Well, phooey.



In a bigger Writeoff, I would've preferred not to self-review this story. Over the last year or so I've come to realize I don't have the knack for self-reviews and it's not a skill that presents a lot of benefits anyway. This story adds some more layers to that by tacking in a more personal direction. But, the size of the field this time just didn't give me much of a smokescreen. All that's to say that I beg people's indulgence for >>CoffeeMinion.

I knew from the get-go that this was going to be steeped in cliche and would rely almost 100% on execution to get through. I thought it might've worked, and I took >>Xepher’s review as early confirmation. Alas, but >>horizon and >>Miller Minus made some really good points about things that were funky and things to improve.

I have a tough time thinking about how I would want to change this. Flawed though it is, it's the rare story that basically turned out exactly the way I wanted it to, plus or minus some stuff with the Luna scene. Nevertheless, I think it's probably worth trying to tune up for the sake of the emotional beats. Maybe switching the order of the Luna and Granny scenes would do it? Maybe Mac doesn't tell anyone at first and has disturbing dreams, then Luna comes to Mac in the dream realm and reassures him? I dunno.

Thanks to those who commented, and please let me know if anyone's interested in helping with edits or whatnot!

Everyone else has done an excellent job of illustrating the strengths and weaknesses of this story, Writer, so I want to call your attention to something specific.

Many years later, Pinkie Pie would confide in Twilight that she had dreamed of hearing those exact words from her mouth many, many times.

This line tells me exactly how the story ends - Pinkie Pie and Twilight are both alive and still together. The story then continues for 2200 words, trying to convince me that there are dire stakes as Pinkie Pie and Twilight are assaulted by mind-shattering interdimensional horrors, but you’ve already dispelled any illusion of tension. Our protagonists are going to be okay.

Now, it’s possible (at that line in the story) that Equestria could still be turned into some nightmarish Cthuloid hellscape, but this story has been laser focused on Twilight and Pinkie Pie, so their well-being is the only thing the story has trained me to care about. I get that you wanted the line to be a callback to the first line of the story, but I think you’d be better served by leaving it at the final line, and having that be sufficient.

I love that it’s Rainbow Dash who tries to steer their relationship in a healthier direction at the end. Cohabitation plus banging does not equate a relationship (unless, of course, both parties are fully aware that’s what the deal is, but it’s obvious this realization has snuck up on them), and it shows some emotional growth on Rainbow Dash’s part that she’s the one to recognize that they’ve fallen into a pattern that neither of them are happy with.

This story is a little rough around the edges, and I think you use too many words to get your point across sometimes, but there’s a lot to love with this story, Writer. Reading it gave me a sort of wistful, hopeful feeling, and I thank you for writing this.

Side note: NCU = Northern Canterlot University? Good job on creating a believable enough acronym that I had to Google to see if it was a real school.

Congratulations to Miller Minus and Icenrose for their medals! Congratulations also to an individual who submitted anonymously; this isn't actually the first anonymous medal, but you have to go all the way back to 2012 to find the previous one. Well done, mystery author!

Been a bit quiet this round, but I suspect the big-money prize round will give the place a little bit of a shot in the arm. See y'all next time.

Also: I've created the folder for this round's stories over in the Writeoff Association FIMFic group. If you end up editing and publishing, add it in there!

I'm surprised nobody picked up how Twilight and Pinkie close the demonic portal by baking a Twinkie. I suppose the term TwiPie is more common for the ship.

I love Twinkie. I fell in love with the ship in mid/late 2012, and my love is going strong to this day. I find it surprising that I haven't followed Andrew's MO and write dozens of Twinkie stories for the writeoff. Nevertheless, I had a lot of fun coming up with this story, planning it, and then writing it.

