Read it Later story count: 157 (-1)
Back to Wednesday this week, I'm pleased to say. I had a nice walk down to the local river yesterday – the first time I'd done that in two months, due to winter mud and flooding more so than the pandemic – and very rejuvenating the experience was too. That helped, and so did being able to get this done on time. Today's three fics are:
Lily's Letter by Miller Minus
All You Ponies by Mitch H
fallin' by The Red Parade
★: 0 | ★★: 1 | ★★★: 1 | ★★★★: 1 | ★★★★★: 0
Note: I use a skewed rating system. A fic I find average scores two stars.
OC and Fleur de Lis
Romance/Sad/Tragedy; 6k words; Dec 2017; Everyone
On a cold, empty evening in Canterlot Castle, two long-estranged friends meet up to try and rekindle their friendship, but they may not have the same goal in mind.
One of these friends is Fleur – it's not giving away much to say that, as even without the name tag it's obvious. The other, our narrator, is a pony we've never met before. What makes this fic is the excellent dialogue, which hits just the right notes of hope, excitement and bitterness. The contrast of the hard-edged dialogue with the adventures of the pair (they're not supposed to be in the castle) works very well. Well before the end it's not hard to realise why the castle is significant if you've paid attention – I mean, I managed it – but the inevitability of the approaching revelation just makes the ending hit all the harder. Present Perfect called this "criminally overlooked" – it has 580 views at the time of writing, so he has a point. ★★★★
All You Ponies by Mitch H
Cadance, Chrysalis and Flurry Heart
Drama; 6k words; Apr 2018; Everyone
This is effectively a Pony version of Robert Heinlein's SF story "—All You Zombies—", and it's just as confusing if you don't know what's going on. It offers a fascinating but brain-melting explanation for some of the oddities of the Crystal Empire's family from the attack on Canterlot through to Flurry Heart's appearance. Hard to explain without major spoilers, but let's just say that if you watch Doctor Who at least occasionally, you might find this a bit easier. Three stars is the limit for me, since I admired it more than enjoyed it; that said, it's quite an achievement to do this and make it (as far as I can tell) consistent both with canon and with itself. ★★★All Chrysalis wanted was what any mother wants - to build her brood into an irresistible insectile horde, and to seize the world for her beloved family. The only thing standing in her way was... family.
fallin' by The Red Parade
Fleetfoot, Soarin, Rainbow Dash and Wonderbolts
Sad/Slice of Life; 3k words; Nov 2019; Everyone
An interesting start here, as Fleetfoot talks things over with Soarin' at a funeral. We do eventually find out whose funeral – and it's not who you'd think; that revelation did catch me out. I enjoyed the world-building stuff about Cloudsdale/Wonderbolts funeral customs, too. On the downside, the frequent breaks for full verses of various military/pegasus songs are too much, giving what is quite a short fic a stutter that doesn't do it a service. This is still a very high two, and one that would have been a three had TRP been just a little more restrained with all those song lyrics. ★★How do you fly if you’re scared to fall? Fleetfoot discusses falling and other metaphors with an old friend.
Next time on Ponyfic Roundup, stories reviewed should include Take the Dragons Bowling by Alaborn.
Lily's Letter was wonderful, thank you as always for digging up these overlooked stories!
ReplyDeleteYou can thank Present Perfect for that one -- it was seeing his recommendation that got me to add the fic to my RiL list. Good choice, I think!
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DeleteI liked "fallin'" a little better than you did, but it wasn't without its problems. I agree the lyrics took too prominent a role. Incidentally, the author likes to use lower-case title like this as a way to challenge the reader's assumptions about what's right or wrong or something like that, but... honestly, how many readers would look at that and say, "Hey, I feel challenged by this!" If they notice at all, a few might just go "huh," and the majority will think "Dude doesn't know how to capitalize titles," which may not be fair, but I wouldn't want to invite that either.
ReplyDeleteI think I'd go in the "huh" category, with a side order of "I wonder why they did that?" I can't say I would have got the idea that they wanted to challenge assumptions, no.
DeleteI think the capitalization conceit works far better in stories like Discursive Formations: phantoms forever, where half the title is capitalized and the lack of capitals (at least in that particular case) draws attention to a major part of the story before its significance is learned in full.
DeleteStill going through these, I just had a look at that story, but ran away after seeing in the comments that it was a "solve these difficult puzzles to find a password or something" mystery. I'm terrible at those and would feel far more frustrated than accomplished if I got, say, half of them. :/
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