” or something, but that’s not for now nor any when in the near future, I fear.

I was aware of the shortcomings of this “non-story” (I’m surprised no one picked up the concept of alicorns’ power names as being introduced but not used), but I couldn’t address them by lack of time and inspiration. I write for fun, as my ideas flow, on the fly, following a vague mental framework, but I don’t formalise any precise structure or synopsis. That leads to incoherencies as I weave around the core conceit. For example, the one-off reference to Astralus was just a wink to Carabas’s The King in the Mountain. It serves no other purpose. Alicorns’ power names I thought were fun, but it turned out I didn’t use them anywhere else than in the short passage they’re mentioned.

These pieces wind up being more experiments than anything else. I take them as an opportunity to wrack my brain, use new words, improve my English. In that way, I’m pretty pleased the prose was judged fair, except for that egregious making nightmare and, above stark still instead of stock still, and maybe other horrors I let slip.

But whatever. I was nurturing the idea of publishing this on FimFic but it’s obvious the fic is crippled with major issues and is, as Cold say, a mere try at a story. As such, it is going to join my ever growing personal cemetery of oblivion.

And once again, I’m truly sorry that that piece didn’t live up to your expectations. :(

I wish this had made the finals. It was ambitious and original and I had it first on my slate (though it was a weak slate). Disappointing.

*peeks at phone with trepidation first thing in the morning*
Huh. Apparently I'm still in this thing, while the overwhelming majority of my prelim slate... isn't? :rainbowhuh: Alas! Special shout-outs to Quill and Fenton--your stories were at the top of my slate and I was hoping at least one would make it!

>>Not_A_Hat
Excellent show, guys! ^^

>>horizon
I straight up lol'd. 8/10 - IGN.com

I guess I'll be the odd one out and say that this story didn't do much for me. Here's how I summarize it in my head:

Mayor Mare: I'm an important pony with significant responsibilities so I have to act serious.

Pinkie Pie: That's so sad!

Mayor Mare: Let's share this cupcake.

The actual narrative arc, as it were, was the short period where Pinkie went around talking to ponies about the mayor. This was the process of discovery wherein the reader slowly discovers why the Mayor seems so sad all the time. Except we already know that because we were treated to the Mayor's own POV earlier in the story and we learned the exact same things. So this portion, which was already so short as to be pointless, was also repetitive. The only purpose it served was to justify how Pinkie learned what we, the readers, already knew.

Why not just have the reader discover these things alongside Pinkie? That engages the reader more.

This story is cute, adorable and heartwarming, as the previous reviewers have noted. I have no arguments there. There's a market for that -- half of YouTube is videos of kittens and puppies.

The real challenge is to write a cute, adorable and heartwarming story that also has some real meat in it, that makes people think. Those are a lot harder to come by.

>>Zaid Val'Roa, >>MLPmatthewl419, >>CoffeeMinion

The Colour Out of Space

Thanks for the silver!

This all began when I was thinking of the prompt as referring to spectral colors, and asking myself under what conditions a pony might radiate them. So, yes, I kilt Rainbow Dash. Sorry. I felt that the text was necessary to set the background and convey the point about spectral radiance.

(I do keep thinking of ways she could save herself–perhaps if she performs multiple rainbooms, it would absorb enough momentum to slow her to a survivable speed.)

Dash in a space suit was drawn in Adobe Illustrator, and the starfield and landscape were done in Photoshop. I had a more complex comic in mind at first, but time constraints forced me to do it all in one big panel.

Thanks for the kind comments and praise!

Genre: Tearjerker

Thoughts: ...

....

I'mma have to come back later. It's raining.

Yeah.

Raining.

Tier: Top Contender

Let me start by thanking every one of you who read the story and commented on it. Feedback of any kind is always a wonderful thing, and one of the reasons I love the Write-off.

Now let's talk about my entry this round.

The most debated point seemed to be Rarity's role in this story, as her character arc was non-existent, which leads to an unsatisfactory read if seen as her story. The thing is, this wasn't her story if not tangentially.

I can't deny that there is a problem here. Even if she wasn't the protagonist, she deserved a meaningful conflict of her own, and the lack of it was one of the major weak points of this story. I intend to add it in the revised version that I will publish.

What this story was was a tale about griffins, both in the larger sense of their civilization and culture as in the specific regarding Gerard's Relationship with his past and his future. Here I need to rework his tale a bit to make the delivery of important information (who made the coat, why it was important, who his daughter is) more organic and better timed. As it stands it works mostly, but that is clearly not enough.

>>GaPJaxie
Warm-and-fuzzies was one of the intended effects, and I'm glad I made you feel that.

>>MLPmatthewl419
I hope that improving the timing of the delivered information and the rhythm of the narration will solve the boredom issue, which is one of the mortal sins of writing IMHO.

>>horizon
Aside from adding a more meaningful conflict, I will probably have to make clear from the beginning whose story this is. I get the impression that I built up some expectations that I then betrayed, and not in an interesting way.

>>Not_A_Hat
THe weird words were brainfarts on my side. Used the wrong language and all that. Regarding the color, I was actually convinced it was widely used as a word for dark gray.

>>Zaid Val'Roa
I'm glad it resonated with you, even with all the rough edges and the structural weaknesses.

>>QuillScratch
If you have time I would love to talk with you about which sentences sounded strange or broke you out of the flow of the dialog.

>>WillowWren
You are right that I will have to reshuffle things a bit to make the gradual reveal more meaningful.

>>Cold in Gardez
As I said before, I will have to work a lot to avoid building wrong expectations, mostly regarding whom this story is about. I will still have to add some meaningful stakes for Rarity, but I have then to make it clear that this is about Gerard. His stakes and the conflict have to be tightened too, obviously.

And that's it. I thank you all again for the comments and the suggestions, and they helped me quite a lot in seeing what I have to work on to make this better. Having a week in which I can only read comments and criticism without answering to them did wonders for me.

>>Monokeras
I think you're being a little too harsh on yourself. I thought the central idea was pretty strong, and while the tones did clash, the serious and goofy sections by themselves were written decently. The only problem was that they really stuck out when placed right next to each other, and thus made the story feel a little too discombobulated. If you figure out what kind of tone you want to write in (e.g. a depressing tragedy or a dark comedy), I think that will alleviate a lot of the issues with this piece.