nnozomi

Amended from past years:
Thank you for writing something for me. With the exception of the do-not-like stuff, please take any and all of this as optional suggestions only, and do what works for you.

Do not like: darkfic in general, incest, humiliation, graphic violence, PWP or graphic parts-and-fluids sexual descriptions (no moral objections, it's just not what I enjoy reading), blatant out-of-characterness, rape/dubcon, Christmas themes (not Christian myself), coronavirus/quarantine references etc.

Enjoy in particular: work (in all definitions) and people being competent at it, hurt/comfort, futurefic, ensemble pieces, playing with language(s), cuddling, scenes from everyday life.

Genfic is good, shipfic is good, although in the case of the latter I’d rather have a story that has something going on as well as pure romance, whether it’s a separate plot thread or a characterization arc.

I'm open to treats if anyone is so kind.

By fandom/characters (alphabetical):
The Crater School – Chaz Brenchley (Any)
The mixture of “boarding school story” with “science fiction” absolutely delights me and basically I just want more (set specifically at the school rather than in the larger setting, ideally). Of the characters I nominated, I love Mary Ellen “Mae”’s relationship with reading and writing, and Levity’s arc of getting comfortable at school, discovering her inherited talent for art, and falling in love; as far as Rachel is concerned, honestly I just want to see her (along with Jessica, of course) be explicitly Jewish (in whatever sense) on page, I refuse to buy that all the way on Mars even a girl named Rachel Abramoff has to be Christian! However, you can use any or none of these three, and/or other existing characters, and/or make up a set of original characters altogether; I’d just like to see the school doing its thing. (Something leaning more toward Antonia Forest than Elinor Brent-Dyer would be wonderful, but that definitely falls under optional-details-are-optional.) ETA: I finished reading Radhika's book just barely too late to nominate her, but I love her and I would be delighted to see her in a fic if you feel like writing about her too.

The Incandescent - Emily Tesh (Worldbuilding)
I have a thing about administration-saves-the-day (not that it does exactly here, but I love how big a part school administration plays in the book) and I love magic integrated into a modern-day setting, so this book did good things for me. Here again more than anything I kind of want a slice of life at school, set during the book itself or otherwise; I loved the A-level students, especially Aneeta, and would be delighted to have a fic focusing on them, but something from the teacher/staff perspective would be great too, or else feel free to make up entirely original characters if you’d rather. If you want to look into what the school (or one of the new schools/programs!) looks like after the events of the book, that would be fascinating too.

Juniper, Gentian, and Rosemary – Pamela Dean (Any)
I’m always about equally fascinated and frustrated by this book, and Gentian’s friends are what I like most about it—they have the most interesting takes on the themes of the novel, femininity and gender in general, religion, art and science, conventionality and unconventionality, romance and friendship, togetherness and solitude, what you have in common with people and what makes you different from them. I’d love a missing scene from the book, futurefic, or anything from their perspectives, especially if it provides a bit of comforting closure for the ending, or else a canon divergence where things go better in the first place. You can throw in romance in any combination among them if you’re interested or keep it to friendship, whatever works.

The Melendys – Elizabeth Enright (Rush Melendy)
I love all the Melendys and their friends (and would be happy to see any and all of them appearing, in and out of the tagset), but I’m especially fond of Rush, the sarcastic, cheerful, quick-witted, occasionally self-doubting polymath who spends hours at the piano; I would love to see Rush a little older and what he’s making of himself, in whatever context. Again, really an ensemble fic in which Rush has his fair share of page time would be great too. I’d rather no focus on romance for this canon (although if you want to give Willy Sloper a love life with any non-Melendy person, that would be delightful!).

