The smiler with the knife

Fiction, 2014 - Yuletide and more

tryfanstone — Thu, 01 Jan 2015 12:41:43 GMT

Yuletide was wonderful - it's the first time this year I've really felt able to write, you know? Although I should mention to you that I have been unfairly shirking irradiant's J2, so that's next on the list. But...

Firstly, the pinch-hit At Close of Day (website | AO3), for Alexander Kent's (Douglas Reeman's) Bolitho books - Age of Sail. I ran through everything with boats I could lay my hands on when I was a teenager, and I kept the Ramages for me and the Bolithos for Pet Mechanic, a big Patrick O'Brian fan. (No, not that kind of fan, although I have promised I'll write him into fiction one day, and if you ever come across a group of bikers from Durham who are well acquainted with fandom you know who to blame.) PM wasn't that keen - I nearly offloaded the books to Hospice at Home in October, and then thought, but what about Yuletide?

I was right. Although, oddly enough, I ended up researching the dark side of Georgian London, not ships of the line. Thomas Herrick/Richard Bolitho, this one, although very sadly no pirates for recipient Shorina.

Then the treat I do Have Such a Store of Dreams (website | AO3) for Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, for turtlebook. I know the film well, but hadn't seen it for years, and when I re-watched it occurred to me how homogenous the brides were - and to wonder what would happen if the roles were reversed. I had not realised how many colour-coded spreadsheets would become involved... "Red shirt smiles at blue dress..." I ought to add, this is the fandom of the Magically Disappearing Story, because I'm convinced at one point there were two stories listed and the other one looked fab.

Then, for Nicholas Monsarrat's The Cruel Sea, The Sea, The Sea (website | AO3), a crossover with Mary Renault's The Charioteer. I'm so very, very grateful to lillibulero, whose superb prompt this was - I loved writing this story. Where do I start?

Re-reading The Cruel Sea was such a pleasure. It's such a good book.
I'd never seen the film, and having done so, was really intrigued by the difference between film and book - I came out of the film sharply sympathetic towards Ferraby.
Re-reading The Charioteer was an interesting experience. I'd loved it when I was young - of course I did, Mary Renault's books and Well of Loneliness were about the only things I could lay my hands on at that point - but always did find Renault's modern novels less appealing than her historical work. Re-reading - eh. Well I came out the end of it shipping Andrew/Ralph, which is probably not the intended idea!
This is the first crossover I've ever written. It wasn't too bad?
The only other people I know who have written The Cruel Sea are Lilliburlero herself, A J Hall and my father.
The only published thing I remember having read in either fandom previously is naraht's brilliant Að fara til Íslands. I'm shortly to remedy this, because I have a stinking cold, so an afternoon reading is just the ticket.

Then I picked up a pinch-hit for taabe, for George MacDonald's The Day Boy and The Night Girl, A Nightingale Sings in the Gardens of Cordoba (website | AO3). That's George MacDonald who wrote The Princess and The Goblin? This fairy-tale pastiche was great fun to write, although I was drawing on some very old memories of Cordoba and time was really short - I'm not at all certain I did right by Nycteris, here. Many thanks for this one have to go to bethia_cathrain cornered for yet another emergency yuletide beta.

And finally - I'd been struggling with this when I picked up The Day Boy and the Night Girl - of course I wrote Five Stories about Tenzing and Hillary (website | AO3), for fenellaevangela. Tenzing and Hillary, friends. I really, really tried to write proper fiction! And at this point I really have to give a shout out to isiscolo's Sonnet for George Finch - I didn't realise this existed until I checked the tags this morning, and it's fantastic!

That was it for yuletide. But I had a couple of stories I'd been playing with back in March I really wanted to get off the table for the new year. I really owe Doro for these - she's been fantastic.

Marvel - Tony Stark/Steve Rogers
Afterheat - website | AO3
Steve's tucked up in bed with the radio and a book, the lights dimmed and the moon shining in through the blinds, when sudden as an air-raid siren he hears an unearthly yowl....

Hockey RPF - Sidney Crosby/Evgeni Malkin
Five Stories in Wartime - website | AO3
Historical AU, set in Finland and covering the Winter War, the Continuation War, and the Great Patriotic War. The research for this was both fascinating and devastating, so you know, if you want to know about Magnitogorsk in the 30s, weaponry of the Finnish Civil War or Karelian poetry...most of it made half a sentence or less. But this is my personal favourite story, right now. I'm proud of this one.

It's time for some more lemsip. Happy New Year, people!

Last of the year - recs, Yuletide and otherwise (the cold and caves update)

tryfanstone — Wed, 31 Dec 2014 15:50:49 GMT

Last rec post of 2014. Happy Hogmanay!

General Recs:

Hamlet - Shakespeare, HIghlander, Hockey RPF, Inglourious Basterds (2009), The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien, Marvel 616, Teen Wolf

Hamlet - Shakespeare

indigostohelit's The Undiscovered Country, Hamlet/Horatio and Hamlet/Ophelia
It's 1959, and the mayor of Chicago is dead.

Superbly done reimagining.

HIghlander
This year I have neither written for nor beta'd for hlh_shortcuts, so it's the first time I feel comfortable rec'ing anything other than everything - I have absolutely no idea who wrote what! But I'm going to rec all the stories anyway for this holiday exchange - there are some gorgeous stories this year, and if you are at all interested, do take a look. Of everything, though, I really loved these, not because I thought them better than anything else, but because of the usual lure, for me, of both history and language.

Bye-bye Blackbird, Amanda, Duncan and Cory
Sometimes there are particular places and moments fondly remembered.

The language. Carnival at the start of the depression, America, absolutely perfectly done from stockings to big top - this is a story that swings.

Drive the Winter Cold Away, Duncan/Methos
Methos celebrates the Winter Solstice and Duncan's Birthday.
Author's notes: A baker's dozen drabble string.

Pefectly developed progression of gorgeous vignettes.

Hockey RPF

ionthesparrow's For the Roses, Sidney Crosby/Evgeni Malkin and Jeff Carter/Mike Richards
The bell shatters the quiet. The gates snap open and they run. Like blood through veins, like water over a cliff, they run like what they are: creatures bred for generations to fly.

If you're going to read one story about horse racing, this is it. Amazing piece of story-telling.

cheesewithmy's Frost Warning, Sidney Crosby/Evgeni Malkin
Sidney's life has always been different, but when he's hired in the middle of the school-year to replace the missing kindergarten teacher of a small town, things take a turn for the weird, even for him. There's a friendly bear. There's something wicked out in the woods. It's up to Sidney to figure everything out while trying to get settled in his new home.

Evgeni Malkin the werebear. Do I honestly need to say anything else? No, really, I was utterly charmed.

Inglourious Basterds (2009)

lonelywalker's The Fate You've Carved On Me, Hans Landa/OMC
Villains never get happy endings, but Nantucket's only gay Nazi is damn well going to try.

You won't be surprised to hear that I don't know this canon at all. But this story...I thought this was a tremendously brave story to write. I keep mulling it over, and for me that's something special.

The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien

marycrawford's On the Cold Hill Side, Gimli/Legolas Greenleaf
In the end, Gimli thinks, Legolas will steal his heart and sail away with it, and even the wonders of the Glittering Caves are not enough consolation for that loss. But when Aragorn calls for Gimli’s help in dismantling the hidden traps of Orthanc, everything changes.

"...even a dwarf is not so great a fool as to try and battle the sea itself.” I loved this for its description, and for its language.

Marvel 616

Teyke's Descent, Hank Pym/Janet Van Dyne and Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
A hundred years ago humanity fled to the skies to escape the Darkness spreading across the land. Now the Flying Cities are mysteriously sinking, imperilling every man, woman, and child who lives there. Together with the transmution mages Henry Pym and Lady Janet Van Dyne, and joined by the amnesiac immortal Dr. Donald Blake, High Wizard Anthony Stark mounts an expedition down into the Dark, determined to uncover the secrets of the magical calamity that wiped humanity from the face of the Earth.

This I loved for its startlingly imaginative, immersive story-telling, and also for the descriptions of stone and caverns and darkness.

Sineala's The Rest of Our Lives, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
It's the next year of the weapons expo, and Steve and Tony are back in Madripoor. Where there is one hotel with vacancies. Which has only one available room. Which has only one bed. Also Batroc is after them again. But that's not really the important part here.

Sineala, writing 616. It took ages to pin down which story to rec, and this post is half an hour late because I stopped to re-read...this one, because I'm fond of the original story-line, and I love the pitch and flow of the pace in this story, but it could be anything sineala's written, in this fandom or out of it.

Teen Wolf

sphesphe's Mush!, Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Two months away from his first adult-class dog sledding race, Stiles finds a big, black, surly dog at the local shelter with a tag inscribed Derek on the collar around his neck. Despite all sense, he decides to try training Derek as a sled dog. It's probably going to all end in tears.

Definitely a younger Stiles than I would normally read - but. Iditarod fic!! (Aliy Zirkle FTW forever!!!)

Revenant's Abominable, Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Where Derek buys a secluded cabin halfway up a mountain, meets a yeti and falls in love with Stiles, but not necessarily in that order.

OMG Yeti fic. Best Thing Ever. (I was all keyboard smash to V, but she just raised a patient metaphorical eyebrow, dammit.)

Yuletide Recs:

80 Days (Video Game 2014), A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess, The English Patient - Michael Ondaatje, Fiddler on the Roof - Bock/Harnick/Stein, Gun Street Girl (song) - Tom Waits, Ivanhoe - All Media Types, King Rat - James Clavell, Kingdom of Heaven (2005), Only Lovers Left Alive (2013)

80 Days (Video Game 2014)

Beside me singing in the Wilderness
The adventures of Behiye bint Kasim, Captain of the pirate ship Canavar, and her engineer and companion Bulbul.

This I came across because of keerawa's rec over on yuletide, and I'm really grateful, because this is both a grand and thoughtful steampunk romp.

A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess

Singing in the Rain
There was me, that is Alex, and my two droogs, that is Pete and Dim, Dim being really dim, and we had just goolied into the Korova Milkbar, a sparkling new mesto just opened up in our fair community. I viddied the place up and down, and I knew already, O my brothers, that this was a mesto after my own liking.

It's incredibly tough to sustain this kind of voice, and to do as well as it's done here - such an impressive piece of writing.

The English Patient - Michael Ondaatje

as if from ashes, Hana Lewis/Kirpal Singh
He walks out on to the small lane outside, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his thickest winter coat. He’s forgotten his gloves again.

Love, in absences.

Fiddler on the Roof - Bock/Harnick/Stein

New Tune, Same Fiddle
Tevye discusses his problems in the New World with his old Friend.

Tevye in America, with a little hope.

Gun Street Girl (song) - Tom Waits

Orphans
A head full of bourbon and a dream in the straw
And a Gun Street girl was the cause of it all

Again, for language, incredibly powerful and atmospheric.

Ivanhoe - All Media Types

A Course to the Ocean
To his deep disappointment, Brian de Bois-Guilbert is not quite as dead as he had imagined himself to be.

That's such a good summary. But this is a great second look at - and second chance for - Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Maurice De Brace, with perfectly pitched dialogue and description.

King Rat - James Clavell

Torre Annunziata
Peter Marlowe, still in his demob suit, bought a ticket at Victoria for the boat train.

Numb, uncomfortable post-book conclusion, so very well done.

Kingdom of Heaven (2005)

Continuitas
Baldwin is ill, but this is nothing new.

Kings are still kings in the dark. Quietly ruinous.

unmasked
"You dealt me my most crushing defeat when you were a mere sixteen years of age."

Two great kings, exchanging pleasantries. The last two lines are stunning.

Only Lovers Left Alive (2013)
Nope, don't know this canon either.

