Fic Spotlight » Fic Spotlight #21 - Truth is stranger than Fics · 2:05am Dec 11th, 2015
The Royal Guard—Ring-Ting-Tingling Edition
[Obs]Hi guys. It's time for more fic spotlight. Jinglemas is coming up soon, so all of you are probably going to need some horse words for your festive jingle related holidays. Here are some good ones so that you don't have to cry to Santa that he didn't bring you MLP fanfics on jinglemas morn. Read and be merry.[/Obs]
Every two weeks, we recommend six high-quality stories from a variety of authors and popular genres. From action/adventure to slice of life, from drama to comedy, from stories about ponies kissing to stories involving pink hairless apes, we feature a wide variety of stories so that every post has something for everyone.
We’re always looking for a tip-top tale, so if you’d like to submit your fic, here are some links you’ll probably find useful:
-The Royal Guard Group
-Submit Your Story!
-The Royal Guard's Official Handbook
Finally—and I cannot emphasize this enough—we are always recruiting. If you think you’ve got what it takes to be a prereader, then don’t hesitate to send us an application. If you have any questions about the application process, please direct them to Prak.
AND NOW, WITHOUT FURTHER ADO... STORIES!
This Week:
Action/Adventure
Rarity’s Quest to Save Literally Everything, by Pegasus Mesa
Drama
The End of Immortality, by DemonBrightSpirit
Romance
Temptation, by Titanium Dragon
Comedy
Martial Bliss, by Skywriter
Slice of Life
Where the Heart Is, by Pascoite
Human
Love Twiangles, by Oroboro
ACTION/ADVENTURE
For Rarity, waking up with split ends is the absolute worst thing ever. Unfortunately, a mysterious stallion proves otherwise when he warns her that Armageddon is approaching and Equestria is doomed, and if that happens, she can kiss her well-coiffed mane farewell. Now the timeline is splitting worse than Rarity's hair as our intrepid heroine travels back again...
and again...
and again in order to save the world, with perhaps a smidgen of help from Princess Luna. And if she happens to find the time for a trip to the spa along the way, well... A mare can't be blamed for wanting to look her best, can she?
PR Recommendation: “While the premise of this story might seem familiar to those who've read a time loop story or two, you'll still find plenty of fun surprises. With its strong characterization, interconnected conflicts, and sharp wit, Rarity's Quest offers something for nearly every adventure fan and is a must-read for fans of time loops.” —Prak
DRAMA
For more than a millennium, it was believed that the princesses were immortal. But as time marched ever forward, it becomes clear that even the alicorns won't live forever.
Princess Celestia is at the end of her life.
While Equestria must find a way to cope with this new reality, those that are truly suffering are those closest to her. None are struggling as much as her sister, Princess Luna. Not only is she forced to handle the duties of ruling Equestria and taking care of the transition, she must also cope with the imminent death of her beloved sister.
PR Recommendation: “Thought-provoking—not in the philosophical sense, but in the design sense—’The End of Immortality’ offers a glimpse of its true message, but despite its short stay, it manages to show quite a few underlying plot threads that make it worth more than the sum of its parts. I'd love even more of this, if it's ever in the cards.” —Figments
ROMANCE
Rarity can't sleep. Applejack had the audacity to fall asleep facing Rarity, and now she can't get kissing her friend out of her mind – and isn't sure if she wants to. But kissing your friend while she's sleeping is wrong... right?
PR Recommendation: “A pleasant little tale about all the thought behind a seemingly simple gesture. Even if romance isn't your usual cup of tea, this story is cute enough to warrant a read.” —Lab
COMEDY
Shining Armor learns the most important tactical lesson of his life.
PR Recommendation: “It's absurd, brilliantly absurd, and I love every word of it. A must read for fans of absurdist humor, and those with even a moderate funny bone.” —Figments
SLICE OF LIFE
Dogs act like they love their families, but nopony will ever know for sure. More importantly, Winona's family loves her. She couldn't ask for more. But she doeslove them. She really does.
PR Recommendation: “This is one of those stories that starts out slow then creeps up on you, where you don't realize why everyone thinks it is so good until you're almost done with it, and then realize that you had missed the forest for the trees, all the way back to the story description itself.” —Titanium Dragon
HUMAN
"My name is Sunset Shimmer, and there are two Twilight Sparkles who are both madly in love with me.
Please help."
PR Recommendation: “Admit it, we all knew: with the existence of two Twilights and one Sunset, someone was going to write this. But don't think that means you know exactly how it'll go. With a fair bit of humor and a surprising ending, Love Twiangles is definitely no fic to overlook.” —R5h
Addendums
If you guys have any questions about our sitepost policies, or our approval guidelines, feel free to browse the handy dandy Official Royal Guard Handbook, and if you still find yourself lacking answers, feel free to ask Prak so that he can find the right person to give you what you need.
See you guys next time!
Dat Mark Twain quote doh.
Rarity’s Quest to Save Literally Everything, by Pegasus Mesa -> says it not finished
Unfortunate.
"Temptation" is an extremely good fic. Listened to it on Youtube.
Love Twiangles! That was a funny one.
(argh why no Sunset emote)
Man, I didn't know you guys did archeology!
(The joke here is that oh my god Martial Bliss is more than three years old now)
3610100
It may be hard to believe, but a lot of the site's newer members have never read it. And of all the stories in this post, it's had the biggest boost to its views and rating.
3610100
3610197
It even made the popular stories box!
3610197
3610280
I'm not saying you were wrong to do so.
I'm just saying, if you were to draw a line where you had the founding of the site at one end, and the current date at the other? You could cut off the entire right half of it, move the date up and it'd still fall closer to the left side.
3610321
Honestly we were lucky that Martial Bliss was even able to be featured. The amount of comedies we get is drastically lower than the other genres, and Sturgeon's Law still applies to those limited few we do get.
Skywriter essentially threw us a bone. We might not be so lucky next time.
3610343
That is possibly the most depressing answer I could have received to a joke message. Comedy is a seriously underappreciated genre, it's either done well or done badly. There's so little middle ground to work with.
I'm actually legitimately tempted to just write a comedy so you ca-- wait, you know what? Does Rarity Lose her Innocence in a Poker Game qualify? I'm morbidly embarrassed of associating myself with the story, but if you're that strapped for comedies at least that one was written in the last 365 days or so.
3610351
It definitely won't hurt you or anyone else to try.
3610353
You will grow to regret that comment.
3610351
It is so cute how you've forgotten that was published more than a year ago :V
But we don't actually care when stuff was published, just that it is good.
Comedy, romance, and human are the three most under-represented categories in the queue; the other categories tend to have fairly healthy numbers. Prior to this site post going up, I had actually read all but one of the comedy stories we had in our queue already, and all the romance stories we had under 25k words.
Interestingly, the acceptance rates for all categories is quite similar (around 20%), so the primary driver of acceptance/rejection appears to be, well, numbers.
Though admittedly another issue with those two categories is that something like a third of the submissions into Romance and Comedy are the same author.
3610379
No it wasn't, it was just a few... months... ago...
... shit.
I do not know why, but I feel weak and confused by the actions and processes to become a pre-reader. I wish to be a pre-reader!? but I feel my worth is of use to no one. Maybe someday, I will return and ask? I may not be popular in any way or form but that does not matter in my eyes. All I wish to do is help the problems and heal the wounds of others. Your blog post was very interesting Mr.Obs, I hope to see more in the near future.