叛逆者|The Rebel (Wang Shi’an)
I got a spectacular Wang Shi’an fic a few Yuletides back, and I have never quite stopped thinking about him and wanting even more. (You can find my thoughts on him AT LENGTH under the "pannizhe" tag here--please feel free to read or ignore as you like.) I can't help wanting a story in which, without necessarily being a better human being, he's compelled by circumstance to turn his talents (thinking on his feet, lying and deceiving as needed, planning ahead, balancing temper and calm...) to good purposes instead of bad ones. I know that is a weird, and weirdly specific request, and I will not hold you to it; basically anything Wang Shi'an-centric, whether canon-compliant or -divergent, would be wonderful.
I’ve requested only Wang Shi’an himself so as not to complicate matters, but please also feel free to bring in any other characters who occur to you—Lin Nansheng and Chen Moqun, with whom he has incredibly complex relationships; Lan Xinjie, Lao Gu or Lao Ji, Meng Annan, even poor dumb loyal Secretary Zhang or Wang Shi’an’s blink-and-you-miss-her wife. One request I do have for this canon is attention to the historical context--I don't mean you have to do a huge research project, but I feel like the story has to be grounded in the time and place for the characters to be who they are.

Rivers of London – Ben Aaronovitch (Abigail Kamara, Indigo)
Indigo and her foxspeak and her adoration of Abigail all delight me, and Abigail’s brilliance and teenage-ness and resilience likewise; I’d love to see them having an adventure of some kind, large or small, details up to you. Any other characters (original ones included) welcome too, although I especially enjoy the way Abigail looks to Nightingale as a mentor and her unlikely friendship with Simon. (My other favorite character is Kim Reynolds; I can’t exactly see how she could fit easily into an Abigail-focused story, but if something occurs to you, go for it!)

Taiwan Travelogue – Yang Shuang-zi (Any)
Because their futures are less determined by the canon, I’m especially curious to read about Ozawa Reiko and Tan Tshiok-bi (Chen Chueh-wei? Chin Jakubi? why is romanization so linguistically and sociopolitically complicated; come to think of it, should Reiko be piped with Ta-tse Li-tzu? sorry, just doodling); what their friendship/romance was like and what happened to them after the events of the book, in Taiwan or Japan or elsewhere, whether they mirrored Chizuko and Chizuru’s relationship, as they do in the book to some extent, or developed in their own unexpected directions. That said, if you want to focus on Chizuko and Chizuru (Chien-ho|Tshian-hoh…), either with missing scenes from the book’s history or giving them an alternate future, that would be lovely too. In either case, one request I do have for this canon is attention to the historical context--I don't mean you have to do a huge research project, but I feel like the story has to be grounded in the time and place for the characters to be who they are. (I speak Japanese and some Chinese, so the more of either, as needed, you want to throw into the fic the better, as long as you’re confident in it!)

Thank you again!

Amended from past years:
Thank you for writing something for me. With the exception of the do-not-like stuff, please take any and all of this as optional suggestions only, and do what works for you.

Do not like: darkfic in general, incest, humiliation, graphic violence, PWP or graphic parts-and-fluids sexual descriptions (no moral objections, it's just not what I enjoy reading), blatant out-of-characterness, rape/dubcon, Christmas themes (not Christian myself), coronavirus/quarantine references etc.

Enjoy in particular: work (in all definitions) and people being competent at it, hurt/comfort, futurefic, ensemble pieces, playing with language(s), cuddling, scenes from everyday life.

Genfic is good, shipfic is good, although in the case of the latter I’d rather have a story that has something going on as well as pure romance, whether it’s a separate plot thread or a characterization arc.

I'm open to treats if anyone is so kind.

By fandom/characters (alphabetical):

Growing Up Weightless (John M. Ford) – worldbuilding
The society of the Moon (sorry, Luna) is described in so much loving detail that I’d just like to know more about it. Some random ideas: How about language? The language they use incorporates a lot of non-English words; what’s its history, are there different dialects by city/generation, was it deliberately adopted or just the result of a linguistic melting pot among settlers, how do non-Lunar people react to it, is it formally considered a language (taught in schools, etc.)? Or: Anything to do with music on the Moon would be great (Albin Ronay is my favorite character, you’re welcome to bring him directly, indirectly or not at all, as you prefer). Or: There’s something of an unspoken class system, with descendents of Names like Matt’s family at the top and new arrivals from Earth at the bottom; what kind of problems does this cause, and is it changing? Or: How does the Moon look by the time Matt is his father’s age, or what did it look like when Albin was Matt’s age? Or: A little Terkel-esque “working” anthology, a day in the life over various jobs on the Moon? Or: We see a couple of “new religions” that have developed post-off-Earth settlement, but how are the existing Earth religions followed on the Moon? Or: just a slice of life in general, anywhere, in any context.
I’d be glad to hear from any of the characters in the book, or from original characters; feel free to play with formats (epistolary, conferencing or other online systems like the ones in the book, official documents, radio, ???) as well.

