Subjective 

Characters

Like with the author’s previous story, dialogue is perhaps the biggest strength. It might be cliched, stereotypical, and “troperiffic,” but it can’t be denied how well the dialogue and character voice evokes the Western genre. Granted, I don’t care for Westerns, but even my film buff friends who do enjoy Westerns think the dialogue was alright—barring a few hiccups.

What do I think of Desert Rat? He’s a very stereotypical character who doesn’t do enough to stand out. The fact that Desert Rat is a pony-bison hybrid whose species is significant to the plot does help, but whatever impact this has is limited because while his species and his magic do affect the plot, they don’t affect his inward personality. Make him a simple unicorn and remove the racial discrimination, and his personality hardly changes. You’ll notice that these are similar issues I raised in my previous review: Bad Whisky and Desert Rat have a lot of the same flaws. 

Really, some of the secondary characters are more memorable than Desert Rat himself. Even if the secondary characters are also fairly stereotypical, it’s not to the same extent as Desert Rat, and their presence allows for some good character chemistry. Meadowbrook especially was almost the perfect foil to Desert Rat’s grittiness, and I wish the story had spent more time with her. To a lesser extent, Doc Furaday and Clear Skies were also nice to read with, since they were allies who could talk at Desert Rat’s level instead of being talked down to like almost every other character in the story.

Non-salient features

>> When Meadowbrook realized that Desert Rat lied to her and brought guns along, her reaction was really…subdued. I was hoping she’d tell Desert Rat off for bringing instruments of death or something. But she just looks at Desert Rat’s guns and lets him leave without saying anything else.

>> Doctor Moravagine’s name is weird, man. I don’t know what it means…

Plot

Unfortunately, the plot of this fanfic lacks structure and proper pacing. For example, in the first chapter, Desert Rat has found a pony he had been hunting for several weeks. What kind of stakes were built up before this moment? How many words are devoted to their confrontation? 

The answer to both questions is “almost none.” Desert Rat’s target is shot dead after one sentence. We don’t get any backstory on Desert Rat’s target until the next scene, and the backstory hardly has any impact on the later portions of the fanfic. Sure, Desert Rat uses the money to buy some new dragoons, but these guns don’t have any purpose aside from shooting a few insignificant henchmen.

Heck, the second chapter actually had a more interesting hook than the first one. It would’ve been interesting to read about the kind, meek Mage Meadowbrook healing and hiring the grizzled bounty hunter as her bodyguard. The internal conflict of Meadowbrook attempting to be the lone light in the darkness of the Wild West—only to rely on the grittiness and darkness of her bodyguard in order to survive the darkness of others. But instead, the fanfic doesn’t realize this potentially captivating chemistry and only has this initial meeting brushed aside with an infodump. I would argue that the second chapter in general was the most enjoyable out of the four because of her, despite that chapter’s plot holes.

When Desert Rat, and by extension the reader, depart from Meadowbrook, the story returns to a sort of wandering pace similar to the first chapter. Desert Rat sort of…wanders around and talks to other characters, maybe getting into a fight. Sure, we are building up to something, the Black Hoof Syndicate, but not only do we not see them—we also don’t see their effects. All we see various…gangs or whatever who are scared of the Black Hoof Syndicate. But we never see the foundation of that fear or even that fear translating to story tension. Desert Rat has curb-stomped every enemy he’s faced so far and even has allies. The story does not even try to pretend Desert Rat will win over the Black Hoof Syndicate in the end. Although the “Manehattan Gold” section of this fanfic is incomplete, the lack of credible threat and tension in this section makes it rather unimpressive.

The “wandering pace” is something I want to talk about. Although the story is not tagged “anthology,” the story functionally is one. “A Town Called Love” had a neat, self-sufficient plot. You could read it by itself and be entertained. But in “Tales of the Desert Rat?” The chapters seem dependent on each other and independent at the same time, not knowing their true relation with each other. The chapters are barely related to each other, but unlike “A Town Called Love,” one never gets the notion that the chapters are supposed to stand by themselves. There’s barely any development, connection, or progression when the story transitions from one chapter to the next, aside from the dragoons, which don’t have any narrative significance as far as I know. The Order of Death or the illness mentioned in Chapter 2? It’s not mentioned in the later chapters; Desert Rat doesn’t even try to learn more about them.

Non-salient features

>> The part where the bartender cleaned the glass with his spit was kinda odd, but it was also hilarious.

He had come.

>> Oh I bet he did, the dirty bastard.

To prevent any further violence against himself, the stranger unloaded  each shell from the scatter gun and placed them in his saddlebag.

>> But that’s quite a long, complex action. He could have just kicked the gun away or better yet, stole it for himself.

“I’m going to go take care of this eye! Take this dead weight to the pyre, after you’ve taught that fucker some manners!”

The  remaining bodyguard simply nodded, and decided to get the message  across quickly and messily by stomping Desert Rat’s muzzle, breaking his  nose.

Desert Rat did nothing. He did not even wince at the blow.  The bodyguard felt slightly disturbed by the altercation, and quickly  left after Doctor Moravagine. But, not before dragging along his dead  companion.