If all the world and love were young
Vampires in space, in a foul smelling tavern, and among a great many variously plush and shining Edwardian objects.
In addition, some music of the spheres.

This one I loved for language and world-building both, and for its lovely, sly humour.

Yuletide recs!

tryfanstone — Mon, 29 Dec 2014 16:49:37 GMT

14th Century CE England RPF

Jesu dulcis memoria
Master Ladislaus of Prague had found great success in England, since he came to London with Princess Anna who had become Queen Anne, God rest her soul.

Excellently done sideways look at Anne of Bohemia and Richard II, affectionately and so neatly written.

Bacchae - Euripides

Agave in Illyria
Poor Semele, in the garden,
Caught a god within her eye
And great Zeus, that boundless circle
Sighed and opened up his thigh.

And Agave, on the mountain
Heard a god say open wide

Fragmentary, vicious and clear-sighted elucidation, brilliantly done.

Cable and Deadpool

What Happens on Providence
Wade has a very, very serious complaint to make about the management around these parts. Trouble is, Nate might just have a solution.

Absolutely brilliant dialogue! I was sniggering all the way through this!

Cloudburst at Shingle Street - Thomas Dolby (Song)

At Shingle Street
It is July, 1940. German invasion of the British Isles seems imminent, and rumours of attacks and attempts and secret weapons abound.
For Hugh Wakefield, WW1 veteran searching for a point in life, and Werner Schultheiss, nineteen-year-old, unwilling German Army recruit, this may be the summer where everything changes, and everyone bursts free.

Hands up, this is my favourite story of Yuletide 2014. I think it's stunning, and I had a lump in my throat when I finished reading. Superbly reseached, and emotionally compelling.

Flight of the Heron - D. K. Broster

On Steadiness and Integrity
An AU in which Keith Windham does not escape capture in Edinburgh.

I loved this depiction of my own city in that brief period when Charles Stuart reigned in Scotland - beautifully done. But the questions of honour and integrity here are very neatly tackled, and everyone is beautifully characterised.

House of Niccolò - Dorothy Dunnett

Waves of Regret, Waves of Joy
Gelis prepares for their meeting with care. She is not like Katelina, who wore her unplucked brows as a sign of pride (of her slovenly nature, Gelis had told her during their last quarrel, and now could never repent). Her face, her hair in its careful symmetry, the shape of her body beneath her clothes – these are weapons, to be used for attack or defence as the situation requires. Her first meeting with Nicholas van der Poele in six years requires all of her arsenal.

Brilliant, knife-sharp analysis of Gelis' motives - absolutely stunning work.

Hyakujitsu no Bara | Maiden Rose

Inugami Monogatari
...in my place I am sending you a volume of fairy-stories from the East, translated and retold in our own tongue for the delight and edification of children of the West like yourselves...
With all of my love,
Uncle Hartmann

A fairy story AU of Maiden Rose, formal and beautiful and cruel.

James I: The Key Will Keep the Lock - Munro

Everything has come to ruin
There's a spot of blood on his hand. There's blood and mud and god knows what else covering him but there, on the back of his hand, there's a spot of Henry's black blood and his hands won't stop shaking.

There's such a desperate edge to this story. I found it compelling, even with the history behind the play itself. James I of Scotland and Henry V of England, dangerously intimate.

The Pacific

The things that was which I 'ave seen
Gene and Sid went to war and came back to home to Mobile—just not together.

Brilliant, painful evocation of friendship and family and community, and the men who went to war and came home.

Pride
Everything. People, I cried over Pride. I started crying about half the way in and couldn't stop. I even recognised the damn earrings, you know? So due warning, I am emotionally attached to this film.

and so this is...
When the world falls apart, some things stay in place.

Christmas, over time. I loved the vividness of both charcters and dialogue.

Disenchanted Angry Young Man
When he finds it, the vanilla sponge that his mother made every year on his birthday for eighteen years, Joe doesn't flinch. He gets out the eggs and the sugar. He doesn't cry.

Reconciliation, grief - a history in small things.

Step into Christmas (the admission's free)
Steph discovers she likes Christmas. Holiday fluff featuring chestnut stuffing, Sian's recipes, mermaids, orthographically correct inappropriate language, Welsh whisky and cameos by Mark, Joe and Mike.

This feels so real! Witty and generous and sweet.

Tigana - Guy Gavriel Kay

Fair Beginning
Alessan and Baerd in Quileia.

The story of the summer king and the thirteenth tree - if anything was ever a missing part of canon, this is it.

Unusual Dragon Hoards - iguanamouth

What Is Mine Is Not Yours
Necco is a small, struggling dragon, who can barely keep his hoard together, in a big town full of much more powerful, temperamental dragons. Some days, it's all he can do to stay alive.

I...don't even know what this canon is? But I really, really loved the descriptions of hoards and hoard-collecting - the knife hoard is brilliantly described, and the minute variations and negotiations of collecting pastries...

The Weirdstone of Brisingamen - Alan Garner

Afterward
Afterwards, Gowther goes to Fundindelve to have a few words with Cadellin.

I love this story. Even if you didn't know canon - and it's perfectly done if you do - this brief confrontation between farmer and wizard is brilliantly written: the consequences of magic.

Well of Loneliness - Radclyffe Hall

The Law of the Wind (that came stirring the sap)
Raftery watched Stephen go, and shifted in his stall. He did not understand English, it was true, but he was not an unknowing horse. Any creature raised in Ireland knew wizards, with the patchwork they'd made of his land so it was all seams. And he knew his rider, and loved her.
Horses are great gossips, and the word quickly spread – there was finally a wizard in the Malvern Hills, and she was Raftery's rider.

I cannot understand why there is not more Well of Loneliness fiction! But this is truly intriguing - an affirmative stealth crossover that really works for both Stephen and Miss Puddleton. And Raftery!

Y Gwyll | Hinterland

Ar Haner Nos yn Glir y Daeth (Upon the Midnight Clear)
A seemingly open and shut case results in Mathias and Mared hanging about the castle ruins late one night - and they find they're not alone...

It's so seldom you see anything about Wales in fandom! But this is both a murder mystery and a ghost story, perfect for the season.

...really ought to do ordinary recs too. I have two free days - but please don't hold your breath!

14th Century CE England RPF, Bacchae - Euripides, Cable and Deadpool, Cloudburst at Shingle Street - Thomas Dolby (Song), Flight of the Heron - D. K. Broster, House of Niccolò - Dorothy Dunnett, Hyakujitsu no Bara | Maiden Rose, James I: The Key Will Keep the Lock - Munro, The Pacific, Pride (2014), Tigana - Guy Gavriel Kay, Unusual Dragon Hoards - iguanamouth, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen - Alan Garner, Well of Loneliness - Radclyffe Hall, Y Gwyll | Hinterland

Exchange season!

tryfanstone — Sun, 05 Oct 2014 08:43:05 GMT

Highlander! hlh_shortcuts is open for sign-ups, people: my favourite fiction exchange for my best-loved fandom. It's only 500 words minimum! You can squeeze it in! Meeethos!

...having said that, given that I'm not really up for social stuff right now, I've already said to ace ringmistress amand_r that I will pinch hit anything (and will end up so doing) but don't want to, you know, actually exchange with its letters and posts and stuff, so I feel horribly guilty advertising the thing to you. Honestly, this year would have been the mother of all DNW letters, so really, best left to next year. Same goes for yuletide, although hoping to write treats does mean that I really, really need to get stuck into the fandomaid fic I still owe. Before sign-ups! There is a plan!

...now, hm, I think I need to clean the windows...and the sink...

Then on my blood-stream I yet will carry you

tryfanstone — Sun, 14 Sep 2014 13:03:26 GMT

That's my dad and me.

I'm not going to talk about Dad dying. It's not what matters about his life.

When I was small, my dad was my hero. He still is.

My dad was a breaker of rules. He took his coffee black, hated prejudice in any form, painted, wrote. He was generous with his time and his prayers. He had the biggest grin - it's the thing everyone remembers, my dad's great grin, his laugh. He had little patience with stupidity, but you'd never know it, he was too kind to let you know. He was passionately interested in religion - or rather faith, because my father despised exclusionary belief. Any discussion inevitably defaulted to politics, by which he was fascinated. He read, always. He was a long distance walker, a cyclist, a sailor, a man who should never have been let loose with a spanner or a screwdriver in his hands (he introduced himself to his new neighbours at one house by putting a spade through the gas main). He knew the value of silence, but his friends were made for life.

Dad apologised to me once for not being around much when I was very young. He wasn't much interested in babies, he said. I don't remember, I said, and anyway, I'm not that keen myself.

I'm pretty sure Dad didn't mean to bring to up in his own image - in fact, I know he didn't, he believed very strongly I should be my own person - but he did. I grew up with Arthur Ransome and Gerard Manley Hopkins, Richard Adams and Gwen Moffat: I don't just remember bible verses, I can quote three different interpretations and believe none of them. I can't remember not knowing how to read a map and compass. Rules are there to be broken. Speed limits are for other people. At work, your job is about people, not things. The most valuable gift you can give is time and understanding. Charity, generosity, is silent and constant. Education is invaluable and for life.

Death, my father said, is just something that happens.

But we never did talk much, my dad and me. We didn't need to.

He left a letter, my dad, when he died. It's very dad - two paragraphs of practical stuff (I found afterwards the files on his laptop where he'd valued his belongings for probate), two pages of financial advice. He says at the end, "Keep your chin up, and don't let anyone tell you what to do."

He left also one model railway, half finished, and Book 2 of the Swallows and Amazions epic he'd been writing. He must have been so amused about that - I am smiling now, I didn't know it existed, but it's a massive, longhand file and I've got it sitting on my windowsill at the moment. It'll get typed and published, next year.

I always thought, when Dad died, I'd be so angry with him for leaving me with the things I'd have to manage in his place. But actually, I kind of feel, it's my turn now, better roll my sleeves up and get on with it. I always thought, I'd miss him so much. I do, but - in dying - eh. I said I wouldn't talk about my father's death. But I know, now, that in the face of what happened when my father died all regrets and sorrows are, not irrelevant, but so much lessoned grief itself has lost all fear. I can grieve my loss, but not his death: my father is not gone. I'll never hold his hand again - my father was a small man, my height, but his hands were massive, warm, fleshy, utterly safe, fearless - but I know with absolutely certainty that I was, and remain, loved beyond all encompassing.

Dads, eh. Of course I think mine's special, he's mine.

I didn't wake up this morning and think, hm, it's about time I talked about Dad on LJ, although I knew I was going to make this one post, sometime. In fact, this is the Sunday of my busiest week of the year - it's half oneish now, I need to be in work in just about an hour, and were it not for the brilliance of my temporary team this year, I'd have been in from 7. But I do feel things are at last settling down: probate is very nearly complete, the nightmare of the new kitchen, bought the day before Dad was diagnosed with AML, is very nearly over, in two weeks, I'll have won or lost this year's gamble on sales, have had my once a year bottle of wine, and be able start writing again. I can catch up with people instead of pearing blearily at e-mails between work and bed (K, I'm looking at you.) So for me this post is, not a ending, but an intent to begin.

It's about time I wrote that novel.

In the mountains, there you feel free.

tryfanstone — Thu, 15 May 2014 13:28:05 GMT

Unovis here, posting for Jay.

On Sunday, May 11, Jay's beloved father died at home.

She appreciates your thoughts and support, but is unable at present to respond to comments or e-mail. She'll return online soon, to speak herself.

We all wish her well.

Breaking Radio Silence: Fic

tryfanstone — Wed, 30 Apr 2014 08:56:22 GMT

OMG finished.

This is not my story. This is my father's epic Swallows and Amazons novel, all 228261 words of it, which I have been editing on and off for the last two years and intensively over the last five weeks. People, I was pretty desperate to get this story posted as soon as possible, and I'm very happy to say that my father will indeed see it today on-line.