The Interior Life (Katherine Blake) – Kathy, Mike, Mark
I adore this odd book, and one of the things I like about it is the way even the minor characters all have their own personalities and interests, including Sue’s kids. I’ve always wondered, what happens if sober Kathy and wry Mike and placid Mark find themselves with their own connection to Sue’s Demoura (or some place related) when they’re older? “Older” could mean anything from early teens to twenties or thirties, whatever you like. They could meet the Demourans Sue knows or their children or an entirely new cast of characters, whatever. Another thing I like is the way the two worlds are so intertwined in Sue’s head (she doesn’t go off questing and leave her own world behind, it’s all happening on multiple levels at once), and I’d want to keep that in the next generation (somehow…). You can have a plot or just a vignette or two, you can have them discovering Demoura etc. for the first time or taking it for granted as a thing they’ve grown up with, you name it. (Mostly unrelated, I’ve always thought that sometime after the book Fred/Sue/Siobhan should happen, so if that appeals to you too, feel free; if not please ignore!)

Juniper, Gentian and Rosemary (Pamela Dean) – Becky, Alma, Erin, Steph
I’m always about equally fascinated and frustrated by this book, and Gentian’s friends are what I like most about it—they have the most interesting takes on the themes of the novel, femininity and gender in general, religion, art and science, conventionality and unconventionality, romance and friendship, togetherness and solitude, what you have in common with people and what makes you different from them. I’d love a missing scene from the book, futurefic, or anything from their perspectives, especially if it provides a bit of comforting closure for the ending, or else a canon divergence where things go better in the first place. You can throw in romance in any combination among them if you’re interested or keep it to friendship, whatever works.

The Order of the Pure Moon Reflected in Water (Zen Cho) - Guet Imm, Lau Fung Cheung, Tet Sang
I don’t even know where to start, except that I love these characters and the language they use and the multi-layered complexity of the world they live in, and would like to read more about them in pretty much any context. Post-canon, what do they get up to? maybe Tet Sang and Guet Imm get to rescue Lau Fung Cheung from whatever trouble he’s gotten himself into (or vice versa, I guess); maybe they all get mixed up in more magical/religious events, if that’s something you’re comfortable with; maybe…who knows. What kind of partnership do Tet Sang and Guet Imm work out together? Does Lau Fung Cheung get over his unrequited crush on Tet Sang? How do events in the larger world affect them? Serious or silly, I just want more.

Skyrider Series (Melisa Michaels) – Jamin
At eleven or so I was obsessed with this silly pulpy space opera series, and I still think it’s fun. One of the things that stands out to me now is that it spells out in so many words (“we are good in bed together, but we’re just not lifemates, or at least not that way”) that Melacha|the Skyrider and Jamin are for all intents and purposes life partners--by the end of the series they’re living together, raising a child together, working together, and very probably fucking, but still best friends rather than a romantic couple; how many canonical m/f pairings can you say that about? Jamin’s iron-woobie combination of vulnerability, competence, and utter stubbornness has always delighted me and I’d just like to read more about him, his point of view on something from the existing books, something post-canon, you name it. (Maybe not with a heavy focus on Collis—it’s fine if he appears, just not a story completely focused on him and his cuteness etc.; any other characters welcome too).

Thank you again for writing for me. I’m looking forward to it!

I have given up on catching up on DW comments, but if you've posted to my f-list I've read it and been thinking of you. It seems like it’s now tradition that I or my partner or both of us will end up sick over New Year’s; this year it was both of us, he with the tail-end of a bad cold (not corona, as far as we know) and me with a series of headaches + bonus sinus stuff. Not serious in either case, just enervating enough that we both spent the holiday mostly at home and sleeping. There are worse ways to spend New Year’s, of course, and the poor people in Ishikawa discovered one of them: we felt the New Year’s Day earthquake too, just a slow wobble that did no harm here, but long and strong enough to scare me but good (Y was a lot calmer, but he grew up with earthquakes, I didn’t). As far as Japan in general is concerned this year, a-Pei taught me a useful chengyu, 否极泰来, nowhere to go from here but up. Knock wood.