A while ago, I came up with the idea of a serious romance plotline developing while the end times took place around it. Me being me, this could only lead to a Twinkie story (or perhaps a Sparlight story, but that's neither here nor there)

I was also acutely aware of the issues of the story, but I only wrote the first scene in the first two days, everything after Twilight reads the recipe was written in a mad dash between 5~6 pm and midnight. My hard drive decided this was the perfect moment to start malfunctioning, so the constant reboots didn't help. I hope this goes some way to explain the little things which rob the story of its shine (a few lines that repeat too often, little contradictions, odd turns of phrase, and the odd typo here and there)

Nevertheless, this doesn't address the core issues of the story, so I'll do that now.

>>Miller Minus

the first half of the story, which I had a lot of trouble following

Yeah, I spent most of Friday coming up with the concept, working on the outline, ironing out some of the bigger details, and writing the opening scene. The Saturday came and did very little writing because I had to take care of some work stuff. Then comes Sunday and I can't get to writing until well into the evening, and then all the aforementioned issues led me to focus on writing and just writing.

Funny how I write better the less I overthink things.

Still, you are right in that the first section is rougher, and the characters come off a bit dettached from what's happening around them. I blame this on me, I was just getting into the rhythm of the story and told myself I'd later go back and rewrite the section that didn't feel as strong. That really worked out, huh.

I've been working on it, though, and I feel the story reads a bit better now. I'll keep polishing it until it's ready for release. Thanks for the comments!

>>horizon

This is a good, and reasonably successful, effort to set a hook with an intriguing idea. But the sentence is also pretty top-heavy.

Yeah, I've trimmed it down to just the bare essentials. Maybe it still sort of spoils her survival, but for all everyone knows, she can end up stuck in a state between life and death as she's baked for eternity in an nth dimensional doughnut. Either way, I'll stick to the new opener now.

Most of the odd lines and contradictory statements have either been reworked or replaced for something else. Blame my reticence for writing a comedy after four years of writing nothing but 'serious' and sad stories.

Also, I got rid of several of the obtuse references to "yesterday's events". My attempt was to show that, while the matter of Pinkie's confession was still present in both of their minds, they kinda had to pay attention to the eldritch beings bleeding into reality first. I don't think I did a good job conveying that, and I'll work hard to make sure the idea comes through.

I mean, you reach this point with several thousand words left, but with the little sharing-the-cake moment you've basically just resolved the emotional arc.

Yeah, I realised this the day after I submitted my story. I found a way of solving this problem, though. Rather than having Twilight accept Pinkie's feelings here, she wants to eat the cake to end the ritual. She would assure Pinkie that they'll have a talk come the morning, but there are pressing matters at haThen I get to keep the following scene more or less the same, just moving the cake-sharing to the very end, when they eat the Twinkie.

>>CoffeeMinion
Twilight's side of the relationship is something I didn't get the time to properly develop in the mad dash to the end. My intention for her arc--before time, and faulty hardware got in the way--was to have her consider Pinkie's advances and accept, but falls short of it due to mostly self-doubt and insecurities. I brushed upon this in a couple of sections, but I didn't dwell on them the way I should've. As I rewrite, I'll try to give more strength to her side of the conflict, as well as making the issues clearer earlier in the story.

>>Xepher

The biggest problems I have are mostly around pacing.

Yeah, I plead guilty on that. As I mentioned it took a while to get in the rhythm of the story, and by the time I did, I had to rush to finish on time, which left no time for revisions.

how does casting a SECOND magic cake spell fix the first one?

The first cake opened a portal to a dark dimension because the cake was meant to be made by two ponies who love each other, not one. Actually going through the correct procedures appeases the Suneightian Goddess of love (and also war, justice, and political power, it seems.)

This is possibly several thousand words too long, and a lot of that is basic descriptions of fighting monsters.

I have mixed feelings regarding the final fight with the eldritch beings. On one hand, I had a lot of fun writing it, but on the other, this is just half of what was supposed to happen. My original plan was for Twilight and Pinkie to lose ingredients as they fought the monsters. This would force them to adapt the recipe on the fly, going from the rich and luxurious cake Pinkie made, to, well, a Twinkie. Their reasoning was that the preparation of the cake was more important, and they were right.