In all honesty, you'd have to be an outright fan of Swallows and Amazons and/or my dad (luckily, I am both) to read the whole thing. Dad took "show don't tell" to heart, created the Mary Sue to rival all Mary Sues in his Titty, and somehow managed to write a entire chapter about accountancy. However, he also wrote at length about walking and climbing in his beloved Lake District and in Scotland, about sailing off the East Coast, and rather poignantly, about Cambridge University, because my father could not go to university and instead earned his qualifications the hard way.

So I can tell you that I'm particularly fond of the later parts of Chapter 7, a lovely evocation of sailing off the Suffolk and Essex coastlines, and also of the beginning of Chapter 14, where Titty rescues one of her climbing companions.

Book One, on AO3.

Books two and three exist in notes only, but at some point I will try and pull those summaries together.

In other news...I haven't even looked at my in-box for a week and a half now, but will try catching up this week. Slowly, it's taken three hours to post this entry here and on Dreamwidth.

Hope very much all is well with you.

State of play

tryfanstone — Thu, 03 Apr 2014 20:57:10 GMT

I will be absent from fandom until further notice. This is not a permanent hiatus, but it will be a lengthy one, and I am exceedingly unlikely to be able to answer comments or e-mails. I'm truly sorry if you're waiting on comment or reply, or will be.

/comments disabled. It's not that I don't value you, I do, but I truly do not have time to answer.

Watching ice-hockey in Moscow

tryfanstone — Sun, 02 Mar 2014 16:06:52 GMT

People, q_i and I went to Russia. We came back yesterday from Saint Petersberg - the sun was shining, but all the flights to Kiev were cancelled.

This post, though, is about small, stunning moments of beauty in a country I loved.

Due warning: I don't like photographs, I didn't take a camera, so don't please don't expect anything great on the image front. Please assume all planes and trains were fine, there was coffee when needed (pistachio latte in GUM, espresso in the Hermitage), many books, sadly very little snow, and much cake. Few Tsars, but while I managed to drag q_i to far too many Great Patriotic War memorials, we failed on her Saint Petersberg railway museum (closed) and she did not manage to bring back a Russian Navy sailor, with uniform or without.

I was quite relieved. Passport control would have been interesting.

We started early, in Moscow, with the Romanov Boyars House, mica windows and tiled stoves, and although the English Court was closed we still wandered around the outside. That's the house from Dunnett's The Ringed Castle, built for the Muscovoy Company in the sxteenth century. Here, for the first time, cloakrooms and plastic overshoes (such a good idea) and early manuscripts and books as a matter of course. St Basil's brought us onto Red Square, the cathedral utterly charming with its painted ceilings and unexpected light, medieval brickwork and sonorous sound system - massive pots embedded in the walls. These worked. Unexpectedly, in the tiny, ornate inner chapel, a quartet of Georgian singers, grave and beautiful.

Afterwards, I had to admit I'd walked right past Lenin's mauseoleum without even noticing. But the State Historical Museum with its Viking cathedral doors and glorious medieval tableware was superb - there's only so long I can stare at flints (Prehistory? Not my thing) but a hall full of Novgorod furniture and armour was mesmerising, and there were plastercasts of the Assyrian reliefs from the BM, my favourite palace decoration of any period.

That night there was ice-hockey from Sochi (I have the clipping from the Moscow Times with its handy summary of Hockey Russian) and a military serial on TNG which we followed in all its many episodes, specular staged shoot-outs and hospital visits - seriously, what was it with the white coats? (If anyone knows what this is called, q_i wants DVDs!)

Next day, we negotiated the Kremlin, the spectacular armoury ( tazlet, you'd love it) with its Turkish and German state armour, its English and Flemish guns - a sixteenth century eight-shot hunting gun, dueling pistols, horse trappings - the diplomatic silver epergnes, state carriages so heavy with gilt it'd be astonishing if they moved, and a sixteenth century carriage, a gift from James VI of Scotland (I of England), the first I've ever seen. I think we managed three cathedrals before fleeing, overcome by saints, down to the gardens. Here, we tried for the State Archaeological Museum, but it was closed, so we wandered down to Arbatskaya instead, because I'd wanted to see New Arbat since Kapitan Amerika. Then back to find Dom Knigi's House of Books unexpectedly surrounded by a medieval street fair of costume and skill-testing. (I bought here Leningrad, Seige and Symphony, and read it on the way to and in Saint Petersberg: I'd have brought the book with me if it had been out in PB in the UK.)

In the morning, the Great Patriotic War Museum, its massive plaza lit by the early morning sun. That's the towers of Moscow State University on the horizon, one of Moscow's Seven Sisters.

We'd accidentally managed to turn up on a day when there were several bands and many people in uniform, celebrating (we think) something to do with the first world war - but, oh, the band uniforms were gorgeous.

And from there back to Arbatskaya, and then down over a beautiful pedestrian bridge (not on my map!) to Gorky Park. Back via the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, with its excellent cafe and Brueghels and gorgeous Egyptian tomb portraits, more fun than the two in the Getty Villa although a little more battered.

That night we left for Saint Petersberg on the Grand Express, along the old Trans-Siberian railway line. I'll just leave that there.

Saint Petersberg meant the Arctic and Antarctic Museum, with its miniature dioramas and CCCP certificates, Polar Heros of the Soviet Union and relics of long-gone expeditions. They have wood from the Terim, one of Scott's sledges, a pair of boots from Shackleton's first expedition, so many books I couldn't read and would love to - and the friendliest museum attendents in Russia. But after tht we took advantage of the gorgeous day and wandered past the Admiralty and over the frozen Neva, around the island of the Fortress of Saint Peter and Saint Paul with its absolutely crazy sunbathers, and to the Cathedral of the Spilled Blood where I found, in the souvenir market outside the Field of Mars, the bust of Lenin I had promised communist Ben B in thanks for passport posting and retrieval services. Capitalism, comrades, has set root with some force among the sellers of tourist paraphenalia. But the canals were stunning in the evening light, and we walked back via the Winter Canal and the Alexander Plaza, so beautiful.

In the morning, the Victory Monument, stark and stunning, with the constant tick of the metronome, Leningrad's heart, the sound of wartime radio, underscoring the simplicity of both monument and museum.

That afternoon, to Pushkin (Tsarkoe Selo) with the best tour-guide ever, Alexander, so happy to be guiding in winter when we had many of the rooms empty for his small party of French and English speaking tourists, so slyly ironic about many, many things. In all honesty, half the reason I wanted to go was because my beloved Professor Jack was so excited that I'd have the chance to see the Amber Room, but having got there, the place was beautiful. Not so much the breath-taking, extravagent excess of the rooms of the palace, but the surrounding gardens and the work that went into the post-GPW/WW2 restoration. And finally, unovis' silver birches, these found just outside the gardens.

The next day - and the next - the Hermitage.
I'm glad I can map read.
Also I have to tell you that the internet cafe in the Hermitage sells the most delicious cakes, but that the bookshop is not brilliant. (Maybe I should put that on Trip Advisor? I'd totally be up for a four month sort-the-place-out secondment - Hermitage, please e-mail for details.) Have some random artefacts:

Here is a late Nineteen Century gentleman's smoking boudoir, for tazlet, and a tenth century Causcaus cauldron, because it really is, and a fantastical dog from somewhere near the Black Sea, again C10th. There are many, many more photographs of arrows with cuniform inscritions - lots of arrows - and Hittite iron and Russian art deco furniture and views from the Winter Palace and a chandelier and a picture of the Osprey Books in the shop for the very helpful Chris of Osprey Books, pictures of tiles and pottery and swords from the Golden Horde and Turkish armour and Iranian flasks and German lustreware and... and... (paintings...yes. But, I am so sorry, painting people, I do like artefacts just a little better.) And also, the C9th-C10th Altai of Southern Siberia.

Five rooms, Six monographs, in Russian. People, I am in love. The fabric preservation. The wood. The horses. The decoration, the felts, the harnesses -

I have many, many photographs, all equally dim in the low light. But lest you think the Altai are all about shamanistic ritual and carved wood ornament of startling and violent beauty, fantastical antler head-dresses and full-body tattoos and vast round-hut emplacements, chariots and swords, there is also softer art:

I could talk for a very long time about the Altai, but I'll probably write them instead.

People, we had an amazing time, and I feel so very lucky to have seen just this very small part of the country, and incredibly grateful to my parents, because this was my much-delayed fourtieth birthday present. And already today I've been looking up where to go next. But I also have to tell you that yesterday, when we flew out of Saint Petersberg, after I'd seen the cancelled Kiev flights and picked up an English language newspaper, I was looking out of the window as we left.

You can still see the shell-holes in the fields around Saint Petersberg.

our address books for so long a slow scramble / now are palimpsests

tryfanstone — Sat, 15 Feb 2014 14:53:08 GMT

Recs! (Pease don't ask about the writing just now. It will be fine.)

Football RPF

Rave - Set Me As A Seal Upon Your Heart (Cristiano Ronaldo/Ricardo "Kaká" Izecson dos Santos Leite) Locked on AO3.

Cris is a half-demon. Ricky is a priest.

What I liked: Faith, demons, family issues, a confident, casual writing style.

Generation Kill

indigostohelit - The Spaces Between the Stars (Brad Colbert/Nate Fick)

Lieutenant Nathaniel Fick of the USS Devil Dog is returning to Earth with the weight of the world on his shoulders: his captain is incompetent, his crew is half in mutiny, and the mission to a distant star may have been more of a failure than anyone could have comprehended. But on the journey back, something in the ship goes terribly wrong—and Nate may have to bear far more than the weight of the world if he's going to keep his men safe.

What I liked: This is a tour de force. Seriously, it's a stunning, stunning piece of writing.
That said, do not do what I did and fail to read the warnings before you are transfixed by the story. Or stop reading almost at the end, when the lifeboat leaves the ship.

Hockey RPF

jezziejay - Somewhere Only We Know (Patrick Kane/Jonathan Toews) Locked on AO3.

Kaner kicks off his twenty-eighth birthday party with an exponential crisis.
Jonny frowns at him. “You’re having a crisis of ever-more-rapidly-increasing numbers?”

What I liked: The uncompromising language. Direct, forceful, breathtaking.

KAT-TUN

Maayacola - Across a Bridge of Magpies (Akanishi Jin/Kamenashi Kazuya)

Remix of bellemelody's The story of the brave Samurai and his beautiful Geisha... There are two timelines: Late 2012, and movie-time (1853/54.) The poems are all from the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu, a famous anthology of classical Japanese tanka compiled in the thirteenth century by Fujiwara no Sadaie..

What I liked: Interconnecting stories, beautifully anguished enemies and lovers.

haikuesque - 9½ weeks (Akanishi Jin/Kamenashi Kazuya)

Thirteen years after leaving KAT-TUN, Jin finds his life hasn't really gone as planned. The last person he expected to show up and rub his nose in it is Kamenashi. The last thing Kamenashi expected was that he'd keep coming back..

What I liked: Favourite trope. Post-canon, character in depressed circumstances encounters successful old friend/lover. I hesitate to say romance occurs. Love, perhaps. This one is very well done.

haikuesque - The Same Deep Water As You (Akanishi Jin/Kamenashi Kazuya)

Kame's got his reasons for seeing prostitutes. Jin's got his reasons for being one. Life is pretty screwed up..

What I liked: Utter immersion in a completely different world. Reading, this honestly doesn't feel as long as it actually is, and the grand array of characters made for a rich reading weekend.

Les Trois Mousquetaires | The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas

Unovis - The Confession of Charlotte Backson (Milady)

Milady confesses. Backstory for Milady, born Charlotte Backson.
Originally posted in December 2005.
Contains a non-graphic reference to a rape. Also a naughty nun.