Among more cheerful topics, it was a very good Yuletide; I wrote four fics and got four fics, the latter an unprecedented quantity and all (as with all my past Yuletide gifts, I’ve always been very lucky) very good. Likewise, my recipients were all extremely kind and thoughtful. My assignment was an Under the Skin fic for elenothar, very much to the point since it was elen who introduced me to the drama in the first place; I had fun with it. Didn’t manage as much in the way of treats as I would have liked to, but I got to mess around with Turandot, do some future fic for a book that could use still more of it, and play with Huo Daofu a little more. (Strictly speaking, the Turandot fic also contains a tiny DMBJ crossover, with an elderly Iron Triangle making a guest appearance as the three ministers…).

With Yuletide over I’ve finally made a return to my original thing. Some of the more major revisions called for by one or two beta readers I’ve given up on for the moment: my brain just isn’t cooperating and I’m afraid of getting so stuck that I lose motivation in general, so I’ve set the (all valuable!) feedback aside to come back to later, when I figure out what I’m doing in book 3. No actual writing so far, just trying to turn three single-spaced pages of notes into a simple outline that will let me start; as always, trying to walk the line between “I have to plan this or I won’t know what to start writing” and “I have to write this or I won’t know what’s going to happen.” Still, I’ve been missing my characters and I’m glad to be back doing mean (and sometimes less mean) things to them!

I finally got around to adding that Firefox extension where you can mouse over a word in Chinese and get the pinyin and the meaning, and with that in hand I’ve started reading a longfic in Chinese (also for Under the Skin; it’s not the fandom I feel strongest about, but for that reason I’m okay with reading entirely blind, as it were, I would be more fussy about Guardian or LTR, although if anyone has any recs in Chinese…?). Progress is slow but ridiculously fun and hopefully useful, we’ll see.

Listening to the Schumann piano quintet, one of my (many) all-time favorites; poor screwed-up Schumann, how could he write so many pieces of such dazzling joy and fulfillment when he spent so much time unhappy? Listen to the last movement, my God.

Japanese trivia for the day: in this country taxis are living organisms, you heard it here first. (No, really. Japan has two verbs of existence (forgotten the proper grammatical term), one for inanimate and one for animate subjects, and while buses and trains and so on take the former one, ある, with taxis you use the animate いる. Me to Y: What gives? Y: “Well, uh, buses and trains have set routes while taxis kind of run around all over the place at large??”

Quotations I liked from things I’ve been rereading lately, a novel and some letters and diaries

“a cherrywood bedstead with a bassoon carved into one of the fat headposts, so that it could be played as you lay in bed and meditated” –John Bellairs, The Face in the Frost [I like the idea but I am not sure Bellairs ever actually saw anyone playing the bassoon; the idea of playing one while lying down is pretty fanciful. Then again, it’s far from the wildest flight of imagination in this book!]
“You say your mind is a rambling rubbish box, and your youthful desires for improvement remain unfulfilled. Congratulations on getting the rubbish in a box, mine spreads in a heap. I don’t remember having many youthful desires (except that I do recall Madeline Carroll featuring in one of them).” –Chris Barker to [his wife-to-be] Bessie Moore, 21 February 1944
“So when you feel desperately tired and unhappy about bombs, the weather, your colds and other ills, don’t take them as personal deficiencies, remember you are not responsible for them. … Think about things as little as possible, and remember that no amount of worrying can alter them.”
--ibid., 10 December 1944
“Meanwhile I contrive to write about 500 words a day of the spy-thriller under cover of a scribbling pad. I write semi-shorthand in a very tiny script halfway through the pad so that when anyone puts his head round the door I seem to be adding up figures. Also I am protected from discovery by the improbability of finding a cost-clerk writing a novel under his scrap-pad.” –George Beardmore, 5 January 1940 [clearly the 1940s equivalent of switching between tabs/windows]

Photos: Three cats (an orange teenager with the cat equivalent of resting bitch face, Jiji-chan pretending to hide behind a handy bicycle, and Koron-chan making green glass eyes at Y), some leftover autumn leaves, winter persimmons, and a clutch of ducks.

Be safe and well.

