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Glass
Sunrise. Sunset. Sunrise. Sunset. Days and days and days in which cycle is maintained. Awaken. Raise. Primp. Preen. Regalia. Smile, smile, smile. Words, smiles. Calm. Hope. More and more hope gifted unto others. Happiness springing forth from the well of myself and washing forth to the rest of Equestria, a font of life and smiles and friendship and more, rebounding upon itself and growing ever more potent, sweeping pony after pony into Harmony's ever-deepening sea.
For them, I am glad. For them, I will continue to smile. For them, I endure day in and day out and take place as the Eternal Sun, for what else is there to be? For my student, my sister, my subjects.
But not for myself.
I don't know when it first happened. Or rather, when it first happened again. The thousand year exile, yes, the hollowness within then had a reason, somewhere I could point and understand just what was missing from my life. My other half cleaved away and lost to me. An old story told time and again, history to legend to myth and then brought back into sparkling clarity when Twilight joined Night and Day once more.
For a time, a time, I felt joy again. Rose each day to greet the sun with a song in my heart. On precious days, I can hear fragments of that song. My spirit dances on ethereal wings and the laughter that bubbles forth is genuine.
Somehow, the good days are separated by longer and longer paths of broken glass. Walking upon jagged edges, each step drawing forth a new cut. I bleed, and bleed, and yet never run dry. Yet the pain of it all, that ache within grows stronger. At times I hear her whispers, Nightmare's counterpart, promising to ease my own pain were I to welcome her companionship.
A lie, yet one I need believe for but a moment to be lost to her. I stand strong, and yet I am afraid. Afraid not for my sake, but for theirs. How will our ponies fare were their virtuous one to be the one to fall? Were their faith to shown itself as but a hollow thing?
For them, I go on. For them I bring the day again and again, force my sore stained hooves to walk the broken pathway once more. For their smiles and joy I move forward. For their love, I endure.
I only wish I knew how to find it for myself once more. I only wish I knew why I was shattered.
A smile that is joy, rather than concealing a broken mare. It is a nice dream.
And then, I awaken.
For them, I am glad. For them, I will continue to smile. For them, I endure day in and day out and take place as the Eternal Sun, for what else is there to be? For my student, my sister, my subjects.
But not for myself.
I don't know when it first happened. Or rather, when it first happened again. The thousand year exile, yes, the hollowness within then had a reason, somewhere I could point and understand just what was missing from my life. My other half cleaved away and lost to me. An old story told time and again, history to legend to myth and then brought back into sparkling clarity when Twilight joined Night and Day once more.
For a time, a time, I felt joy again. Rose each day to greet the sun with a song in my heart. On precious days, I can hear fragments of that song. My spirit dances on ethereal wings and the laughter that bubbles forth is genuine.
Somehow, the good days are separated by longer and longer paths of broken glass. Walking upon jagged edges, each step drawing forth a new cut. I bleed, and bleed, and yet never run dry. Yet the pain of it all, that ache within grows stronger. At times I hear her whispers, Nightmare's counterpart, promising to ease my own pain were I to welcome her companionship.
A lie, yet one I need believe for but a moment to be lost to her. I stand strong, and yet I am afraid. Afraid not for my sake, but for theirs. How will our ponies fare were their virtuous one to be the one to fall? Were their faith to shown itself as but a hollow thing?
For them, I go on. For them I bring the day again and again, force my sore stained hooves to walk the broken pathway once more. For their smiles and joy I move forward. For their love, I endure.
I only wish I knew how to find it for myself once more. I only wish I knew why I was shattered.
A smile that is joy, rather than concealing a broken mare. It is a nice dream.
And then, I awaken.
It's a nice little character piece. There's some good pathos here.
On the other hand, it's fairly 'flat' emotionally; it doesn't get better or worse, it just kinda... is. Well, that sort of fits the ideas inside, I guess, but I tend to like more progression in stories.
Still, it reads easily and doesn't overstay its welcome.
On the other hand, it's fairly 'flat' emotionally; it doesn't get better or worse, it just kinda... is. Well, that sort of fits the ideas inside, I guess, but I tend to like more progression in stories.
Still, it reads easily and doesn't overstay its welcome.
I find the character exploration here very telly, because there's not much in the way of story that would provide an avenue for showing.
As a result, the examination of Celestia's character feels overwrought and forced. The idea that she suffers is being pushed, rather than being crafted behind the veil then allowing it to be discovered by the reader in the natural course of exploration. This pushing is about all the piece consists of, and as such becomes rather monotonous, even with the short wordcount.
Minor style nitpicks: I'm not a big fan of the sentence fragments that are heavily present here. They have their uses, especially sometimes as single-word expressions of a character's thoughts or perceptions (for example, in the first paragraph, "Awaken. Raise. Primp. Preen. Regalia. Smile, smile, smile. Words, smiles. Calm. Hope." was very effective), but my feeling is that it can be a bad habit to overuse them, especially when something really should be expressed as a full sentence. Often this can be fixed by just changing or adding one word (for example, "More and more hope gifted unto others." -> "More and more hope is gifted unto others.") and just makes the prose flow so much more naturally and with less stilt and disconnect.
What's good: not trying to fill all 750 words just to have 750 words. I know I said earlier that this piece gets monotonous, but at the same time, I don't feel that it's too long for what it's trying to accomplish. It gets there and knows when to stop, and the ending, I think, is just right with those last four words.
