Karazor’s “Outside The Reaching Sky”

08 Friday Aug 2014

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Today’s story looks to the future, with a tale of first contact gone horribly awry.

Outside The Reaching Sky
[Adventure] [Alternate Universe] • 106,310 words

(Curator Note: Although this story is a sequel, it requires no knowledge of the original work.)

Eighty years after the events of The Dread Chitin, Equestria is a radically different place.  The arcane science of the late Duran Thirk and the information found on the Star League library core have combined to catapult the nation’s science ahead by hundreds of years.

Now, facing the possible aggression of a completely unknown alien power, Twilight Sparkle and her friends have to gather together once more, leading a crew of the best ponies they could assemble in a voyage outside their own star system.  They seek to learn about their potential foe, to explore the galaxy around them, and possibly find allies and friends to stand alongside them.  Who knows what they will actually find?

FROM THE CURATORS: Outside The Reaching Sky is science fiction in the best classic tradition — “straight-up space opera,” as Horizon put it. “It’s got the same sort of verve as Star Trek: gratuitous space battles mixed with character drama.”  Equestria stumbles into a galactic war and conspiracy as they bootstrap themselves off their planet, and the ponies’ new frontier is richly realized. “The worldbuilding and technical additions feel ‘real’ in a way too few stories do,” Chris said, and Present Perfect agreed: “Karazor’s done a good job crafting alien mindsets, not just in the actual aliens the ponies encounter, but for the ponies too.”

Like much classic sci-fi, it lingers richly over the details of its civilizations and  technologies.  That attention to worldbuilding was too much for some curators, but a majority of us dove in and found ourselves quickly swept up.  For instance, Present Perfect did a double-take after getting sucked into a multi-hour reading marathon: “Wow, I’m halfway through already?” Chris was similarly sucked in: “I read a couple of chapters right before bed, and found myself too worked up over what an idiot Fluttershy was being to get to sleep.  Any fic that gets me that invested in its characters deserves a feature.”  Horizon summed it up: “If it doesn’t grab you within the first chapter or three, it won’t; but if you enjoy it, it’ll reward you right through to the end.”

Read on for our author interview, in which Karazor discusses birthday panic attacks, eighty-year changes, and the language of infinite monkeys.
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anowack’s “The Princess Of Books”

01 Friday Aug 2014

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The next time you want to write comedy mixed with a thoughtful moral lesson, today’s story is a great one to take a page from.

princess-of-booksThe Princess Of Books
[Comedy] [Slice of Life] • 17,954 words

Celestia had a problem. Somepony wrote a novel about Nightmare Moon’s rebellion. This made Luna quite unhappy, and unfortunately for her sister, Luna has not yet gotten the hang of modern traditions like freedom of speech, the abolition of the death penalty, and not bothering Princess Celestia when she’s trying to sleep.

Fortunately, Celestia also had a faithful student, one who is now a Princess with an ill-defined portfolio and perfectly capable of dispensing justice by the laws of both today and one thousand years ago.

Now Twilight Sparkle has a problem.

FROM THE CURATORS: We found The Princess Of Books not only entertaining, but exemplary on two levels.  The first was how its tale of remedial Lunar education felt remarkably faithful to the show itself.  “Though the comedy tag certainly fits, it isn’t laugh-out-loud, but it is a rather masterful mixture of light humor and show-tone slice of life, with just a hint of going beyond the show’s boundaries in ways that make sense,” Present Perfect said. “It’s also an excellent look at Twilight adjusting to her role as a princess in ways that mirror what we’ve seen in season 4, despite having been published prior to it.”  Part of that excellence was its well-roundedness: “It includes all of the mane six without feeling bogged down,” JohnPerry said.

Its other exemplary feature was, as Horizon put it, “the story’s core maturity” in its examination of the issue of censorship (which remains all too relevant in our own world). “It’s refreshing to find a story with a strong moral that doesn’t overplay its hand,” JohnPerry said, and Chris agreed: “The lesson at the end was a great mix of blunt, important, and thoughtful.” Amid all its silliness, it treats its characters and their decisions with respect: “Twilight’s presented with several easy outs, any one of which could have plausibly worked given the conceits of canon, but refuses them and stands on principle, to everyone’s immediate discomfort and ultimate benefit,” Horizon said. “Aside from Luna’s early anachronistic wrath, everyone acts reasonable, and the different sides of the conflict are all presented as having legitimate reasons driving their actions.”

Those conflicts end up escalating into a climax and epilogue that “made me want to stand up and cheer,” Horizon said, and Present Perfect agreed: “The ending is rather unexpectedly epic.”