Amended from past years:
Thank you for writing something for me. With the exception of the do-not-like stuff, please take any and all of this as optional suggestions only, and do what works for you.

Do not like: darkfic in general, incest, humiliation, graphic violence, PWP or graphic parts-and-fluids sexual descriptions (no moral objections, it's just not what I enjoy reading), blatant out-of-characterness, rape/dubcon, Christmas themes (not Christian myself), coronavirus/quarantine references etc.

Enjoy in particular: work (in all definitions) and people being competent at it, hurt/comfort, futurefic, ensemble pieces, playing with language(s), cuddling, scenes from everyday life.

Genfic is good, shipfic is good, although in the case of the latter I’d rather have a story that has something going on as well as pure romance, whether it’s a separate plot thread or a characterization arc.

I'm open to treats if anyone is so kind.

By fandom/characters (alphabetical):
Chronicles of Chrestomanci – Diana Wynne Jones (Chrestomanci, Michael Saunders)
Interested to see Michael Saunders in the tagset—I don’t think I’ve ever come across fic about him! It would be fun to find out how Michael came to the castle, how he and Chrestomanci work together, how he interacts with the other denizens there, what his backstory is. I love the carefully measured glimpses we get of Chrestomanci coming out of his vagueness to show just how formidable he is, and some of that would be neat from Michael's perspective! Other characters also very welcome, especially Milly, Janet, and Julia, or from the previous generation (?) Tacroy and Flavian.

False Doctrine Series - Alice Degan (Peachy, Kit, Elsa, Harriet)
As an amateur musician I'm interested in Peachy the disorganized composer--I'd love to read his perspective on the events of the book, with a good helping of music if at all possible. Or something from Harriet's point of view, I enjoy her down-to-earth practicality and wonder what her narrative voice would sound like too. (We get plenty of Kit and Elsa in the book itself, but I am very fond of them and have no problem if you want to write more about them as well!) Something about the four of them after the book would also be neat; pretty much anything in which I get to spend more time with the characters works for me....
(Also, as a long-shot, if you want to bring in an original character or two to show me what the conceit of the book looks like from a Jewish or otherwise non-Christian perspective, that would be FASCINATING.)
(Note: I have only read the first of the two books, so I'd like a fic that does not focus on the second book, although I'm not worried about spoilers if they come up.)

Lost Tomb Reboot (Huo Daofu)
I just find Huo Daofu and his sarcasm and his competence and his sharp dressing and his reluctant care a delight, and I will read anything you want to write about him—what he does post-canon, something from his point of view set during LTR, you name it. (I haven’t seen the other Lost Tomb things but I’m open to something involving Sha Hai and other parts of his backstory, as long as it’s not the whole entire fic; no worries about spoilers.) If you want to pair him off with someone, I have a thing about Huo Daofu/Bai Haotian (I’ve written one fic about them under my other AO3 name, scherzanda, and also received a terrific gift fic with this pairing, but more is always good), and I tend to subscribe to past Huo Daofu/Wu Xie, but I’m okay with other ideas as well.

Pseudo-Edo SF art – Yamaguchi Akira
See my comment on the Yuletide promo post for details. As linked there, you can also find the paintings in question here among other places. I’ve narrowed down the paintings to three, but pretty much anything by Yamaguchi in the same style would work. I’d love a random story set in this setting—a slice of life, a bit of alternate history, you name it. Especially if it features trains!

Steerswoman Series – Rosemary Kirstein (Steffie, Zenna)
Steffie is probably my favorite character in the whole series, against stiff competition--I like his meticulous way of thinking things out, his practicality, his kindness, and his deadpan quasi-humor. I’ve been given a wonderful Steffie fic in the past, but I’m always up for more. I’d love to see him working with Zenna in Alemeth, learning to be a steersman and figuring himself and his town out, while Zenna gets started on her new life as well. (I love Zenna too--her easy-going calm, which seems partly innate and partly a coping mechanism she's worked out, and her interest in the people around her. I love the way all the steerswomen (and proto-steersman Steffie) have their own distinct ways of solving problems.)

Thank you!

Because I’m procrastinating on work and writing, my Yuletide post.