What I liked: It's unovis. Religion, rage, love.

Marvel

northatlantic (breakthecitysky) - It Will Probably Accelerate (Steve/Tony, plus many others) Mixed canon.

So the working title of this was variously 'mixtape,' 'how steve rogers got his groove back' and 'oh my god quit thinking of things to add.' Steve's perspective of the assembly of the Avengers after the dust has settled and the rebuilding begins.

What I liked: Steve's anger and sense of displacement.

Kiyaar - This Mess We're In (Steve/Tony) Comics canon, Secret Avengers.

Steve is a troll, Tony is obliging. Everyone gets done. Set in that fictional interval during Secret Avengers where Steve is a Commander and he and Tony are actually on speaking terms. Unabashed porn.

What I liked: Sharp-edged banter, desperation, fragility and endurance.

My Chemical Romance

deadpegasus - L For Lucky (M for Mine) (Ray Toro/Mikey Way, Frank Iero/Gerard Way, Mikey Way/Pete Wentz)

“Yeah, look.” Mikey turns his head to peer at the crowd over his shoulder. “This is going to seem weird, but.” He stares behind him and seems, for a moment, at a loss for words. “Well, there’s no tasteful way to say it.” Mikey looks Ray in the eye and just shrugs. “This is a highly organized sexual gathering for very specifically kinky people.”
Ray feels a bit of spittle lodge in his throat and tries his best not to sputter when he disagrees, “That’s actually a pretty tasteful description of an orgy.”

What I liked: Nicely done - eh, I want to say swingers AU, but that's not quite right. Orgies, though, definitely.

National Football League RPF

ionthesparrow - Take, Eat (Brett Favre/Aaron Rodgers)

Brett always gets to say where. Brett always gets to say when.

What I liked: I have no idea who these people are. But this is a subtly disturbed piece of fiction, excellently done.

ionthesparrow - This Won't Hurt (Alex Smith/Dustin Colquitt)

The average NFL QB stands 6’3” and weighs about 225. The average quarterback career runs about 6 years, depending on who you believe, and allowing for the variance generated by guys like Blanda and Favre, and all the cup-of-coffee players littering the other side of the bell curve. All that makes it seem Alex is sitting pretty square in the middle of things, average in all senses of the word.
But Alex has always been exceptional.

What I liked: I have no idea who these people are either. But this is another gorgeous piece of fiction, same author. Written for yuletide.

Original Fiction

Iron Eater in s2b2 (Shousetsu Big Bang) - Seismic Gap and sequel The Stones' Earthen Grasp (m/m)

Orcs in love.

What I liked: See above. Gorgeous piece of story-telling.

Rise of the Guardians and Guardians of Childhood

not_poignant - From the Darkness We Rise and Into Shadows We Fall (Jack Frost/Pitch Black)

Twenty two years have passed since the defeat of Pitch, and Jack lives alone, touch-starved, with only the company of a solitary Nightmare. One evening the Man in the Moon sets him on a path that will lead him to unexpected relationships, draw the attention of the Guardians to a new coalition of villains, and challenge Jack's every notion of what it is to be good, evil, and what it is to live in the shadows.

What I liked: Absorbing piece of story-telling, grandly themed. (There are some lovely stories coming out of this Rise of the Guardians canon.)

Supernatural

dear_tiger - Love and Crocodiles (Sam/Dean)

Dean is trying to follow Sam down into Hell. There is a guy who can get him in, but in exchange he wants to eat Dean's love all up.

What I liked: Dean.

Teen Wolf

breenwolf - the devil won't let me be (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

After Halloween, Stiles has two questions that need answering.

What I liked: Questions of identity. Not so much the question of sexuality, but the sense of possibility framed by awkwardness. Also, porn.

Anonymous - Catch Your Breath (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

The Bait Bus AU, in which unsuspecting straight guy Derek is lured into the bus by a beautiful young women named Erica and agrees to be blindfolded and get a blowjob on camera. Only to discover he's being sucked off by the ever so eager, ever so male Stiles.

What I liked: What the hell was I reading the other day? Eh - the biography of gay porn star Al Parker. So, Al Parker and his partner given to cruising California in a converted truck, luring happy young men into threesomes and moresomes.
Perfectly timed, perfectly done, this story.

Chash - Tsundere (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

Tsundere is a Japanese character development process that describes a person who is initially cold and even hostile towards another person before gradually showing his or her warm side over time.
(Or, Stiles goes to college and his roommate is a catboy.)

What I liked: Grumpy, angry cat!Derek. Also, Chash's comic timing is always brilliantly spot-on.

Siria - tiger, tiger, burning bright (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

“So dude,” Stiles called over his shoulder, “not to alarm you or anything but there’s a tiger in our back yard.”

What I liked: Simple, beautifully constructed sentences. Also, it made me smile.

twisting_vine_x - A Road That's Built To Last (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

Stiles is driving the Trans-Canada highway, all the way from Toronto to Vancouver. He's always been told that it's a bad idea to pick up hitchhikers, but, somehow, he's still got someone riding shotgun with him, and he's starting to think it might be one of the best decisions he's made in a long time.

What I liked: Connections, disconnections, the sense of isolation and impermanence.

Eh, AWOL for a while from Friday. Even more than now.

OK, so....

tryfanstone — Tue, 07 Jan 2014 19:25:17 GMT

People, it was merriman who wrote the absolutely gorgeous Deaccession for me in hlh_shortcuts. It's on AO3 now, too - books in space! How can you resist? Although in all honesty my favourite part of this story is merriman's superb re-imagining of the Library of Alexandria - it's just gorgeous.

Summing up in brief, the months before Christmas were, frankly, pretty grim for writing. I feel I totally short-changed pat_t (who wrote the really superb Escape from Purgatory for me a couple of years ago, Highlander/SPN) with An Incomplete Lexicon of Unwarrented Festivaties (Duncan/Methos), and managed a last-minute solitary pinch-hit for yuletide (Twa Turtledoves and a Cockerel in Clover) for aurilly, who asked for Dunnett, Francis Crawford/Christian Stewart, if Christian had lived. The prompt was so good, irresistible. And I did manage that Marillion treat as well - Punchline, for athersgeo. I did not, I swear, set out to write lyrics!

In retrospect, I'm really glad I didn't actually sign up properly for yuletide. My father has had shingles, really badly. I was with parents in Penrith for two weeks at the end of Oct, and have been there every weekend since: it is awful, absolutely awful, to see someone you love in such pain and be unable to do anything to help. He says he actually can't remember anything from the end of October to mid December, and...I'm really glad he can't. He's in less pain now, out of bed, thinking about the model railway and the S&A novel - much better.

That made writing difficult. (I smile: understatement.) I'm hoping things will be better this year, and although have effectively had to drop out of smallfandombang, I have not given up hope on this story. 2014 will be the year I finally write Generation Kill!

- Happy New Year, people. I hope it's unexpectedly and bountifully great for you!

Yuletide recs

tryfanstone — Fri, 27 Dec 2013 20:21:05 GMT

AO3 remains the only bibliographic index user of which I am aware that, infuriatingly, continues to list books under title and not author's surname as a primary reference. Grumpily, I've done the same here.

Recs:

Fandom: 莊子 | Zhuāngzǐ - 莊周 | Zhuāng Zhōu

Story: On Bigness (莊子 | Zhuāngzǐ/Original Female Character)
Author: DaisyNinjaGirl

Summary: In the darkness of the Northern Ocean, Zhuang Zhou muses on bigness...

What I liked: Meditative, sly, quietly humourous story which is beautifully written, a joy to read. I loved the small circles of ideas and imagery - I felt I'd been reading something akin to a stone falling in a small pond, concentric, slow ripples of words.

Fandom: Appalachian Murder Ballads

Story: Rose in June
Author: RecessiveJean
Summary: For all it was such an inconvenient place to live (what with the zombies, and all) even now I'm dead I can't quite bring myself to leave.

What I liked: The dialect. I've no idea how accurate it is (although I suspect, very) but the rhythm of speech, the language, is gorgeous, and the sense of place startlingly rich. It's melded seemlessly with a zombie apocalypse which is just one more day-to-day hazard.

Fandom: Black Sheep - Georgette Heyer

Story: The Aftermath of the Abduction (Miles Calverleigh/Abigail Wendover)
Author: redsnake05

Summary: For all it was such an inconvenient place to live (what with the zombies, and all) even now I'm dead I can't quite bring myself to leave.

Summary: After an abduction, there must be a gloomy house in the countryside filled with sinister retainers. Abby has no intention of letting it stay that way, and, all in all, she has high hopes of this abduction turning out rather better than any trashy romance one might do.

What I liked: Lovely cheerful and practical coda to the book - Abigail with tea and lists!

Fandom: The Charioteer - Mary Renault

Story: The Road to Rio (Crossover with Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome)
Author: greerwatson

Summary: A troop of Scouts from Lanyon's school go on a camping holiday in the Lake District.

What I liked: Lovely piece of writing, which is set between Pigeon Post and We Didn't Mean to Go to Sea, and in keeping with both. Although the small story of Scouts, Swallows, Amazons and D.s is well worth reading, it's the so very slight hints of future events which I found fascinating. Incidentally, I'm pretty sure this prequels recipient Naraht's own Að fara til Íslands.

Fandom: The Eagle | The Eagle of the Ninth (2011)

Story: Annum Novum
Author: exeterlinden

Summary: The merchant, Gnaeus, who had sold Marcus this property, had spoken of a solid main building, of well-kept pens and fertile soil, all newly abandoned by deceitful tenants and only cheap because he was tired of the whole business and wanted the land off his hands for good. He had talked of neighbours and a village nearby with opportunities of trade, but he had entirely failed to mention that the house seemed to lay deep in tribal country.

What I liked: Quiet, but not simple examination of Marcus and Esca settling after the end of the film. A new year indeed.

Story: Wherever You Go
Author: Alby_Mangroves

Summary: “We might be meat for hounds tomorrow,” Esca rasps, feeling the words scrape his throat raw and watching for understanding in Marcus’ eyes. They have no time to waste now. None at all.

What I liked: Definitely film-based, desperate scene of gorgeously written hurt/comfort porn.

Fandom: Edward II - Marlowe

Story: Exeunt
Author: skazka

Summary: "Tell me, sirs, was it not bravely done?"

What I liked: Vicious and highly disturbing dialogue from the point of view of Lightborn (Lucifer), Edward II's assassin in the play. Brilliantly written.

Fandom: The Fast and the Furious Series

Story: it's hard to do these things alone (Brian O'Conner/Dominic Toretto,Gisele Harabo/Han Lue)
Author: electrumqueen

Summary: Brian doesn't lie to cars. He doesn't lie to Dom either, but that's a newer development.

What I liked: Brian talks to cars, and cars talk back. The Charger and the Supra of the first film (this is set between five and six) are given perfect voices, and I really love the author's characterisation of both American muscle cars and of imports. It sounds like crackfic, but there's a fascinating depth to this story.

Fandom: Frankenstein - Nick Dear

Story: Ouroboros (Creature/Victor Frankenstein)
Author: kangeiko

Summary: Victor collapses in the Arctic. The Creature intervenes.

What I liked: Lies, love, ice. Thoughtful and wincingly sharp vignette.

Fandom: The Hour

Story: Paris (Randall Brown/Freddie Lyon)
Author: doveheart

Summary: A bar, a man of fifty looking for a girl of twenty.

What I liked: Perfectly delineated drabble on, I think, expectations. Loved it.

Fandom: Hyakujitsu no Bara | Maiden Rose

Story: Sacred Ground (Taki Reizen/Klaus von Wolfstadt)
Author: petrichoral

Summary: Klaus believes in things he can touch, not superstitions and mountain spirits. He doesn't see any problem in cutting across a sacred mountain to surprise the enemy.
But the spirits are more real than he thinks. Now he has to decide whether to risk bringing their curse down on Taki, or abandon Taki and let it run its course - though he can't see any way he's getting out of that alive.