As a result, the examination of Celestia's character feels overwrought and forced. The idea that she suffers is being pushed, rather than being crafted behind the veil then allowing it to be discovered by the reader in the natural course of exploration. This pushing is about all the piece consists of, and as such becomes rather monotonous, even with the short wordcount.
Minor style nitpicks: I'm not a big fan of the sentence fragments that are heavily present here. They have their uses, especially sometimes as single-word expressions of a character's thoughts or perceptions (for example, in the first paragraph, "Awaken. Raise. Primp. Preen. Regalia. Smile, smile, smile. Words, smiles. Calm. Hope." was very effective), but my feeling is that it can be a bad habit to overuse them, especially when something really should be expressed as a full sentence. Often this can be fixed by just changing or adding one word (for example, "More and more hope gifted unto others." -> "More and more hope is gifted unto others.") and just makes the prose flow so much more naturally and with less stilt and disconnect.
What's good: not trying to fill all 750 words just to have 750 words. I know I said earlier that this piece gets monotonous, but at the same time, I don't feel that it's too long for what it's trying to accomplish. It gets there and knows when to stop, and the ending, I think, is just right with those last four words.
Regardless of not being the kind of stories I often enjoy, I feel there is a huge pacing problem within your very first paragraph. You start with very short sentences ("Sunrise. Sunset.[...] Awaken. Raise. Primp. Preen."), with some of them a bit longer ("Days and days and days in which cycle is maintained." ; "More and more hope gifted unto others."), which is good, because it prevents the beginning from being boring and 'predictable'.
But then we have that huge sentence to end your first paragraph ("Happiness springing forth from the well of myself and washing forth to the rest of Equestria, a font of life and smiles and friendship and more, rebounding upon itself and growing ever more potent, sweeping pony after pony into Harmony's ever-deepening sea.").
This last sentence completely breaks the pace you've just settled earlier. I would have probably not minded if this sentence was detached from the others, standing as its own paragraph, but since it is attached to the others, it is supposed to form something coherent visually, and that break in the pace destroy that consistency.
But then we have that huge sentence to end your first paragraph ("Happiness springing forth from the well of myself and washing forth to the rest of Equestria, a font of life and smiles and friendship and more, rebounding upon itself and growing ever more potent, sweeping pony after pony into Harmony's ever-deepening sea.").
This last sentence completely breaks the pace you've just settled earlier. I would have probably not minded if this sentence was detached from the others, standing as its own paragraph, but since it is attached to the others, it is supposed to form something coherent visually, and that break in the pace destroy that consistency.
Genre: Daybreaker
Thoughts: Similarly to another story I reviewed, I feel like this is very functional as a brief glimpse into Celestia's inner struggles, but it doesn't quite resonate for me as a story. This feels much more like a journal entry, or a confession — and I think it would be interesting to see what might happen over a progression of those, or if one character or another became privy to those and tried to use them for good or ill. But on its own, as it stands right now… I feel like it just needs something more, though I'll apologize and say that I'm not quite sure what that is.
Tier: Keep Developing
Thoughts: Similarly to another story I reviewed, I feel like this is very functional as a brief glimpse into Celestia's inner struggles, but it doesn't quite resonate for me as a story. This feels much more like a journal entry, or a confession — and I think it would be interesting to see what might happen over a progression of those, or if one character or another became privy to those and tried to use them for good or ill. But on its own, as it stands right now… I feel like it just needs something more, though I'll apologize and say that I'm not quite sure what that is.
Tier: Keep Developing
I read all of my ballot a couple of days ago so I'll be saying whether I could remember the story from the title alone in my reviews, simply because this round I can tell you that. I couldn't remember this one when I read the title. A major reason for that is that I think it's mistitled.
Considering the title is "Glass", there are too many other motifs. The water in the opening and the idea of waking up from a dream at the end get way more emphasis simply because they are at the start and the end. The image of glass receives a few mentions, sure, but only once we're halfway through, and to boot it's surrounded by other images (songs, nightmares). I don't mean that you have to push glass on me as a metaphor in every sentence to make it worthy of being the title, but I just don't think it's important enough as is.
I agree with the sentiment that framing this around an actual event would give it more impact. Since being joyful is the nice dream that Celestia keeps waking up from, why not show us Celestia in a dream that's nice but also increasingly filled with manifestations of how empty she finds it? She'd have something to react to, and we as readers could infer more.
Considering the title is "Glass", there are too many other motifs. The water in the opening and the idea of waking up from a dream at the end get way more emphasis simply because they are at the start and the end. The image of glass receives a few mentions, sure, but only once we're halfway through, and to boot it's surrounded by other images (songs, nightmares). I don't mean that you have to push glass on me as a metaphor in every sentence to make it worthy of being the title, but I just don't think it's important enough as is.
I agree with the sentiment that framing this around an actual event would give it more impact. Since being joyful is the nice dream that Celestia keeps waking up from, why not show us Celestia in a dream that's nice but also increasingly filled with manifestations of how empty she finds it? She'd have something to react to, and we as readers could infer more.
So yes. This is more stream of consciousness of my mood at the time than anything else, hence no story, because it wans't so much a story as a brief essay on a set of feelings. Apologies on that aspet, but also not really sorry since it was more a 'Sunny, make something' project than anything else. Just ...yea. It got melancholy fast.
>>Astrarian
The title is 'Glass' as in a combination of 'Feeling fragile as glass' and also like, walking through a field of broken glass in which any action is pain, but so is inaction.
>>Astrarian
The title is 'Glass' as in a combination of 'Feeling fragile as glass' and also like, walking through a field of broken glass in which any action is pain, but so is inaction.