My gift: What Tomorrow Brings, by teyla, for The Rebel. Post-canon, a meeting again. Not a context for Chen Moqun and Lin Nansheng that it would have occurred to me to imagine, but it really works, the characterization is excellent, punches are not pulled but at the same time there’s a hint of hope and care. In general I’ve had three wonderful gift fics in a row for this fandom and I feel very fortunate. (The same applies to Yuletide in general, where I’ve always been very well done by.)

Things I wrote: I had three very kind recipients, all with fascinating prompts that really deserve way more fic… .
the casting-forward of desire, Teixcalaan duology. I found this a lot of fun but VERY difficult to write, I think partly because, while I love the Teixcalaan books a lot, they are relatively new to me, and so the tone isn’t embedded in my brain the way older favorites are; I had to keep on going back to the books to check both details and general atmosphere, and I kept finding more things that made me think, I can’t do that! Also I ended up writing THREE examples of Teixcalaan poetry, talk about playing to my weaknesses.
From where she stands to where I stand, Steerswoman series. This allowed me to try out one of my favorite characters, Reeder (and, offstage, his father), and to lean into experimentation with the steerswomen’s principles. Writing post-canon Steerswoman fic always makes me LONG for more canon, when, but that’s inevitable. (Also, a dash of pure unintended Yuletide comedy. My fic title, from an in-canon lyric: “From where she stands to where I stand.” The title of my recipient’s additional treat, not by me and in a completely different fandom: “There she stands.”)
not one jot less than I am, The Rebel. The idea for this came together in one neat sentence or so the day before Yuletide reveals, and I started writing at 11 at night and finished, 4K words later, at 4 am the next morning. This is not my usual writing practice at all and I don’t plan to make a habit of it, but it was fun. That being the case it is not the most polished or the best conceived of anything I’ve ever written, but there are a few lines I really like.

Other things I read, ie especial recs (among a larger number of really good fics):

The Dark is Rising
What Sweeter Music, by sylviarachel The Will/Bran is very nice but the best part is Will as put-upon (but fulfilled) music teacher, obviously written by someone who’s been there.

Diana Wynne Jones
Gently Rise and Softly Fall, by liseuse. Post-The Lives of Christopher Chant, Tacroy and Rosalie work out some trust issues. Funny and also gently moving and thoughtful.
A Castle for a Romantic Poet and a Very Practical Witch, by redsnake05 Sophie and Howl get comfortable in the castle post-canon. Very good Sophie voice (“She very nearly forgave him”), sweet, romantic and funny.
Addendums, by ryfkah. The Homeward Bounders: letters to Jamie from his friends. PERFECT HELEN.
Waymarkers, by Izilen. Dalemark Quartet, Maewen growing up and learning how to live in both worlds. I like the modern-day worldbuilding, and the writing is lovely, just the right kind of spare.

Disco Elysium [I’ve never even played this game, just read enough about it to enjoy the fic]
Commute, by pomfret. Kim moves to the 41st Precinct, with some help. Lovely small moments of warmth and kindness.
Meticulous Attachment, by AntigravityDevice. Harry and Kim have an evening of intimate moments, involving sex, painfully attained shared understanding, and weird sandwiches. Gorgeous.

Lord Peter Wimsey
Some Like it Lukewarm, by Persiflager. Lord Peter and Charles Parker undercover in drag, finding their drab boarding-house-and-drag-show life unexpectedly memorable. Nice little cameos by canon and original characters, too.

Lost Tomb Reboot
Relatedly, by elenothar. Post-canon, Wu Xie spends some time with his uncle while Wu Erbai is recovering, and they practice communication in various languages. Such a good start on all the post-canon Wu Erbai fic I’d like.

Swallows and Amazons
all this covert of the blessed, by lastwingedthing. Nancy POV on a family vacation long after canon, with the torch passed to new pirates, and creative work continuing among the adults.

Tam Lin (Pamela Dean)
What’s to Come is Still Unsure, by edenfalling. A little bit of post-canon Molly and Robin, with a perfect Molly voice.

Teixcalaan duology
Yaotlek: A Retrospective, by poppyseedheart. Long after canon, Nine Hibiscus is officially, and unofficially, remembered. Really appealing original characters, elegant use of language and imagery, exciting ideas.