There was also all the talk about thinking about your love while baking. I aluded to this in a few brief moments, but never actually made Twilight think about her feelings for Pinkie while baking. This will be corrected on the final version.

>>Rao
I'm glad you enjoyed it, I'll be sure to make the final version even better!

>>Icenrose

This line tells me exactly how the story ends [...] I get that you wanted the line to be a callback to the first line of the story, but I think you’d be better served by leaving it at the final line, and having that be sufficient.

Yeah, I changed that line, and Pinkie outright says that instead of trying to make a cool sounding line..

---

Thanks for your feedback, everyone! I'm still stoked about making it to finals, and I hope to keep making enjoyable stories in the future.

Also, that line about the banana filling is similar to what happened to Twinkies during WW2. It was hard to come across bananas, so they used whipped cream to fill the caky thingies. Isn't that a wonderful piece of trivia to everyone who is Zaid and absolutely nobody else?

>>Zaid Val'Roa
Ahhhh, it's a Twinkie. Now I get it!

Mind if I ask what's up with the title? I feel like I should be able to figure it out, but we're a couple weeks deep on this Writeoff and I still haven't.

>>CoffeeMinion
It's quechua for Bread Demon.
K'awka means bread while Supay means devil, or demon. It appears that incas didn't have a word for cake, if you'll believe it. Rukuy Qhepa means looking back.

Thank you to everyone for reading! I'm glad this story handed out a few laughs, and I feel so blessed to have won. I wasn't originally gonna do a retrospective but I'm procrastinating my The Next Generation entry, so hey! It might be fun.

>>Miller Minus
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain scribbling notes to himself, furiously, with a crayon.

>>Xepher
I knew this story wasn't for everyone, and as I submitted it my only hope was that not everybody found it to be too much darkness with not enough fun to cover it up. As this story turned in my head post-submission, I focused a lot—thanks to your comment—on trying to up the funny but leave the darkness where it was to make a more solid story. I hope what I end up posting on fimfic hits that balance better. And seeing your thought process as the dark parts hit you was very useful for that. So thanks!

>>Zaid Val'Roa
I was gonna say something during the contest but figured I'd wait until it was more transparent:

...There doesn't have to be an art contest to draw some awesome art for something... I am looking for cover art if you're interested! I've already looked around and came up dry. I might have to resort to using a meme. D:

>>CoffeeMinion
The fact that the dislocation shocked you so much after you had just heard pony's death as involving her body "folding in on itself" is really interesting! Take nothing away from your reaction, it's fair. It's what you felt. I'm curious, is it because it's actually happening in the scene? Was the description just more visceral for the second one? Either way, I'll be sure to rate the posted story teen :)

Thank you so much for reading!

>>Rao
You know, it's funny. I had finished most of the story apart from the ending on Sunday evening, and the one I was heading for was really unsatisfying. They found her, she was alive, Soarin got no conclusion, and she just decided to drop charges because she thought the whole event was a lot of fun. A really poor cop-out, but I had nothing else. And I figured it would probably get docked for that, just like Delta did.

And then I thought about it a little more, and I realized that the ending I should have been writing (what you saw above) was so in front of my nose it really was like magic. The title was already what it was. I already had a daredevil cadet. Soarin was already losing faith in his Captain's ability to solve everything for him. And the inspector had already come and told S&S that they just had to get rid of the old dizzitron, although he originally said dismantle. I just had to change that one word, and the ending was suddenly a cinch to write.

So take that how you will—maybe my subconscious truly wanted that ending all along, or maybe it really was magic.

Thanks everyone! I'm excited to see everyone's entries on Tuesday!

tfw I pop in to do a review and don't even know whose story it was.

>>horizon
I certainly hope so, but the deadline is only a few days off, and the mentors channel is very quiet. We got 9 questions in the first week, but nothing since. Tomorrow will mark the end of three solid weeks of nobody asking for help. So either everyone's very confident in their entries, pushing it to the last minute, or not participating.

