My Little Dashie by ROBCakeran53

[size=+1]My Little Dashie by ROBCakeran53[/size]
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I don't think anything has been more recommended to me whenever I've asked what I should look at next. Apart from something like Fallout: Equestria, of course, the Brony Recomended reading list can get pretty dauntingly long with personal preference.

However, My Little Dashy is something worth picking up and reading. This right here is someone's fantasy in prose. It's executed well, drawing a simple metaphor around the action while genuinely attempting to explore the idea of interdimentional adoption. Bizarre but carries it well, I think. Even better, you can pull bits out of it to improve your own works.

Although, you can say that on almost anything...

The plot is simple, for those that haven't picked it up already. The narrator is this guy who's pretty much had to survive life on his own since loosing both parents. Now alone, struggling to pay bills and finding nothing in his life worth a darn any more, depression is quite rightly settling in and holding up colour swatches of gray. Then, he finds a filly Rainbow Dash in a box with little to no explanation of why she's there. Taking her in and trying to contain a primal Brony scream of joy, he effectively raises her in a story spanning fifteen years.

Until that fateful day when she has to leave.

Now, I will say that this story is very well done. Its not particularly sophisticated in its symbolism, I will add. I would have thought that the average reader would sus that the town around him links to his emotional state right from the get go (it get's better as his life experience gets better). It works to create that Mellon mood necessary for the rest of the story to progress from as we trudge through this depressed area.

The first person perspective is oddly sketchy on details too. Possibly rightly so. The result is to draw attention to the only thing the author wants you to pay attention to - the narrator - by blurring the outside world. Rainbow Dash is barely there as an effective character and not another soul intrudes. Rainbow Dash is the subject, not the point of what's being said. The introverted nature points back at the feeling of the narrator. The extrapolation is the whole point because it's an exploration of your experiences through the idea of Adoptive Fatherhood, not being a Brony, necessarily.

Yes, Fatherhood, not necessarily Brony Fandom. In fact, the narrator - whom I suspect is a self-insertion character (who are perfectly fine when done well (like here)) - gives up on his Brony interest while Rainbow Dash is in his company. Whether you think of this as part of him shielding Dashie's brain from an existentialist melt-down if she were to ever find out about the show (and the Fandom as a whole) or because having Dashie is all the pony he could ever need is entirely up to you. I like to say it's a mixture of the two, heavily sided on the 'I-don't-want-Dashie's-brains-to-explode' motive.

Those that have read this one before will likely just nod and say "Yeah, so what?" to the above paragraph. Well, I said Adoptive Fatherhood which is a different kettle of fish with one, recurring problem that My Little Dashie presents in a novel way, I think: not being related does not affect you as a family.

The Narrator does mention that Dashie know's that she's not of his flesh and blood. One is a human and one is blue and able to fly. The Author can't draw out that old "Your adopted!" cliché as is where the child finds it out on their own before they can be told by their parents. There's fights, drug taking, booze, crying and can probably be found on something like Hollyoaks or the OC. Yadda-yadda, see it a mile off but it makes no sense here. My Little Dashie is bizarre because of it's cross-dimensional element.

Spoiler: I don't want to spoil any key points so I throw this up: Spoiler Warning:

Dashie does find the show online and, quite rightly, is horrified. Why? Because her first thought is to throw a knee-jerk reaction to how creepy this all looks. He's been raising a part of a show he enjoys for fifteen years. The initial reaction is to shout 'Pervert!' and run, right? And there is the new spin on the old formula. Dashie is outraged, sprinting off to process the tidal-wave of information while the Narrator slips back into his depressed groove. Not because his best piece of memorabilia is gone but because the soul point of his life has run away, exposed and vulnerable he proceeds on a walk.

What I like to think My Little Dashie is saying on, well, I want to say Bronies specifically but it really could be anything that we would say defines us as us is how we truly care about it. We'd want to defend it as well as nurture it with our support, no matter how small. We'll make changes in our lives to accommodate this interest. People take time out of the day to play a game, or to write things. They'll even attempt to get better at it by gathering information to help or even set aside a special place for that interest. I'm sure most of you have a shelf or a container of all your Pony items. Maybe even a whole room where it's allowed to grow in. I like to think of the metaphor of a child representing a strong interest but I'm not convinced it's strictly 'correct'. I could be wrong.

But that's not the reason you've read the Fan Fic, is it? Nope! While the Fatherhood Aspect is what appears to fuel it, what your reading it for is the feels. It's a tragedy at the centre of all this that delivers the punch that gave this Fic a kick that others haven't got. If this truly is a story with a self-inserted narrator in it, I have to hand it to the Author for the sadism that goes into wrenching daughter from father. While I will not agree that the landing has been made perfectly as you can see the ending coming from a mile off, it does manage to have a decent impact.

Actually, if I think about it, the inevitability of the conclusion, that could only be one logical conclusion ratchets up tension like a roller-coaster, to then release it when needed to make the Tragedy more effective when needed...Anyway...

The Tragedy is done right because it remembers that levity is an emotion. While you can look at something like....err...Final Fantasy XIII to beat a dead horse (pun not intended), note that most of the emotions experienced by Lightning are largely angst and misery. When a character experiences that and nothing else, the feeling of even greater depression for the character is moot as the player reaches a threshold for the misery on-screen. They either get bored or start to wonder when the fun stuff starts.

My Little Dashie manages the basics easily. Characters experience happiness and laugh at stuff. Why is that good? Well, the variation throws off any...Let's say, resistance to misery that might happen. As a result, you are more likely to feel that contrast when it's good stuff being taken away than when it's like Final Fantasy XIII when the bad is poured on the bad over and over. In fact, it's this that helps to set up the ambivalent ending. It's dissonant: she has to leave but it's painful to see it happen. There is a moment of elated joy between the Narrator and Dashie at this point just before the ending sequence as a big punch in the gut. Just as things are stable and happy, it all has to stop.

I can see why this is such a tear jerker. It's geared towards this purpose, managing to draw the two character's together before wrenching them apart. Just as all parents must eventually let go of their kids at some point, of course. My Little Dashie is able to present the biggest trail for a parent in a way that we, Bronies, can understand. The result of years of life and teaching and nurture has cultivated to this crescendo.

Douglass Adams once wrote about finding works worth reading in Romance Novels, where you'd normally expect trash. I think it's the same for Fan Fics. Stuff like this seems to prove me right.