>> But…why didn’t the doctor and the remaining bodyguard kill Desert Rat? They would be preemptively (or in doctor lingo, prophylactically) eliminating a thorn on their side. Subtract 0.05 from this section’s score.

He checked the front door.

Unlocked.

>> Okay, two questions. Did the doctor seriously not consider that Desert Rat would come for him and, like, plant a tripwire trap at the door or even lock the door? Alternatively, why didn’t Desert Rat consider the unlocked door suspicious? 

“Medicine? That’s got nothing to do with my job. I just do what the  Order wants,” the doctor said, as he levitated the scalpel, and mimicked  dragging it across Desert Rat’s neck.

There were two loud clicks as the drifter finished loading his shotgun.

>> Mad lad just stood there and let his enemy reload while he gloated.

“Miss Meadowbrook,” he began, “I paid you back what I owe, so I’m heading on my way. Thanks for your help.”

And that was all he said, before leaving.

But, like, him killing the doctor wasn’t even in defense of Meadowbrook. He wasn’t being a bodyguard to Meadowbrook at that time; he was just enacting a personal vendetta that Meadowbrook did not even have. How is that paying Meadowbrook? Subtract 0.05 from this section’s score.

Objective

Prose and Writing Style

The story starts with almost no descriptive identifiers for its protagonist, only calling him “pony.” There actually is a reason for this: the protagonist’s physical appearance is concealed from the reader in an attempt to slowly reveal more information about him, building up to a “surprise” at the latter half of the chapter. While this is not a wrong way to describe a character, the execution in this story leaves something to be desired. Because the reader doesn’t have a distinctive descriptive feature to associate with the protagonist, it’s very easy for the reader to confuse the protagonist with other ponies in the first chapter. The author tries to address this by calling the protagonist “the stranger,” but this doesn’t always work. In the reader’s mind, everyone in the first chapter is a “stranger”: the reader hasn’t met them yet.

The first chapter—and to a lesser extent, the other chapters—also have a problem with dumping info onto the reader. Some infodumping is fine, even necessary, but generally, if a piece of information can be conveyed through some other way, like dialogue, it’s best to go with that. For example...

The pony the unicorn had spent weeks trying to lose had found him once again.

You can use dialogue to convey the information here. “What are you doing in a shithole like this?” “Looking for a shitbird like you.”

For the most part, though, this problem becomes less frequent as the story progresses. There’s even a part in Chapter 2—where Desert Rat tells Meadowbrook about his backstory—that shows how to give exposition well. Having a character give exposition through dialogue is already a step up from an infodump by the narrator. But then we get this.

Meadowbrook turned a slightly paler shade when the drifter touched his hoof to his pair of horns.

A good way to spice up exposition delivered by character dialogue is to show the other characters’ reaction to that exposition. Maybe not even just a reaction, but their own comments. It makes the exposition sound more dynamic and gives you opportunities as an author to experiment with character chemistry.

I do not consider sentence fragments to be grammar errors if they are used “appropriately.” But I do think this story uses too many sentence fragments. How many fragments is too many is a matter of subjectivity, but in my own writing, I try to limit them to one to two per scene.

Weeks passed, and Desert Rat found himself walking into the town of Deadrock. A diamond dog settlement with next to no ponies.

“This town is mostly diamond dogs.” Do you think this information is so impactful that it needs to be underlined with a sentence fragment? I don’t think so.

With regards to action scenes, a lot of the issues about tempo and rhythm I raised in my previous review also appear here, so I won’t mention them again. It does make sense, given that this story was written earlier. I will note that one-sentence paragraphs tend to be overused a lot more in this story, especially in the second chapter. And to the author’s credit, there are instances where tempo and rhythm are used well in tense scenes.

Quick as a diamondback, the stranger shot three holes through the door. Silence followed. Then, the sound of a body dropping.

By the way, this excerpt also illustrates a good example of sentence fragment usage. A short, punchy sentence fragment after a comparatively long action can add a lot of oomph to a story. Save fragments only for these moments, and your story will reap their benefits without sounding awkward and stilted.

There is one thing I’d like to commend in this fic, and it’s connected to the previous point I made about character dialogue. When the author puts his mind to it, he can write a concise description that nonetheless evokes the gritty themes of the Western genre. In a few instances, the author even manages to evoke a narrative style resembling the character’s voice, which is always welcome.

Manehattan was like a dead dog in desert heat. Full of maggots and shit. If it was up to Desert Rat he would have avoided Manehattan like the rotting carcass it was. But the bits promised for going there were too good to pass up.

I kinda wished this applied to all the appropriate descriptions, though—I couldn’t figure out what epidemic was spreading in Chapter 2, and I’m about to graduate medical school! Was it TB? You just need PIER-S—pyrazinamide, isoniazid, ethambutol, rifampin, and streptomycin.

Non-salient features

Holstering his weapons, the stranger casually placed the severed head in his saddlebag, then sauntered out to the saloon.

>> But he just did that a few sentences ago. “With three clean, powerful strokes of his blade, the stranger finished by placing the severed head in his sack.”