Read on for our author interview, in which anowack discusses meta-goals, mythological gifts, and mixing morality and grins.
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PoweredByTea’s “The Wrong Fork”

25 Friday Jul 2014

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Today’s story is a tiney glimpse into Equestrian high society.

wrong-forkThe Wrong Fork
[Slice-of-Life] • 1,138 words

During a lull in the conversation at an upper class charity dinner, Rarity takes a moment to contemplate some commonly held assumptions made of Princess Celestia. Specifically, her table manners.

FROM THE CURATORS: As previously mentioned here, stories this short — “The Wrong Fork” barely clears 1,000 words — are easy to write, but difficult to write well.  The effect of each word is magnified when a story is so brief, and PoweredByTea uses that here to great advantage.  “This story manages to invest a trivial moment, an idle bit of speculation, and a no-stakes ‘climax’ with such draw that it sucked me right in,” Chris said.  “The Wrong Fork is a great example of how small moments can be used to build character and introspection.”

This fic also drew praise for its strong closing.  “The last line really tied the whole thing together; a nice way to put everything into context,” JohnPerry said.  And Present Perfect marveled at the themes introduced by Rarity’s closing actions: “This is the Equestrian high-society version of a soldier throwing himself on a grenade, or a movement leader going to political prison,” he said.

Ultimately, though several of PoweredByTea’s stories were worthy of a feature, we selected this one for the exemplary mileage it gets out of its brevity.  “My god, this is deep for a thousand words,” Present Perfect said.

Read on for our author interview, in which PoweredByTea discusses social climbing, anthropological studies of the English, and sheep-bone headwear.
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Obselescence’s “More Than You Know”

18 Friday Jul 2014

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You’ll learn something important from today’s featured story … something that you won’t want to forget.

more-than-youMore Than You Know
[Dark] • 8,869 words

Princess Celestia has been keeping a dark secret from her subjects for a very long time.

It’s not an easy truth to tell, but if anyone can accept her after learning it, it will surely be her most faithful student.

FROM THE CURATORS: Our memories of this fic, despite the horror of its core premise, are unanimously pleasant. “This is the sort of fic that gives the Dark tag a good name,” Horizon said. Present Perfect concurred: “It never turns to gore or jump scares or even a visage of evil to send shivers up the spine.  It’s about trust and authority and power, and the best part is —”

(Wait, where was I?  Was someone speaking?  Oh, right —)

“— it makes perfect (if twisted) sense within the context of Equestria,” Chris said.

And that faithful reflection of the canon world and cast was part of what made it such exemplary My Little Pony fanfiction.  “It’s a thought-provoking and terrifying horror story that still somehow feels true to the spirit of the show,” JohnPerry said.  Horizon added: “It plays beautifully off of young Twilight’s eager naïveté.  Her character voice really reinforces the sense of wrongness.”

That wrongness was controversial — “I feel like Celestia does have a point,” Bradel said, and he would have preferred to see more discussion of the morality behind the story’s premise — but even so, he found the story exemplary for its effectiveness.  “Obselescence picks his pieces very effectively to make the story more horrifying,” Bradel said.  “The sheer weight of menace in the ending is absolutely amazing.”

Read on for our author interview, in which Obselescence discusses sticky misspellings, overstated victories, and how to give writers better advice.
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Titanium Dragon’s “The Collected Poems of Maud Pie”

11 Friday Jul 2014

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Today’s story is about rocks.  It’s about lots of different kinds of rocks.  Because not all rocks are the same.

The Collected Poems of Maud Pie
[Comedy] [Random] • 1,018 words

Maud Pie has written thousands of poems.

Here are some of her poems.

They’re about rocks.

FROM THE CURATORS: When you think about Maud’s poetry, if you do at all, you probably don’t think of it as anything more than a gag about Maud’s emotionless obsession with rocks.  This story nails that joke; Horizon said it “works on the level of a character study; it’s a reflection of its dull, singleminded author.”

But there’s more here than just a thousand words worth of dull.  As Chris explained, “it starts off with just enough of what you’d expect to set the rest up as variations on that theme, and Farming Rocks was such a perfect and unexpectedly serious poem that… well, that I remember the name without even clicking the link to the story.”  Horizon concurred: “A piece like “Farming Rocks” sneaks up on you, just when you had your expectations set, and blows you away,” and highlighted several other poems that catch the reader off-guard in a refreshingly thoughtful way.

But whether it’s being stolid or surprisingly deep, the one thing this story always was was entertaining and well-written.  JohnPerry said “the poems themselves are actually really well-written, and do an excellent job capturing the voice of Maud Pie.” Horizon added, “the occasional author’s note, and the author’s contributions to the comments section, both reinforce the voice of the poems”; Chris concluded “These are clever, memorable, funny, and as many other superlatives as you want to throw out there.”  

Besides, as JohnPerry put it when he nominated this story: “it’s Maud Pie. Do I really need to say more?”

Read on for our author interview, in which Titanium Dragon talks about how overrated gold is in the D&D draconiverse, the importance of being an editor, and what he has in common with James McAuley and Harold Stewart.
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Stereo_Sub’s “RUN”

04 Friday Jul 2014

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Today’s story is, quite simply, poetry in motion.

RUNRUN
[Romance] [Tragedy] [Alternate Universe] • 6,647 words

We were the summer-sunset-wind, warm and wild and untouchable.

We were rulers of a crumbled-down kingdom, prince-and-princess of the sandstone sky.

We were long-day shadows, stretching ourselves dark and blurry past our breaking points and more.

We were pulsing breath-and-blood, flowing fast through veins of buildings and wide-open spaces.

We were rebels rivals friends lovers runners…

Until that moment, that second, when it all fell away.

FROM THE CURATORS: “It’s about an adult Scootaloo and her boyfriend living a high-stakes life of parkour and not giving a f**k about anything,” Present Perfect said when introducing this story to us. And while there was some disagreement on how to summarize it — “It’s about two ponies who can’t live lives where they’re whole, and can’t survive being broken,” Horizon suggested — what we immediately agreed on was the gripping power of the prose.

“This piece marinates in style.  It’s featurable for its narration alone,” Horizon said.  Present Perfect agreed: “The words are thrown like knives, but they’re all on target and everything is just so tight.  This is the first fic I’ve read since White Box that makes good use of textual gimmickry, and the effect is wonderfully kinetic.”  That gimmick — lines with single words shifting the visual direction of the text — “was very well done,” JohnPerry said.  “It never felt hokey in its execution, which is a feat in and of itself.”

But even beyond the surface flash, this found ways to delight us.  “It packed an emotional punch with a very minimalist style,” JohnPerry said. “It takes the ‘Scootaloo as cripple’ idea and actually does something clever with it, and the characters are strangely engaging.”  Though the Alternate Universe tag is well-deserved, that gave it the breathing room to build itself into one of the most approachably literary stories we’ve reviewed.  “The author needs to get off this site and go write a Pulitzer-winning novel,” Present Perfect said, though we’re quite grateful for the ponyfic in the meantime.

Read on for our author interview, in which Stereo_Sub discusses invisible monsters, mutual catharsis, and nocturnal productivity.
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KitsuneRisu’s “Twilight, There’s a Ghost in Your Basement”

27 Friday Jun 2014

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Today’s story is a stirring, inspirational tale about courage in the face of the unknown … or, more accurately, the complete lack thereof.

twilight-ghostTwilight, There’s A Ghost In Your Basement
[Comedy] [Drama] [Mystery] • 8,636 words

Twilight firmly believes that ghosts belong in the realm of fantasy. But after multiple brushes with the supernatural in her home, she turns to the one pony who can help. Now Fluttershy, Twilight and Spike must banish the spirit before it starts flinging her pans and clogging the toilets.

FROM THE CURATORS: “I spent my lunch break today desperately trying not to break out into laughter as I read this story,” Chris said with the vote that earned this story its feature. “Kitsune’s got a way with deliciously ridiculous metaphors which puts a neat little bow on the jokes proper.”  The rest of us agreed.  “It’s certainly funny,” Present Perfect said, “a remarkable example of wordplay.”

It also shone in its thoughtful presentation of the characters. “My goodness, Twilight and Spike had the perfect, funny but real brother-sister dynamic going the whole way through,” Chris said.  Horizon appreciated that more broadly: “There are some magnificent character moments for Twilight that come out of nowhere and leave an impact regardless. … Digging into characters’ heads in a comedy takes some tonal juggling, but it keeps all the balls in the air.”

Our disagreement over this fic centered, of all things, on ladybugs.  “The scene with the ladybug tiptoes over the line from funny into simply bizarre, but it’s that same straight-faced presentation of the absurd that led to some of the moments I found most hysterical,” Horizon said. Chris countered: “By the ladybug’s fourth or fifth mention, the sheer contrast it made to the events proper (and the fic’s dogged insistence on including it) had me nearly in stitches.”  And Present Perfect offered a laconic dissent: “What.”

Read on for our author interview, in which KitsuneRisu discusses Twist, pie, mud, and the unholy fusion of two creatures that should never have seen the light of day.
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xTSGx’s “Statistics”

20 Friday Jun 2014

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Today’s story: Eighty-eight paragraphs.  Two sisters.  One poignant examination of love and loss.

statisticsStatistics
[Sad] • 1,042 words

Sometimes, all we need are a few stats to shed some light on a subject.