What I liked: This is gorgeous. It's rich with the mythic imagery, frustrated passion, formality, and violence which is the hallmark of the original canon, perfectly depicted.

Fandom: Irish Mythology

Story: The Three Sorrows of the Deer-Folk of Ireland
Author: Daegaer

Summary: Many sorrows were brought on the deer of Ireland by clan Uí Baiscne; the slaying of deer by fleet-footed Fionn and his stealing away of Sadhbh to be his wife, and the two-fold loss of Oisín, who should have been their own.

What I liked: Both the rhythm of the language of this story, and the inevitable sorrows, so sweetly and sadly delineated. In particular, the normalisation of transformation - animal to human - and also the sense of both time and magic passing.

Fandom: Moby Dick - Herman Melville

Story: The Hen Frigate (Captain Ahab/Mrs Ahab (Moby Dick))
Author: the_alchemist

Summary: Melville describes Ahab's wife as a 'sweet, resigned girl'. But what if she wasn't?

What I liked: The dark comedy of the immensely practical Mrs Ahab. It'd be very easy, too, to make her the heroine of the piece, but like all the best characters Mrs Ahab too has her flaws, and for her not her whale but her husband is the chimera she follows.

Fandom: The Losers (2010)

Story: we're all adults here (Carlos "Cougar" Alvarez/Jake Jensen, Aisha al-Fadhil/Franklin Clay)
Author: misura

Summary: The kind of conversation people have when they've been stuck in a safehouse for too long.

What I liked: Shapeshifter AU, short and sweet - I loved the wordplay in this one.

Fandom: The Outsiders - S. E. Hinton (crossover with The Wire)

Story: Dawn Goes Down To Day (Johnny Cade/Dallas Winston)
Author: Sharksdontsleep

Summary: The new kid drops into the chair closest to Johnny. “Pass me that worksheet, will ya,” he says, with a twang that says he’s not local.
Johnny and Dally, in Baltimore.

What I liked: The High School AU I never knew I wanted to read. Dirty, gritty and real. It says something worth hearing, too, this story, about cycles of violence and love.

Fandom: Le Roman de Silence | The Romance of Silence

Story: Le Silence de Roman
Author: Lyrstzha

Summary: Good Master Heldris of Cornwall
Promised Silence a happy fall
From valiant knight to queenly maid,
Changed a spindle for a blade.
But that fate was far too quick;
Joy is not a three-day trick.
So let Master Malduit tell you all
You've never heard from old Cornwall.

What I liked: I started laughing at the author's comment - 'I certainly did not go into Yuletide thinking, "This year, I want to write an epic in iambic tetrameter heroic couplets!"' and carried on smiling throughout this heroic, ironic, witty piece of...iambic tetrameter. There's both a modern sensibility and a medieval rhythm to this tragical tale, and I loved both.

Fandom: Rush (2013)

Story: Slide (Marlene Lauda/Niki Lauda, James Hunt/Original Female Character(s))
Author: Roadstergal

Summary: James pays Niki a visit, Niki pays James a visit. There is driving, there is swearing, there is a great deal of friendship.

What I liked: The casual, immediate rivalry and friendship between Niki Lauder and James Hunt so insightfully written. I really like the language, too - the pad-pad-pad of Niki Lauder's cat - but this story feels real.

Fandom: Roustabout (1964)

Story: Winter of His Discontent (Maggie Morgan/Joe Lean)
Author: Qwilleran

Summary: He's an old sourpuss with a drinking problem. She's a carnival owner with a few messiah issues. They've been friends so long there's nobody who doesn't treat them like an old married couple.

What I liked: There's no happy endings, but the show still goes on. Older people fiction, with the weight of friendship and the tangled obligations and bruises of life delineated perfectly in this fierce, compassionate piece of writing.

Fandom: Stalky & Co - Rudyard Kipling

Story: King and the Maiden
Author: Ione

Summary: An interlude never discussed by Number Five

What I liked: Schoolboy humour, written so very well, with an elegantly turned and warm adult sophistication. It's the slyly humourous tone of this story which I found enchanting. The slang is perfect, but it's the rat-taming, slingshot-wielding Elizabeth who steals the show!

Fandom: The Sting

Story: Aces (Henry Gondorff/Johnny Hooker)
Author: misura

Summary: “You know, kid,” Henry said, slowly unbuttoning his third shirt, “there's two things you should do when cheating at this game, and only one of them involves the cards.”

What I liked: A slyly witty piece of writing perfectly performed for film and characters.

Fandom: Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome

Story: Dispatches (Dorothea Callum/Nancy Blackett)
Author: labellementeuse

Summary: Do come up and visit me next time you get a bit of leave. Love, Nancy.

What I liked: Nancy and Dorothea, during the war. The language is perfect - both characters appearing as themselves, older; the 1940s setting is brilliantly realised; but I think what I liked most of all is the matter-of-fact growing affection between these two women. Lovely to catch a glimpse of the other Swallows and Amazons, too!

Fandom: Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome

Story: The Road to Rio - see Fandom: The Charioteer - Mary Renault. Crossover.

Fandom: Swordspoint Series - Ellen Kushner

Story: On Love, In Truth (Alec Campion/Richard St Vier)
Author: Leleke

Summary: Languishing in the harsh, brilliant light of an endless summer afternoon, Alec watches Richard practice against the wall of their sweltering room and wants.

What I liked: This sharp, elegant piece of sleight-of-hand is a beautifully understated character study - more in what is deliberately unsaid than the words themselves. There's not an excess syllable here, but the whole is perfectly done.

Fandom: The Wire - Crossover with The Outsiders - S. E. Hinton, see above.

Edited 01/01/14 to add authors.

I haven't got a lot to give, but what I've got I'll give to you

tryfanstone — Tue, 24 Dec 2013 11:23:29 GMT

Starting with Highlander!

If you didn't know already, the annual Highlander exchange fest hlh_shortcuts is posting at the moment, and I woke up this morning to the most glorious story! I'm going to summarise it as BOOKS IN SPACE! But you also need to know that it has an entirely gorgeous and equally corrupt space-age Alexandrian Library, and all sorts of filing systems, and complicated shenanighans with Amanda being awesome, and moments of heart-wrenching pathos to balance the shining adventure of the thing - oh, and Methos! It has Methos, with library, too. And it's pretty much all I could desire for Christmas, and if you'd like it too, you'll find it here - Deaccession.

Otherwise, other recs:

The Fast and the Furious

estrella30 - Rhythm and Blues (Brian/Dom)

From a prompt: Coming without being touched. (Which, huh. Now that I reread, I don't even know if this qualifies. Oh well *g*)

What I liked: Short, sharp and very hot.

Hockey RPF

Kelfin - A Month of Sundays (Erik Johnson/Gabriel Landeskog)

Unlike some guys, who freak out when things get even a little bit gay, Erik is fine with this stuff. Erik's not even fazed when Gabe's attempts at flirting with him start to get semi-public, a fact that, by his own judgment, makes him at least five to seven times more tolerant than your average forward-thinking American.

What I liked: I was smiling all the way through this story. You know, that wry, half-amused, half-rueful smile when you recognise every word? It's about religion and politics.

pentapus and twentysomething - Thou and You (Sidney Crosby/Evgeni Malkin)

There's no way to tell just by looking at someone whether or not they are a magician. Some are more obvious than others, but Evgeni has been introduced to thousands of people since coming to London and he has never been absolutely certain before.
But when Lady Everly says, "Oh, Your Highness, this is Mr. Crosby," Evgeni knows the man in front of him is a magician.

What I liked: The tone of this story. It's sixty thousand words of historical UST, and the tone is consistent throughout: I was truly charmed. This one, you can read as original fiction.

J2

deirdre_c - Throw Your Arms Around Me (Jensen Ackles/Jared Padalecki)

There were hundreds of houses, thousands of people who came to swim and play in Jensen’s lake, but Jared was the only one he cared to know by name.

What I liked: Best Tentacle Fic Ever. This is adorable. I love it.

The Last Unicorn

unovis - Come to Mommy (gen, Mommy Fortuna, Harpy)

She looked at the harpy and asked herself, "What do you see?"

What I liked: unovis' powerful, angry old women. So perfectly written.

Marvel

theladyingrey42 - Unfurl Your Gown (Steve Rogers/Tony Stark, MCU)

"I feel ridiculous." Steve scowls at his drink and pretends he's not shifting just to feel the skirt against his thighs.

What I liked: Hmm. Kinkfic, cross-dressing, but what I actually oved about this one was the quality of tenderness in this relationship.

Xparrot - No Such Liberty (gen, Thor, Loki, MCU)

Thor takes Loki back to Asgard in chains, but this does not mean that the god of mischief's schemes are ended, or that Thor has or ever will give up on his brother. But when Thanos threatens the realm to claim his lost prizes, on which side will Loki fall?

What I liked: Everything. I loved this story. I'd watch this movie. It's story I've always wanted for these two.

nerdwegian - We're Starting At The End (Clint Barton/Phil Coulson)

All Clint wants is to get through his afterlife with as little human interaction as possible. He's got his job, he's got good friends (as friendly as the Angels of Death ever are, anyway), and he's got his little apartment. It's not much, but it works for him--that is, until Phil Coulson's name appears on his assignment sheet. Over and over and over.
Surprisingly, Clint finds that he doesn't mind that much.

What I liked: Lonely and introverted person finds happiness. That’s pretty much it! I seem to have written this a few times as well... (See below!) This one has a glorious description of angelic rota duties.

phenominable_snowman - The Official Avengers Movie Night Movie Selection Bylaws (Steve Rogers/Tony Stark, MCU)

The world rushed in and Tony found himself inches from the crush of the virus, poised on the verge of the overwrite, that deep red tangle pooled in the base of his skull. And he wanted it.

What I liked: It's no secret I scare easily. I don't watch horror movies and I don't (after that embarrassing evening when pet mechanic had to come and rescue me) read horror books. So, if I tell you I was genuinely scared, you may not have the same reaction. Nevertheless, I was.

original fiction

staringatsuns in s2b2 - Undertow (original, art)

No description given.

What I liked: Simplicity.

Star Trek RPF

Medeafic - Men's Corsetry (Chris Pine/Zachary Quinto)

Chris discovers that he enjoys corsets, and bondage.

What I liked: I don't honestly think I can say this is the cross-dressing themes recs round with only two stories? Anyway, I liked this one for the loving description of sensation.

Supernatural

sonofabiscuit77 - Snowed In (Sam/Dean)

Based on the prompt "snowed in". There's an epic snowstorm in Kansas. Sam and Dean are stuck in the bunker, doing the gardening and cooking, arguing about climate change, having average sex, and (sort-of) talking about their relationship. Domestic Winchester future-fic, set about eight years post season eight. (No spoilers for season nine)

What I liked: Written for riyku in spn_j2_xmas, both of which are glorious things, this is an older person fic, and it's lovely.

Swordspoint

canis_m - Gasconade (Richard St. Vier/Alec Campion)

It was a fairytale; he would treat it as such.

What I liked: It rains. Richard and Alec snipe at each other. Everything is perfect.

Teen Wolf

Anonymous - never seen a man with so much dimension (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

"I'd like to hoard you," Derek said.
(Derek is a dragon. Lydia organizes his library. Stiles fails to rescue her.)

What I liked: Dragons. Books. I don't need to say more, do I?

leah k (blinkiesays) - Then You Think Again (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

"Holy crap! Why the hell did you lie to incredibly powerful magical beings with trust issues? How was that Plan A?"

What I liked: The way Stiles’ voice is written, young and darky humourous, a characterisation sustained throughout a long fic.

aprettysmalldose - Gotta love the classics (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

“Or you could just blow me,” He says, casual as all fuck.
Yup. That's pretty much the fic.

