I’ll be reviewing stories from fellow ani-bloggers. This is going to be fun!

Recap

First of all, let me talk about the Create A Story tag that I did last year. Of the heels of a trio collab, I asked my fellow bloggers for one last help. It was a tag that other bloggers can join in. The entire thing is to have people write stories and this makes sense since we are all writers. I decided to make this more interesting by having people choose between three choices. The idea is to basically have some people make the same choices, but their stories will still come out different from one another. Another point of the choices is to exclaim the creativity of the bloggers and the endless combination that comes with the tag. To cap this tag thing, I was supposed to compile and review them. Keiko actually compiled them already, so I only have to review them.

You may be asking, why now? Simply put, I’m a lazy person. I have a “tea time” project that I haven’t finished. I’m also close to ten years with my 1000 review goal and I’m barely halfway there. My motivation comes and goes. It came here now so I want to pump this out soon.

TPAB The Reviewer

I will be reviewing the stories like how I review anime. I’ll point out the stuff I like and I’ll point out stuff that I may not like. So I apologize in advance if you don’t like my review of your stories. I’m sorry. I’m only human.

Fall + Forest + Tragedy

Let’s get this ball rolling with the awesome curator of these works: Keiko. I’ve collab with her several times and we used to exchange stories back in Discord. I treated the thing as an IM and I was mostly talking to her. She loves the color black as I remember the stories we used to exchange. She is also a literary major or something. Basically, she studied stories and books so her composition is really good.

Her story is about a girl being eaten by a wolf, but so much emphasis was given to the forest. The wind and the leaves give the feeling of uneasiness, and I think it’s not a literal wolf killing the girl. In how the words are combined to make meaning of it all, this feels like a suicide. The wolf is a symbol for suicidal thoughts and it overcame her then she took her own life. Keiko crafted a vivid picture here and I can’t believe she cranked out a story this great in under a thousand words.

I’d give Keiko’s story a five out of five. Visit her blog and say hi to her as well. She’s friendly.

Of Yesterday

This is a combination of Rain, Streets and Tragedy. First of all, this didn’t happen in the streets so I’ll be giving a minus point for that. I kid. Secondly, this story read like a gawd damn light novel. If you’re not familiar, LN stories are basically just story scripts with very little literary accessories like how Keiko showered her stories with a lot of symbolism. LN doesn’t do that. Stories are setup as if it’s like a script and Leap’s story is just like that. It’s a really good story, since it pulled you in with the pathetic homage to an anime trope but then the story pulls a 180 on you. It might’ve been written like an LN, but the story truly feels like a Jun Maeda script. Have you ever played Key games and marvel at how it can just turn dim in a moment’s notice? But the story never skips a beat though and you’re often just entranced by the development. Leap’s story is definitely oozing with strong influences.

You can tell Leap is definitely a massive anime fan, and his writing reflects that. I love it. Five stars. Leap does a lot of music posts and he is among the rare music ani-bloggers of our community. Go say hi and pick up a few recommendations while you’re in his domain.

Clair de Lune

Arthifis made this piece with “Music, School, and Drama”. It’s a rough piece and you could tell English isn’t really his primary language. That’s fine, since English is also not my first. His story is brimming with personality though. I was greeted with words like “Vanilla Ice Cream” and “2 day beard” and I’m certain he’s the only one that uses this kind of verbiage in our landscape. The writing might be sloppy in some areas, but it is very expressive. It is also very passionate. You can tell Arthifis loves to write and he crafts a beautiful story here. You can also tell the passion in his writing is drawn from his real life. It’s easy to spot personal stories like these, since it’s very hard to fake them. When the characters started expressing their love, you can tell it was the writer expressing it as well.

The writing might take a few hits, but the ending certainly made this story worth it. Give it a read, you guys. Check out Arthifis at AnimeShelter as well. I didn’t know he migrated to his own website. That’s awesome.

This story gets five stars. I realize I’m only giving high marks here, but rest assured these stories deserve their stars.

Punslinger Mountain

Rossiroad seems to be among a few group of inspired people to use the Comedy choices and he mixed it with Fall and Mountain. His interpretation of “Fall” is literal though, and I think that’s the joke. Now, comedy is subjective. I mean, jokes are only effective if they make you laugh and Rossiroad attempted to make a story full of jokes. I appreciate the style, but I’m pretty sure not a lot of people can appreciate it. It took me a few lines to also realize what he was trying to accomplish here. It’s certainly not for everyone, but the few that can understand the madness will certainly have a roaring good time. Rossiroad writes in complete chaos though, and I bet he have posts of big wall of texts because I feel like his mind is always churning out thoughts. From how I read his story, it feels like it comes from a guy that has a lot of inside thoughts and commentary but is usually quiet in real life. I mean no offense. I actually find this story fascinating. There is meaning in the madness and method in the chaos. It’s pretty cool.

Check his blog here. This story gets three stars from me. A thumbs up for using the Comedy choice too!

Crescendo

Biblionyan gives us a story of “Music, Sea, and Tragedy”, and the tragedy tag seems to be popular one. It’s fascinating that a lot of writers go there. This one is really beautiful as it describes the process of letting go. Biblionyan gives us vivid imagery, and you can tell she is a massive book fan. Her blog is half anime and half books too, but I love how she uses them big words to paint her story. It definitely takes me out of the story sometime, since it often feels forced, but that’s a personal nitpick from me. Her composition is pretty tight as well, and you do easily get lost in this image of a girl trying to let go. Props on the open ending use of tragedy as well, since we can only gather the loss she is trying to combat. Much like Keiko above, you are welcome to interpret it in your own way and in your own bias lens. You can also tell there is a bit of a personal experience mixed in here about the process of letting go and moving on. You cannot paint a picture this vivid without a picture of your own.

Check out Bibilionyan’s anime book blog here. This story gets a four out of five stars from me. Again, it’s a personal bias since I read dumb.

I’m not really sure how many joined in on this blog carnival, but I’ll do five stories for each post. Happy reading, you guys!!!! Check out all the stories here. If your story isn’t in the hub, then inform Keiko.