FROM THE CURATORS: Our shortest feature yet — which barely clears FIMFiction’s thousand-word minimum — illustrates that what makes a piece of fanfiction exemplary is being exactly as long as it needs to be to tell its story effectively.  “Statistics packs a lot of punch for something so small,” Bradel said. “I read this back when I’d just joined the site … I started skimming it to refresh myself, and even that got me teary-eyed.”

Stories that draw emotional depth from the relationship between Celestia and Luna are common, but we all appreciated the novel twist this brought to the genre. “This uses an original device to good effect, and that is exactly the sort of thing I love for us to feature,” Chris said.  Present Perfect agreed: “For all this looks like an accountant’s ledger, it was rife with emotion and ultimately accomplished what it set out to do.”

And what it accomplished was to imbue those numbers with gravitas — a remarkable feat, considering that the story contains nothing but the titular statistics.  “The typical abstraction of large-numbers math is that ‘one death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic’,” Horizon added.  “This is worth reading simply for its inversion of that.”

Read on for our author interview, in which xTSGx discusses moral debates, lion mercenaries, and the Great Hnnnng War of 2012.
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ArgonMatrix’s “The Firework Lotus”

13 Friday Jun 2014

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Times change.  Friends change.  But there are some things, as today’s heartwarming story reminds us, that remain constant.

firework-lotusThe Firework Lotus
[Drama] • 16,670 words

The Firework Lotus Celebration, a grand festival which celebrates the dawn of a new year, is a tradition held near and dear to Spike’s heart. But when the winds of change threaten to take this special time away from him, Spike is forced to make a difficult decision. Which is more important: what he knows to be right, or what he feels to be right?

And as Spike soon discovers, it’s a choice best made with the help of some friends.

FROM THE CURATORS: It’s difficult to summarize what it is that gives this story its raw emotional power, as Chris discovered when nominating it: “The only notes I ended up leaving myself on the story were ‘wow,’ ‘super-sweet,’ ‘perfect Spike moment,’ another ‘wow,’ and ‘important theme,'” he said.  But he gave it a second shot: “It’s the kind of sweet but memorable story which sticks with you.  It’s got wonderful, powerful moments scattered throughout, it deals seriously but hopefully with the need for change, and is just generally beautiful.”

The exemplary writing of the story is easy to see from the first scenes, where it follows Twilight, Spike, and the friends and family surrounding them through many years of holidays.  “A shining example of why ‘show, don’t tell’ is such common advice; this is exquisite, exquisite showing, simply playing off the contrasts as the whirlwind of history sweeps around the calm eye of the event itself,” Horizon said.

And even after it unfolds those years and spends most of its length discussing a single, pivotal celebration — with some strange but memorable digressions into the routines put on by the supporting cast — it closes strong with some important and affirming lessons that feel exquisitely and laudably pony. “I love it when stories make me applaud for them,” Present Perfect said.

Read on for our author interview, in which ArgonMatrix discusses Equestrian innocence, authorial road trips, and universal protagonism.
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CCC’s “Games”

06 Friday Jun 2014

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Are you starting to feel restless?  Do you need more from your ponies than the typical tales you see repeated in the show?  As the protagonist of today’s story will tell you, you’re not alone.

Games
[Slice-of-Life] • 13,391 words

Twilight asks Discord for a game of chess. Discord agrees – in order to make a point.

And in order to ask Twilight to complete one simple task.

FROM THE CURATORS: This story starts with an idea that’s oddly rare in the fandom — Discord is an embarrassingly intelligent being who has no inherent stake in chaos, he’s merely driven to extremes by boredom — and then it ups the stakes by taking that idea to a logical extreme, deconstructing his defeats and posing Twilight the challenge that drives the remainder of the story.  “This is a marvelous take on Discord, up there with Diary of a Pliant Tyrant. I would go so far as to call him sympathetic,” Present Perfect said.  

But it earned its feature for more than its excellent Discord character study.  “The series of encounters with the Mane Six feels remarkably authentic,” Horizon said.  Chris added, “There was a logical reason for him to visit each of them in turn, and none of their appearances felt gratuitous.  Also, I liked how short those chapters were — I didn’t need more than a taste of each.”  

And the story sealed the deal by closing strong.  “My biggest worry in the opening chapters was that the author was going to hit me with something expectedly unexpected and I wasn’t going to be able to buy that a real, workable solution had been found,” Bradel said. “But the ending was a solid payoff for the setup … and the author nicely foreshadowed it.”  Horizon agreed: “The ample foreshadowing all points in one direction, but the delightful epilogue turns it from obvious to clever.”

Read on for our author interview, in which CCC discusses subtle surprises, earned endings, and Earth’s Equestria.
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