What I liked: My teenage id is showing. (Actually, that’ll be my early twenties, too. And the rest.)

jezziejay - I See Your Face Before Me (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

While Stiles was studying in New York, Scott moved to LA and found a new co-bestie. Stiles can't wait to meet him. The feeling, however, is far from mutual.
AU piece, based somewhat around one of the stories in the movie Love Actually. The end especially.

What I liked: Lonely and introverted person finds happiness. That’s pretty much it! I seem to have written this a few times as well...

unamaga - I Like It When You Tell Me (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

What Stiles has in his hands when he turns back around is definitely not a file, though. Instead, it’s thick and black, curved into a wicked-looking c-shape with a small bullet vibrator jutting out of one end.
“That is not what I was expecting,” Derek admits honestly.
“Yeah, I can tell, you’re turning,” Stiles gestures to his own face, “you’re kind of, um, pink.”

What I liked: Kinkfic, toys, beautifully constructed.

queerly_it_is - Dirty paws and furry coats (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

Stiles is eight years old when his dad brings Derek home.
[AU based on Disney's The Fox and the Hound]

What I liked: Enchanting story, with a little depth to it, too.

idyll - Kiss the Cook (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

Derek's a professional chef, and Stiles is a blogger who butchers his recipes.

What I liked: it's a story for anyone who has ever tried to cook something more complicated than ramen over a single ring or a campfire. Also... I like what it has to say about the relationship between food and love and family.

magneticwave - que tu m’aimais encore (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

Wolves mate for life, don’t they?

What I liked: Trope reversal and lovers reunited - I was always going to love this story.

ingberry - And We'll Be Complicated (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

Stiles already had his hands full with the case he was working on for the enigmatic Mrs. B. He really didn't need this too, but there was no changing the fact that he no longer remembered Derek Hale or anything connected to him. And no one could figure out why.

What I liked: Amnesia fic. I really liked this one for the books.

Venivincere - Derek Hale's No Bad Very Good Day (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

Derek Hale is having a good day. Something has obviously gone very, very wrong.

What I liked: Comfortfic!

- Happy Holidays, people: Happy Christmas to those who celebrate.

Fic: Blowing Soap Bubbles at the South Pole (Marvel, Steve/Tony)

tryfanstone — Thu, 21 Nov 2013 17:55:23 GMT

Fandom: Marvel. 616.
Pairing: Steve/Tony
Rating: NC-17
Wordcount: 25,000

Summary: Forty-eight hours: a graphic novel. 616 universe, futurefic, AU from the end of Stark Disassembled. Written for the cap_ironman big bang 2013.

Art: avienica produced two lovely illustrations for this story - posted here.

Beta: So very many thanks to doro, who stood stalwart and exact in the face of everything I threw at her for this story, with its triumph of style over structure, its finickity formatting and its miserable lack of plot. Thanks too to the anonymous helper who made this story, in its early stages, so very much better than it was to begin with.

Blowing Soap Bubbles at the South Pole

website | AO3

- I can't make AO3 justify right: this story appears as it is supposed to on the website link.

Fandomaid - Typhoon Haiyan

tryfanstone — Wed, 13 Nov 2013 22:33:23 GMT

fandomaid's buy-it-now Philippines fundraiser is currently running here, with the list of approved organisations for donations here. There are some amazing authors and artists and craftspeople offering aidgifts, and I've just signed up here. As usual, if you're at all interested, I'll be late (possibly very late, although next year's not too bad right now for fic committments) but I will deliver.

I'm truly sorry if you all know this already - I'm a little tangled in family stuff here in Penrith. Hoping to be home and around online a little more next week, but at the moment everything's a little unsure and ragged around the edges.

Fic: The Mountain (Marvel, Steve/Tony)

tryfanstone — Tue, 12 Nov 2013 07:50:08 GMT

Fandom: Marvel. Movieverse.
Pairing: Steve/Tony
Rating: R
Wordcount: 36,000

Summary: Sixty-two days without a single blade of grass, four hundred pitons, twenty-three stoves, six down-filled suits and a moth-eaten bow-tie. Summer 1968: Tony Stark vs. The Mountain. Written for the marvel_bang 2013.

Art: zephre created the gorgeous artwork, the image of Steve in the ice you see below and the one of Bruce's life-saving belay in the story, and posted about it here and here on AO3.

Beta: So many thanks to doro, working once again in a fandom she doesn't read and with an utterly distracted author. She works miracles.

The Mountain

website | AO3

Armistice Day, 2013.

tryfanstone — Mon, 11 Nov 2013 08:53:42 GMT

- night has fallen and the barbarians have not come.
And some who have just returned from the border say
there are no barbarians any longer.

And now, what’s going to happen to us without barbarians?
They were, those people, a kind of solution.

Cavafy, Waiting for the Barbarians
Translated by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard.

Incunabula

tryfanstone — Mon, 21 Oct 2013 11:18:34 GMT

A very long time ago, back when mementis and I were working on standing on the edge of nothing, we had a discussion about Generation Kill. I'd never seen the series, but I thought then and I think now that the fiction produced for this fandom is extraordinary. And because I was working with 1920s San Francisco at the time, it seemed a very short leap to thinking writing 1940s LA for this fandom (Hooker/Biker AU, post second world war) would be equally easy. Nearly two years later, I'm finally ready to write the story we were talking about then, but my schedule is brutal. I can do a 10K rough draft of a historical AU when I haven't yet seen the canon, in the gap between hlh_shortcuts and yuletide deadlines and Jan 31st, no?

I can try. Pimping anyway: smallfandombang. I signed up late, you've got ten days. Sign-ups close Oct 31st.

A 10,000-word big bang for small fandoms!

FAQ | Rules | Authors | Beta/Cheerleader | Affiliate

On the subject of extraordinary fiction, recs:

Generation Kill

Dira Sudis (dsudis) - You Drive Through the Dust (Brad Colbert/Nate Fick, plus other pairings)

August 2002-August 2003. Nate and Bo lead their platoon to war and bring them home again.

What I liked: Part 7 of the Every Marine a Wolfbrother series, and if you haven't been reading this, where the hell have you been?

Hockey RPF

ellievolia, hazel and thisissirius - Take You There (Patrick Kane/Jonathan Toews)

It’s Kaner at the door. Balding, short, slightly paunchy Kaner, standing there with a duffel and a suitcase, looking obstinate and cranky and like the ground’s been taken out from under him. “We’re getting divorced. Let me in.”

What I liked: Older Person Fiction. Also, reconciliations, fragile bridges - I was always going to love this one.

thehoyden - King and Lionheart (Sidney Crosby/Evgeni Malkin)

Sidney’s wedding day doesn’t go quite as he’d planned. When he’d bothered to imagine it at all, he’d thought of a nice June wedding in Nova Scotia, outdoors with the sun streaming down. He hadn’t imagined this hurried affair on the tarmac on a rainy and unseasonably cool day in early September, a month after his twenty-fifth birthday.

What I liked: pure comfort fic.

Marvel

orderlychaos - Murder at the Savoy Hotel (Clint Barton/Phil Coulson)

When tragedy strikes at the Savoy Hotel, a beautiful socialite is found dead in her room. Her prized possesion, the Blue Star Diamond is stolen amongst the chaos. Detective Inspector Sitwell of Scotland Yard calls on the famous detective Phillip Coulson for help on the case.

What I liked: The lovely period pastiche of Agatha Christie, which fits so unexpectedly well with Coulson.

Road Movie to Berlin - They Might Be Giants

broadcastdelay - Got a Medal of Freedom (from Self-control) (gen)

A B-list actor and his beleaguered agent star in a tale fueled by bourbon and propelled by gratuitous, thinly-veiled references.

What I liked: From the Jukebox 2013 challenge over on AO3. (Exactly, dammit, my kind of thing, but if I want to keep my job I will always be unable to write both Jukebox and Fic_Corner.) I love the frenetic, fragmented pace of this particular story, and the dialogue is gorgeous - snappy and cynical and stylish.

Teen Wolf

trilliath - Squids are to Llamas (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

Merman Stiles isn't having a very good day. At all. But he's swimming to the surface to meet Derek and he's really hoping things are going to be looking up.

What I liked: Oh good god, am I really rec'ing Merman fic? I am. I really liked - it's the first time I've come across someone really thinking about how this inter-species human/merperson sex is actually going to work. I was amused.

verity - and home before dark (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

The mystery of the absent Hale brother was hardly a mystery at all until he appeared at last, set on taking up residence out in the woods.
(In which Derek is a hedgewitch. With a cat.)

What I liked: the quiet, magical worldbuilding.

To no-one's surprise, I am horribly behind on e-mails now, I'm signed up for far too much, and I'm going to be away a lot. Please expect slow replies. But, I am very excited about:

The London Steampunk Halloween Weekend, for which q_i has dragged out the velvet hotpants last seen in Carlisle in 1996 and I am rocking vampire librarian. This means I will be in London next weekend - there will be Cutty Sark viewing as well.

Lumiere Durham, which Pet Mechanic only told me about *after* tickets had sold out, but PM will know someone who knows someone else and all will be well.

I'll be in Penrith just before the Lumiere, although parents will not be making it over the Pennines. (Chemo timetable.) A good thing, because my mother is sentimentally fond of PM and I think, lives happily in the belief that he's some kind of small cuddly person with a great accent whose lack of coasters is only the result of not having enough christmas presents, and not a utter and uncrossable cultural divide.
He does have a great accent.

Also, while I'm on excusions... Hayseed Dixie at the Liquid Rooms, Skalloween with Bombscare again (in that horrible skanky club down on Carlton Road, the one where they put the burlesque on at Festival?) Moscow and St Petersburg in February and Rome in April. I did just slip that in.That's my fortieth birthday present and q_i's, too - thank you so much, my parents and q_i's mum. St Petersburg! In snow!!! I am very happy.

- when were those fic deadlines again...?

Hope all is well with you guys, too.

BIG MEN WITH BIG SWORDS (and chips on their shoulders)

tryfanstone — Sat, 12 Oct 2013 13:49:49 GMT

The annual Highlander exchange hlh_shortcuts is almost ready to go - there's a day left to sign up, people. This is my favourite fest of the year, and in all honesty all the usual suspects have signed up already, but if you've ever considered writing Highlander you couldn't start in a better place! Sign-ups are here - it's dead easy, a 500 word minimum.

- and if you're on my f-list and you're responsible for requesting the album from that band formed in Aylesbury in 1979, please hurry up and post your DYW letter to the yuletide_admin DYW post!

It's getting late in the game to show any pride or shame / Burn a little brighter now

tryfanstone — Mon, 23 Sep 2013 16:12:30 GMT

State of play:

yuletide, people. FYI. (Not that it really matters, just in case anyone wanders over from AO3.) Last year's yuletide was pretty much amazing - isiscolo's Minstrel's Song (Rosemary Sutcliff's Knight's Fee) was a story I absolutely loved to pieces. Still do, not to take away from all the smashing stories that preceeded it - and I wrote more than I'd ever done before, loving the freedom so to do. This year... eh, I've never had a problem writing, but I struggle to find enough fandoms to request. So this year, I'm not signing up, I'm just writing treats.

Work was utterly brutal. Work will continue to be a litttle brutal for the next two weeks at least, and I will continue to be slow responding to e-mails and comments. I'm truly sorry if this affects you. (Yes, I'm looking at you, holiday people and Lost Prince people and Steve/Tony AO3 people.)

However, by some minor miracle (actually that's heroic beta Doro, if I'm honest) she and I do seem to have managed, so far, both marvel_bang and c_im_bigbang. These two stories need serious additional umph. But, they're in. :)

Not really fiction recs:

hlh_shortcuts - gearing up for another round in amand_r's capable hands! No sign-ups yet, just confirmation that this matriarch of a fandom is pulling on her dancing shoes again.