Happy New Year! I wish everyone a joyful, healthy, fulfilling year (and thereafter). I'm very grateful to friends on Dreamwidth for the mutual support and interest of this comfortably loose-strung community. Much love to all.
I have been on-and-off sick for most of the week--not corona as far as I can tell, just my usual headache/pain in the neck thing (literal and figurative, obviously) plus alpha. Mostly sleeping a lot and limply reading Yuletide. Still sort of iffy but mostly in one piece; there are one zillion DW posts I want to comment on among other online responsibilities, but I thought I would start with New Year's greetings and a bunch of Yuletide-related stuff I mostly had written up earlier. (Effect of writing in advance: this got quite long! Sorry.)

My Yuletide gift, as previously noted, was the amazing The One that Got Away by achray--I was so certain of the author that I almost cited her in my previous post, and delighted to be correct. This was a Yuletide of firsts in many ways for me and one was writing my assignment in the same fandom as my gift: mine was The Language of the Enemy. Between the fandom and the content, I feel like anybody already familiar with me probably guessed this one in two seconds flat (I know at least one person did!), but there it is. Much grateful to sakana17 for all her help. This was also the first time, out of sixty-odd fics on my AO3, I’ve posted an E-rated one there (albeit pretty mild as Explicit fics go), and also the first time I’ve used Choose Not to Warn. (For the record, I don’t think any of the major warnings actually apply, but in this fandom major character death is always sort of hovering ominously in the background, and it’s not easy to define the consent-related status of Chen Moqun/Lin Nansheng).
I doubt I will write any more Rebel fic (hah, when I say something like this I'm usually lying), but between achray’s fic and mine I still have so many thoughts about Lin Nansheng and Chen Moqun and Wang Shi’an and the way integrity, respect, self-respect and self-defense (and the lack of all of the above) intertwine in their relationships. Nothing I could actually write out, but still.

I also wrote a couple of treats, to translate a passion, to divide a sorrow (Harriet Vane writes a murder mystery) and Awful's Turn (the aftermath of Archer's Goon). Both were a lot of fun. One unexpected side-effect of the latter was that I finally got around to watching the 1980s BBC six-episode drama version of Archer's Goon that I've had bookmarked on YouTube for years and years, and was pleasantly surprised at how good it is! ( Read more... ) (I have also realized that my post-canon feelings for this book include not only Howard/Ginger but Quentin/Torquil/Catriona, and I’m not sure I managed to keep either of these out of the fic in question.)

Finally a handful of photos that struck me as auspicious.
( Read more... )

Be safe and well.

Amended from past years:
Thank you for writing something for me. With the exception of the do-not-like stuff, please take any and all of this as optional suggestions only, and do what works for you. Not all of the stuff I like, for instance, may be applicable to all the fandoms I've requested; choose what makes sense to you.

Do not like: darkfic in general, incest, humiliation, NC-17 for either violence or sex (no moral objections, it's just not what I enjoy reading), blatant out-of-characterness, rape/dubcon, Christmas themes (again, not opposed to their existence in general, just not Christian myself), coronavirus/quarantine references etc.

Enjoy in particular: work (in all definitions) and people being competent at it, hurt/comfort, futurefic, ensemble pieces, playing with language(s), cuddling, scenes from everyday life.

I tend to prefer genfic, but have no objection at all to background romance/relationships, or even a shipfic with a high gen ratio, as it were. Any pairing/threesome/etc. is fine as long as you can make me believe in it.

By fandom/characters (alphabetical):
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Thank you again.

Amended from past years:

( Read more... )

Amended from past years:

Thank you for writing something for me. With the exception of the do-not-like stuff, please take any and all of this as optional suggestions only, and do what works for you. Not all of the stuff I like, for instance, may be applicable to all the fandoms I've requested; choose what makes sense to you.

( Details here )

Amended from past years:
Thank you for writing something for me. With the exception of the do-not-like stuff, please take any and all of this as optional suggestions only, and do what works for you. Not all of the stuff I like, for instance, may be applicable to all the fandoms I've requested; choose what makes sense to you.

( Details )

Anyway, as above, please take from this what you see fit; I’ve made some fairly specific requests/prompts, but as long as you’re kind enough to observe the do-not-like list, I’ll be delighted to read whatever you wanted to write. Many thanks.