I want to first apologize for being less active than normal in this round. I did read and rank all the stories, something which I don't think I've been able to do in a while, but that's no replacement for a good, critical review. I feel bad for not lending my voice to any of these conversations, and I beg your pardon for it.

Now, let's retrospect.

So, this was not the story I wanted to write for this prompt. I had a much longer idea, with a greater sense of scope and scale, which, unfortunately, I didn't give myself time or room to write. I devoted my energies to other projects before returning to the writeoff, realized I couldn't execute my idea in the hours before the deadline, and very quickly improvised a completely different story. Just about everything you read here was made up as I went; there was no outline or framework in place beforehand. Purely a fly-by-wire operation, which is why parts of this story are so thin (the vagueness with respect to the backstory, the plot connection with ...But It Often Rhymes, which nobody seemed to catch, and Baby's First Shakespeare Discussion, were all born from the haste with which I put this together).

Still, I'm surprised by how little I hate the final product. It's not great, but I like how a lot of it turned out, particularly the dialogue, and the interplay between the principle characters. Cheerilee is, per usual, an extension of my psyche, and the way she runs her class is more or less the same as the way that I run mine (some of her lines are things that I've said to my students), so maybe... that's why? Or maybe I just write better when I'm operating on instinct? I dunno; I probably shouldn't make a habit of that, either way.

A lot of people criticized the fact that no explanation was given for the break-up between Applejack and Rainbow Dash. As I've mentioned, that's partly because I put the story together on the fly, and didn't have anything more than a vague notion of why they split. The Othello discussion, however, is supposed to be allegorical; basically, Rainbow thought Applejack was cheating on her, said and did some stupid stuff, and Applejack left her as a result.

It's a ham-handed TV storytelling device, I know, but what can you do.

But also, I didn't pay the break-up itself anything more than lip service because I didn't think it was important. Respectfully, I still don't. They broke up; why doesn't matter. The story's about the fallout from that break-up.

...Anyway, some specific responses:

>>CoffeeMinion

Thoughts: I hate to say it but this didn't really work for me. This has a lot of technical cleanliness going for it. But for me, this bogged down pretty hard in the discussion of (or, perhaps, the argument proximal to) Shakespeare. I like EqG for its ability to give us the best of both worlds between MLP and humanity, but to me sometimes it feels weird when stories just directly import RL things without adapting them into the world. And when the story's centerpiece is literally Shakespeare,it's like… whaaa?

I guess it's my own fiat that EqGworld is parallel to the real world (at least, in this story/continuity). I could've come up with a faux-Shakespeare name and play, but A: I already did that once, and didn't want to make it too obvious who was writing the story, and B: I didn't think I had the time to come up with a fictional Shakespeare analogue and a play that would, hypothetically, have covered the same themes and subject matter as Othello. Hence, Shakespeare.

>>horizon

The scene arguing about Othello mostly works, because it's clear throughout that it's just a (badly) thinly veiled attempt for the characters to talk about themselves, but if we had more context from earlier in the story and if Cheerilee explained a little better what the relevant parts of Othello under discussion were while framing the questions, you could make it work on both levels at once, which would be pretty awesome. More context for the breakup would also ground sections like the Scootaloo boxing practice, and maybe let you flesh that scene out so that it more directly contributed to advancement as well as simply showing character (as it does now).

I'll concede that I can probably do more to contextualize the break-up than I currently do, beyond just clumsily integrating Othello's main conflict into the narrative. The discussion, itself, is so bare-bones because I had to scramble to remember anything relevant from the play, since the last time I read it was... three years ago? Almost four, actually. And I hadn't read it before.

Nor since, obviously.

Anyway. Thanks to everyone for the feedback. I'm particularly taken with >>MrNumbers's suggestion that I shorten the story somewhat. I have some ideas on how I might do that, but I also want to address the other previously mentioned critique: to add a scene of Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash working out, and use that to flesh out the backstory.

So it might be that the story gets a net gain of words. Who honestly knows?

Guess we'll find out.