Over on Dreamwidth, island-of-reil's The Lost Prince community The Lamp is Lighted! and surexit's Lost Prince Newsletter tag, because there should be more Lost Prince fiction in the world.

The Be-Ro Book. I'm sure I've mentioning this conic, distinctive proprietory recipe-book on LJ before. My current copy is edition 34: it originally belonged to my mother's mother, and it's the one cookook I could not live without. It's not the recipes - although almost everything within this book has the taste of nostalgia, for me - it's the gold standard of listing how long, in how hot an oven, you should bake almost all flour-based products. After years of sporadic searching, I'm very glad to see the link for purchase on-line. It's here.

Fiction Recs:

Due South

Brigantine - Ajax Fassbender's Amateur Guide To Zombie Wrangling (Benton Fraser/Ray Kowalski)

After Ray Vecchio disappears undercover into the wilds of Las Vegas, Fraser decides it’s high time to quit moping, and get on with life. Diefenbaker puts in his two cents, which is pretty much where the trouble starts.

What I liked: Steampunk Chicago! Also, there is a dangerous book, some gorgeous description, and a wicked sense of humour.

Highlander

unovis - So... (Duncan MacLeod/Methos)

So the sex comes at the beginning.
May contain meta. May contain ham. I wanted to write a slash story inside out.

What I liked: So you guys know anyway that writer unovis's work is the joy of my heart, and it's going to be no surprise that I'm rec'ing this story, a Highlander story written for hlh_shortcuts in 2007. Nothing about unovis's biting, sharp observation has changed: merely that she's been gradually re-uploading to AO3 and I have been gradually re-reading these jewels of stories. There's - eh. Every word here, precisely placed, perfect.

Hockey RPF

ionthesparrow - Ride Your Chrome Horse (Jeff Carter/Mike Richards)

Roll on highway, roll on along.

What I liked: Gorgeous piece of Americana.

Marvel

Muccamukk - Heart of Steel (616 and MCU: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark)

Steve wakes up in the mid-twenty first century, the Golden Age of America, and doesn't like what he finds. Fortunately, Tony has some ideas.

What I liked: Fascinating and very well thought through alternative future, in which the tolitarian government structure hinted at in Civil War and the Director of Shield comics is fully realised. The author notes that this is being currently revised, and I would have quite happily read another ten chapters of political double-dealing and emotional development, but well worth reading as it stands.

Kathar - What to Do When the Safehouse Burns (Clint Barton/Phil Coulson)

At the end of their strength, their safehouse compromised, frozen, lost, and out of contact with SHIELD, Clint Barton and Phil Coulson broke into an isolated cabin in order to survive. That was last night.
This morning, extraction is the last thing on Clint's mind.

What I liked: The subversion of every single cabinfic cliche ever, plus a double-cross that included almost every member of the MCU team and the reader. Loved it!

Panic!at the disco

bad_peppermint - A Storm Brewing; in which the honorable Spencer Smith asks questions and finds answers (Spencer Smith/Brendon Urie)

Ever since he started university, Spencer has been quite content studying his dragons and trying to talk to Brendon, the young man who works at Spencer's boarding house. Having the dragons fall mysteriously ill is the last thing he wants, but then again, it does mean more time spent with Brendon as they try to figure out what's wrong.

What I liked: Steampunk with dragons! Utterly charming story from the author of last year's equally diverting spn_j2_bigbang story Mr. Ackles' Flower Shop for Unusual, Extraordinary, and Peculiar Plants.

Skyfall

foolish_mortal - synchromesh (James Bond/Q)

"I should let you know that MI6 is not in the habit of ceding to terrorists," Q tells him with chilly poise. "But it is after hours, and this is at least a halfway decent kidnapping."
Bond's answering hum of amusement resonates and mingles with the sound of the revving engine.

What I liked: a Q who is both capable and whimsical.

Supernatural

dear_tiger - The Witch Is Dead (Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester)

In 1988, three witches in Montana are growing a monster in their garden, and Sam is holiday snack. When Dean and John show up to get him, one witch is killed, and Dean gets a love curse that he keeps secret. As teenagers, Sam and Dean are living in a dying industrial town in Pennsylvania, where they come across a crooked old creature that takes an unusual interest in Dean. As adults, Sam and Dean return to Montana for a hunt and run into the two surviving witches who have been unsuccessfully trying to grow their monster. Dean, still carrying the love spell from the dead witch, is looking like perfect plant feed.

What I liked: Beautiful worldbuilding - there's something about the atmosphere in this original and fascinating story which is reminiscent of the most disturbing of fairy tales, something alien and disinterested.

Supernatural RPF

brutti_ma_buoni - The Modern Way (Jensen Ackles/Jared Padalecki)

For the kinkmeme prompt: J1 was raised in the Old Way: Alpha sees omega; Alpha knots omega; Alpha and omega live Happily Ever After. Unfortunately, social mores have "evolved" since his grandwolf's day and courtship is all the rage now. He's never wanted to bother with it, but his mother won't stop harping on him about when he's going to give her grandpups. J1's not going to run out and knot just anyone--that's illegal now. Consent matters these days. Trouble is, he doesn't have a clue how to court anyone (he's sure Chad is giving him bad advice), and now he's got his eyes on J2, a guy who might be his his Meant To Be. (Also happy to twist the prompt and have an omega tolerating the courting but wanting the old way more.)

What I liked: brutti_ma_buoni, an author writing excellent, original takes on SPN kinkmeme prompts. This particular story is omegaverse, an inversion of an inversion, and very neatly done.

Teen Wolf

pyes - In the New Year (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

In Beacon Hills they don't say "Happy Holidays." Instead they say "Yo, Derek," which translates to "I'm pretty sure I soul-bound my sorry ass to the floor of your loft, four years ago, while reading spells off the internet." I think that's beautiful.

What I liked: Accidental, concealed soulbonding - it's a very different story, but I like this story for the same reasons I loved cluegirl's forced bond Harry Potter stories. Soul bonding is not necessarily a welcome or wanted event, and there is no guarantee of a happy ever after.

verity - see you when you're ready (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

On the couch, Stiles arches his spine and rolls onto his side to press his face against the cushions. "I'm not part of your pack."
Derek freezes, pullover in hand. "You could be."

What I liked: Mpreg of the unwelcome, horrifying, magical variety is this very well done Harry Potter/Teen Wolf crossover. Given that under normal circumstances I'd quietly backbutton from at least two of the descriptors above...I found this story both thoughtful and fascinating.

ohmyjetsabel - Tiny Houses (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

"So this is what Stiles does. He lies in Scott’s bed and waits for Melissa to say she’s found someone to get it out of him, to cure him of the wrongness and the bad, and he dreams.
God, he dreams.
He dreams of fire and swollen bellies and that scene in Alien, of giving birth to jackals through his urethra, the whole horrific nine yards. His head is a terrible place to be, he can’t imagine his stomach is much better, why anyone would want to put a thing inside of it."

What I liked: Same caveat as above- I am not reading my normal fare right now. So this forced mpreg, body horror longfic was absolutely perfect. For me, it did slide a little towards the end (and that's personal, I'm just not great with kids) but most of it I found unusual, vividly written and fascinating.

Unloyal_Olio - On Anchors and Rudders (Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski)

Stiles might be a sentinel, but Derek is a werewolf. Derek is not and never will be a guide.
W-e-r-e-w-o-l-f.
There is no way in hell he’ll be a guide. No. Way. In. Hell.

What I liked: not quite forced bonding - rather the informed, slow growth of a guide/sentinel relationship, despite a background of the usual forced bond tropes. I liked this one for the way Derek's internal voice was written, metaphor and sentiment included.

X-Men: First Class

spicedpiano - Communion (Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier)

Everyone knows the best French cuisine in New York is made by Erik Lehnsherr, executive chef of the new restaurant Écarlate. And he's every bit as scary as he is talented.
Only Charles, his sommelier and secret husband, has the balls to face him no matter the cost.

What I liked: Disturbing, precise dissection of of a story.

aesc and palalife - The School for Scandal; or, The Patron (Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier)

The Graymalkin Institute, a run-down, forgotten school in a forgotten corner of Genosha, is run by Charles Xavier, the forgotten and dispossessed heir of a disgraced and once-noble House. Years ago, he entered into an agreement with Emma Frost of the Massachusetts Academy to prevent the government from shutting down the Institute, and now she's calling in her debt. The terms of the agreement: find blackmail material on the Duke of Genosha himself, Erik Lehnsher.

What I liked: Political worldbuilding, rebellion from the inside, the tension of a relationship where both parties are fully aware of what they are concealing from each other - and from the reader. Very neatly done.

helens78 - Love Or Charity (Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier)

Not!fic. Charles is a dom-for-(sort of)-hire, Erik is in the market for someone just like him.

What I liked: Inclusive, aggressive posturing - feel free to snip back at me: I found this convincingly masculine.

No, really, the sky is falling in

tryfanstone — Tue, 10 Sep 2013 19:58:24 GMT

~~sky~~ ceiling. Today's great event on the work front.

I haven't a hope in hell of answering e-mails or comments for at least another week and probably two. If you e-mailed and I haven't replied, I'm sorry. I'll get to you, and if it's time sensitive I am even more sorry. It's just not possible right now. I *am* hoping to take Saturday afternoon off, but if that happens it'll be a last-minute desperate attempt to add at least a hundred more words to a fest story squeaking through word count.

/comments disabled, apologies. State of the week.

Last dance with Mary Jane (Strictly Minimalist Pimp Post from Very Tired Person)

tryfanstone — Thu, 15 Aug 2013 20:44:05 GMT

history_bigbang

FAQs Writers Artists Betas Cheerleaders

Recs:

American Idol RPF

Vae - Solo Virtuoso (Kris Allen/Adam Lambert Brad Bell/Cassidy Haley)

Adam Lambert, rising star of the LA music theatre scene, doesn't get much chance to meet potential boyfriends. Performing six nights a week limits the possibilities for socialising so when his friend Alisan suggests he try a lunchtime speed-dating event, it seems like the solution to his problems. Musician Kris Allen, at the same event because he lost a bet, appears perfect for Adam. Cute and confident, there's only one snag: once bitten, twice shy, Kris has decided that he doesn't want to have sex with other people.
Kris has a few things to teach Adam about the kinds of solo fun to be had with sex toys, but can Adam convince Kris to change his mind and take another try at the joys of sex with a loving partner?

Figure Skating RPF

Isagel - Like Something from Andy Warhol's Pornographic Period (Evan Lysacek/Johnny Weir)

'Slore', Johnny had said on tv, making it a charming joke, but here he has no compunction about spelling out the words. About making sure Evan knows he means them, knows that they're true. By the time Johnny is done with him, he can usually feel them, carved all the way into his bones.

Historical RPF

Vae - Madam Geneva, gen, locked on AO3

Gin.
Ginevra. Madam Geneva. Mother's Ruin, put whatever name on it you want, they all say something different and they all mean the same thing: escape.

Hockey RPF

joatamon - Anger Management (Locked on AO3) (Brandon Bollig/Andrew Shaw)

In January 2013, at the start of the shortened season, Brandon moves in with Shawzy.

Marvel

SakuraTsukikage - Relativistic Heat Conduction (Steve/Tony)

Age of Ultron-based, but not entirely canon compliant. Written for the 2013 Cap-Iron Man Reverse Big Bang. Ultron has attacked, obliterating most of the world's superheroes and resistance in a matter of hours. The remaining heroes band together and share what strength they have to get through it, to survive, and defeat Ultron once and for all. Steve Rogers grieves in the wake of the disaster and the heroes' defeat, and no one knows if he will be able to provide the leadership they need--but Tony Stark isn't about to let him slip away that easily.

theappleppielifestyle - there still might be a place for us somewhere (Steve/Tony)

Ten years after high school ends, Tony stumbles on a stranger who looks strangely a hell of a lot like the guy he was in love with as a teenager.

