I felt very detached from the overall story. That’ll happen with me and abuse stuff quite often, and one of the reasons I don’t read much of it. I think the oppressiveness of the situation for the foal was more than I wanted to get into.
I had nothing invested to lose, nor much sense of loss as I couldn’t connect with the foal, it’s family, etc. It’s that detached numbness I can feel when seeing “X many people died in an accident” on the news. It’s all intellectual.
That’s not to say it’s poorly written or anything. It just didn’t land for me.
Do appreciate “Reddit Word.” It’s interesting in that it’s something that would be unacceptable in the main two social groups I’m in even though they’re quite opposite each other (ie, my more liberal leaning friends and online friends versus my conservative Christian friends many of whom are not pro-LGBT). Even when I was in the South it wasn’t tossed around or used much.
Regarding abuse: I like @Stwumpo stuff because he’s saying something or aiming at a target. I like @BFM101 for the rich characters I can dig into. So it’s not that I won’t read and enjoy abuse heavy work. But there needs to be something else there for me, and in this case I couldn’t find a hook for me to latch onto. That is, of course, TOTALLY a personal taste thing and has no bearing on the quality of the work (which again, was good but not for me).