With a sigh, he magically lifted his hat and wiped the sweat from his brow. The dying bartender saw the stranger's horns.

“Two horns…” he gasped. “I should have known. You’re the devil himself!”

The second sentence repeats the word “gasp,” and the information in it is already conveyed in the bartender’s dialogue. It’s better to delete it and let the bartender’s dialogue speak for itself.

What Gunsmoke presented was a revolver unlike any Desert Rat had seen. That is, all but the cylinder.

So…the cylinder was the only component of the gun that wasn’t unique?

What truly was disturbing about his appearance were the cutie mark of a  skull with a top hat, and the necklace with a noble’s coat of arms on  full display.

Again, like with “A Town Called Love,” telling instead of Showing isn’t a very common issue in this fic, but it still pops up infrequently.

pigeons with bowel problems

Okay, this is actually a pretty neat insult, not gonna lie.

A stallion with a red nose that stood out greatly against his yellow coat stumbled his way down the sidewalk, crumpling the suit he wore when he bumped into a gas lamp.

This sentence is grammatically correct, but it is clumsy because of the “that stood out greatly against his yellow coat” bit, some redundancies, and a bit of chronological mixups. 

Grammar

In about 10,000 words, I found about 103 errors. This gives a Grammar score of 8.35. The story is still readable, but the number of grammar mistakes in it cannot be ignored, especially because there is one type of grammar error that was so pervasive it was the first time I had to invoke my “repeated errors into account, but only up to ten times” rule. 

When your sentence has two verbs separated by the word “and,” those verbs should not have a comma. This is the most common grammar error in the fanfic—more than half of the 103 errors I found were of this type.

Desert Rat investigated the case, and found only papers inside.

Desert Rat investigated the case and found only papers inside.

Another common error is the placing of a comma after “but.” While I don’t consider starting a sentence with “but” to be an error, I do consider it an error when there’s a comma after it.

But, lives are at stake

But lives are at stake

Finally, tense errors are relatively common in this fic. You can choose between past or present tense—whichever one you’re comfortable with. But be consistent with that choice.

Assessment 

• Characters: 4.5—A mixed bag, but ultimately a net negative. The story does dialogue well, barring a few hiccups, and some of the side characters have interesting chemistry with Desert Rat. Desert Rat himself, however, falls short as a protagonist.

• Plot: 2.9

  • 3 - 0.05 - 0.05 = 2.9
  • Plot holes and lack of tension aside, if the story was meant to be an anthology, the individual chapters are too dependent on each other to stand by themselves. If the story wasn’t meant to be an anthology, the chapters have little natural progression and relation.
• Prose and writing style: 5—Yet another mixed bag, but this time without a “negative bent.” There’s both good things and bad things with the prose, and they roughly balance out.
• Grammar: 8.35

5.188/10

Although “Tales of a Desert Rat” has some good ideas with its secondary characters, dialogue, and occasional bits of good prose, it ultimately falls short of providing anything more than a mediocre reading experience, no thanks to its cliched protagonist, unfocused plot, and grammar issues.

Plan

• There are important pacing differences between an anthology-like story and writing a normal multi-chapter story. Is each chapter supposed to stand by itself? Then make sure they really can stand by themselves, especially in terms of pacing. Chapter 2 was a good example of this. It first introduced our heroes, established the stakes and the villains’ threat, and ultimately concluded in a final confrontation between the heroes and villains.

  • Additionally, an anthology-like story can also benefit from having certain elements carry over from previous chapters. You already have the dragoon, but you can also incorporate more narrative-significant things. Maybe Desert Rat’s time with Meadowbrook made him somewhat more compassionate. Or alternatively, maybe the war horse’s death made him more vengeful.

• Be careful with making badass, archetypal protagonists. You could probably get away with making secondary characters archetypal to a T, but protagonists are different. Protagonists are the face of your story. Base them on an archetype if you want to, but just make sure the reader can tell your character apart from a sea of similar characters.

  • With regards to the badass part, make sure to balance your character’s abilities and the threats they face appropriately. If your character is so awesome that enemies cannot pose any conceivable threat to him, either make the enemies stronger, your character weaker, or tailor the plot to focus on a different conflict.

• Controlling sentence and paragraph length goes a long way in controlling the rhythm emotional atmosphere of your writing. This is advice I gave in my previous review, but in this case, I want to apply it in a different context: description. When you devote more words to something, you make the reader focus on that thing more. Shorter descriptions are for less important things in your story, since your reader will focus on that less. Naturally, it stands that the more important elements in your story such as, I dunno, the main character’s appearance require more words to describe.

  • Don’t overuse sentence fragments. They slam the brakes on the reader and force him to notice a piece of information. Only use fragments if the information is really worth snapping the reader’s attention to. Otherwise, the story’s flow will feel like a car starting and stopping as it drives down a quiet suburb—jumpy and annoying.

If there’s anything you want to clarify, feel free to ask anything in the comments!

DECIMAL NUMBERS

7506744
SIGNIFICANT FIGURES

7506743
First off thank you for the review. Moravagine is a title of a book about a psychopath also this was the first story I ever written.