RurouniHime - As Sharp As Any Thorn (Steve/Tony)

It’s four days to Christmas, there’s a city in shambles, and the nation is in mourning because of the actions of a single man.

Supernatural

Rivkat - Rough Riders (Sam/Dean)

From two spnkinkmeme prompts seeking a Sam who likes rough sex and a Dean who doesn’t nearly like it nearly as much, but won’t admit that until Sam figures it out. Additional contents: fantasy/roleplay noncon.

Supernatural RPF

cleflink - The Beat of Our Noisy Hearts (Jared/Jensen)

In a world where heartbreak is a literal condition, it's Jared's job to sew, fill and patch the physical wounds left in people's hearts by lost loves, misunderstandings and betrayals. Jared's own love life is mostly at the pining like a fifteen year old girl stage, largely because Jensen doesn't date and Jared doesn't do one-night stands, but he's got good friends and a job he loves, so he figures that he can't complain too much.
When a killer attacks Jensen, Jared discovers that a needle and thread, desperation and a sharp scalpel are enough to save Jensen's life, but at a cost that is going to change Jared's life forever and tie them both together in a way that goes far deeper than flesh.

Teen Wolf

theteapirate - all earz on me (Derek/Stiles)

Stiles is a college radio DJ with a talent for pining and hooking up with douchebags. Derek is a college baseball player with a talent for eyebrows and misrepresenting himself. Neither boy is particularly talented at communication.

halfhardtorock - Taking the Edge Off and series (Derek/Stiles)

They're pack now and they're settled. They lost their chance. So they really shouldn't. They just shouldn't--

Four stories about writing

tryfanstone — Tue, 02 Jul 2013 21:02:28 GMT

(a) It seems to me that, if an author writes good fanfiction – and by that I mean fanfiction which is true to that author’s image of the characters, or to the setting, or both – then, almost by definition, that story as it is written is not going to be good original fiction. Fanfiction is by its very nature a collusive collaboration between reader and writer, a text of allusions and assumptions containing a shared vocabulary, accessible via an mutual understanding of the source from which the story came. Original fiction is, by its very nature, a separation between reader and writer across which both are seeking to create understanding, building bridges to each other. Fiction builds: fanfiction explores.

(b) When I read, I read more than one story in any piece of writing. There is the story, the overt plot, beginning, middle, end. Jane buys a new car. There is the story underlying that story, the bones of it: Jane’s journey, a story about materialism, or personal success, or fulfillment.

Then there is the story under those stories, the author’s unconscious assumption about any of those words being meaningful to the reader, the reader’s unconscious assumptions about the author’s words. The author writes Jane and sees a woman who is conventional and ordinary. The reader reads Jane and sees a woman with opportunities and potential. The author resents Jane’s mundanity, while the reader envies her security.

Here too is the story of the writing of the story, the memories and experiences, the overheard conversations and snatched images that the author drew on in the writing: the coffee that sped a paragraph or the telephone call that slowed it. And of the reading of the story, a shared experience or an adventure into the unknown, the early morning commute, fractured and tedious, or the slow unscrolling in the light of a bedside lantern.

No story is alone.

(c) I believe that once a story is written, it is its own thing. It is the product of the author’s life, but not the sum of it: the inhabitant of the reader’s imagination, but not the owner of it. A story stands on its own merits, to fly free or stumble and fall. It will speak to some people and not to others.

(d) This story, tonight’s story, is a collaborative work, because in it is every word I have ever read and every writer to whom I have ever spoken. In it are my first teacher’s grammar lessons and my last beta's exactitude, my father’s hands holding a coffee cup over a lunchtime table and the hiss of my computer’s fan. In it too is the quality of light on your screen as you read, and the way your hands hold the text: phone, tablet, screen, paper.

These words, tonight’s story, are not mine any more than they are yours, but they are ours.

This is why I tell stories.

But I'm good for one more try

tryfanstone — Sun, 30 Jun 2013 11:28:21 GMT

Stuff:

Posted: Afterwards (Steve/Tony, AO3 | website) from a prompt at capkink: So Steve and Tony are accidentally hit with some kind of death-ray but things go wrong and there are unexpected consequences. Steve has to come inside Tony at least once a day, everyday or else Tony has painful cramps/migraine/weakness/whatever that would eventually put him in a coma and kill him. So they reluctantly start a sexual relationship. Dubcon warning.

Tumblr: now as myself. Not fannish blogging.

Stuff that isn't fiction:
This post on reviewsbyjessie on self-publishing has a great summary on methods and resources. And, only a little sideways, I was really interested by this post, naraht on the erotics of nostagia. While I'm on the subject: antique-erotic: a fascinating collection of seriously vintage porn.

News:
Off-line, apologies, for the next month, or I'll never get anythng written - and you won't be surprised to hear I'm late on e-mails again. Only other news: finally, my bikes sync: my R6 passed her MOT on Thursday (and I might have just spent far too much on short-barred brake and clutch levers, because I'm old and my hands hurt, although OMG servicing a racing bike is EXPENSIVE) and the Katana goes in for hers at the end of next week. The garage promise her newly chromed front forks by Wednesday. Anyone who has been following the saga of rebuilding my classic vintage bike, please heave a sigh of relief with me - it's been years.

Recs:

Hockey RPF

stepquietly - Make My Body Say Ah Ah Ah (I like it, like it) (Sidney Crosby/Evgeni Malkin)

Geno doesn’t quite understand why Sid likes to keep sex to a minimum during the pre-game period. Sid claims that he likes to focus on just feeling his muscles move and thinking about getting his head in the right space to play. Geno would much rather just get off.

Hm. Because it's a great use of sexual denial as a motivator.

James Bond (Skyfall)

sc010f - Sweated Sheets and Cold Tea (Bond/Q)

When they kiss, it happens just like in the movies – pouring rain on a crowded sidewalk, passersby studiously ignoring them, Bond's lips are cold, but his tongue is warm and he claims Q’s mouth without hesitation. Q cannot help but think of deus ex Moneypenny, and he knows he'll have to make her pay for it somehow.

Inevitable, disconnected - this one's real.

im_not_a_lizard - ...Would Smell As Sweet (Bond/Q)

Written for this prompt: I think we all know Q department would totally be mixing up some aphrodisiacs for the 00's to use (or maybe even just for science). I want Q accidentally dosed and Bond being all gentlemanly and trying to help him through it without doing anything that Q may regret later. Meanwhile, Q is very much in favour of climbing Bond like a tree and having him every way he can.

A little less real.

Marvel

Margo_Kim - Underground (Steve Rogers/Tony Stark Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov)

After a Civil War, death, rebirth, a takeover by Osborn, brain deletion, and the fall of Asgard, Steve and Tony might just be starting to get back on solid ground with one another. Things aren't perfect, not yet, but they can be in the same room as each other without resorting to violence, and they've even managed to share a smile or two.
Seems like the perfect time, then, for Tony to try and fuck it all up with a stupid game of gay chicken.

130k of stylish adventure and seriously hot sexual tension.

Amuly - America Isn't Chicken (Steve Rogers/Tony Stark)

Five years ago, Thor's Chitauri army decimated the Earth. Now what's left of humanity lives in bases under the Earth's surface, safe from the toxic atmosphere. Tony likes to think that humanity's adapted pretty well. After all, they have movie nights and dances; they're doing better than could be expected. But when he learns that the little world of safety and stability they've carved out is about to be slowly but surely destroyed, the New York Underground is left with only two options--fight or flight. Tony knows which one he wants. If only Steve weren't on the exact opposite side. Meanwhile, Natasha wants whatever option will save Clint, Pepper wants whatever option will save the base, Maria Hill wants whatever option will save everybody, and nobody's exactly sure who Loki's trying to save, but everyone's hoping it's more than just himself.

Darkish AU, not only a stunning adventure but a fascinating look at choices and consequences.

Star Trek RPF

glayish - Soon and For the Rest of Your Life (Chris Pine/Zachary Quinto)

So… Catching a break in his first big New York play would have been so much simpler if Chris didn’t have to play the love interest to his Ex.

Rec'd - actually, because of this post, in which Zachary Quinto appears to be the only person attending the opening of the punk fashion exhibition at the Met who is... actually wearing punk. That's nothing to do with this story, which is rich with language and regret.

Teen Wolf

briecheesie and daunt - A (Sort of) Fairytale (Derek/Stiles)

The summer after senior year starts normally enough, with the gang spending their final months before college together at the Martin family's lake house. Then Jackson stumbles onto the burial ground of a witch's ex-husband, Stiles is magically turned into a fox, and things somehow manage to get worse from there. The gratuitous Princess Bride references are only of moderate help.

Rec'd for the art, which is so cute, but also for the way Stiles' slide from human to fox is described, the gradual dissolution of humanity.

Survivah - A Simple Life and Finding Miracles (Derek/Stiles)

Derek plans to spend the rest of his life holed up in the woods after Laura dies. Then he meets a stubborn young fox, and the stubborn young fox meets an urn of Deaton's magic powder, and his plans change.

In a complete reversal of the story above, in this one fox Stiles becomes human. Equally cute, with moments of sharpness.

Fic: Капитан Америка и Железный Человек | Kapitan Amerika and the Iron Man (Marvel, Steve/Tony)

tryfanstone — Mon, 17 Jun 2013 18:06:50 GMT

Fandom: Marvel. Movieverse.
Pairing: Steve/Tony
Rating: NC-17
Wordcount: 60,000

Summary: The Red Son reboot, in which Steve Rogers’ childhood heroes were aviators and polar explorers, and Tony Stark grew up reading Captain America comics in Siberia. Written for the comics_bb 12013.

Art: amberdreams produced the most stunning, gorgeous artwork for this story, just amazing. She posted about it here - Livejournal | AO3 - please do let her know if you like it.

Thanks: While I read a few books for this story, I am most indebted to Anna Politkovskaya's Putin's Russia, Laurie Essig's Queer in Russia and Martin Sixsmith's Putin's Oil. Unaccredited lyrics quoted within text are from The Beatles' Yesterday and Rage Against the Machine's Killing in the name of. Jumping Jack Flash is owned by The Rolling Stones. There are both paraphrased and directly quoted lines from Captain America, Iron Man, Iron Man 2, and The Avengers. amberdreams's glorious image of Steve and Tony above Moscow uses Vasily Nesterenko's View of the Kremlin from the Old Town Square as a base.

I am hugely grateful to my colleague Ann, without whose enthusiasm for the Avengers this story would never have been started. To unovis and tazlet for initial discussion: unovis also added her expert knowledge of Russian art, and most of the text in the Futurist scene is her suggestion. Ben B proofread for Stalinist Russia and Communist history; science blogger Geoff Robbins explained radioactivity in terms I could understand (and blogged about it here) and mechanic Tummer spent a long weekend discussing Russian motorcycles of the Second World War.

choosycloud very kindly checked my information about modern Russia. choosycloud also mentioned, and I think it's worth mentioning to you too, that in this story of necessity I'm representing a very limited and generalised view of Russian history and politics.

doro beta'd this story. Her work is meticulous, exacting and uncompromising, and I think she's amazing. It's like having the best safety net (with a sense of humour) in the world. It's entirely down to her that you're not over-run with colons, erratic identifications and stray commas, and if you see a mistake you can be damn sure it's mine.

For this story, as every other, I owe q_i: first reader, cheerleader, fandom enabler, provider of mugs, coffee and sadistically placed kudos, incurable optimist.

Капитан Америка и Железный Человек | Kapitan Amerika and the Iron Man

website | AO3