Fanfic Review I – Bugsydor's "Tastes Like Heresy" · 4:16am Jun 27th, 2014
I can hardly believe it has been a month since I last posted anything. Suffice to say, it involves a combination of work, WildStar, and the World Cup.
Anyway, in the interest of posting more, I am changing up this little review column to focus mostly on single fics. I will still do the occasional comparison, but I noticed that, in trying to tackle multiple fics in a single post, I ended up spending an inordinate amount of time editing each review in sequence. Then, when doing a second pass, I had no idea where I was going with each idea, and essentially had to scrape or redo reviews a few times. Hopefully this will speed things up, and since I won't need a fairly large block of editing time to write these anymore, I should be more timely and frequent in my postings.
Bugsydor – Tastes Like Heresy – Culinary Experimentation History
A royal chef gets exiled for creating a forbidden dish in pre-unification Equestria.
This is a strange fic. To start with, despite it being a 9-chapter long story, its main plot can probably be properly contained in a limerick. Then, instead of focusing on things pertaining to the more significant aspects of the story, such as why the cook was exiled, or the consequences of her actions, it actually spends about 8 chapters on the creation process of the taboo food. The incident itself comprises such a small part of the fic to be almost incidental, and the whole story is nothing but a very roundabout way of explaining it. But, as damning as this may sound, I actually liked this story quite a fair bit.
This fic, through a sequence of fairly isolated scenes, weaves a great tapestry of a pre-unification society, where the three races view each other as little more than myths. Racism runs rampant, they have bizarre misconceptions about the other races, such as seeing pegasi as demons, as well as various other unique details in how the society itself works, such as how unicorns control the weather, their culinary, etc. It is all very well thought out, yet feels organic instead of rigidly planned, thanks to nice bits of obfuscation, characters disagreeing on certain points, and other bits of world building. Things work out wrong enough to make you think somepony actually had to come up with a solution to a problem, instead of the author having a cool idea that is subsequently worked into the story.
A diverse cast of characters is also built through these scenes, defined well in how they view this society, their personalities, and their relationship to the main character. They are all used very well in a Tribunal scene by the end, that manages to recast their previous interactions in a new light. Another thing well done is the whole process of culinary experimentation. That is one of the highlights of the fic, and the trial and error process feels very realistic and gripping.
In the end, this is a fic with multiple shining points, full of interesting and funny scenes, but that suffers from being too unfocused. As much as I enjoy seeing how Amber Spice develops cooking oil, it adds almost nothing to the overall narrative, and the whole story ends up as a whole bunch of set-up without any real pay off. However, I did enjoy reading it quite a bit, and I will make sure to check out the ongoing sequel to see where the author will take the story.
Why it should be read: For a story about pre-unification Equestria that breaks various conventions for an unique effect.
Stand-out Moment: The scene with the grease fire was hilarious and precise.
8/10
Makes me think of the line "Prestigious and Precise" from Queen's "Killer Queen"
Thanks for the review! The criticism is valid and warranted, and I'm very glad to hear I'm getting the worldbuilding right.
Also, I delight in seeing this line: