it's a magical world

JUMPING RIGHT ON AHEAD with snowflake_challenge

Challenge #8: Rec at least three fanworks that you didn’t create.

Aw yeah, this is MUCH better than self-promoting. I'm just gonna dive into my AO3 bookmarks and pick out a few of the fics that I go back to reread over and over and over again. (I rarely bookmark, mostly because it doesn't usually occur to me and not because there shouldn't be lots of other excellent fics on this list, but if you want a super eclectic assortment of awesome fic in a wide variety of fandoms, this is what I've got.)

Um, clearly good characterization is my bulletproof kink, because that's pretty much the only thing these all have in common. That, and longer/plottier fic, as a general rule.

IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER, by which I mean in reverse order of when I happened to bookmark them:

Ordinary Numbers by BootsnBlossoms & Kryptaria
James Bond (movies), James Bond/Q
Summary: More than anything, Mike Taylor wanted to be ordinary. Being a genius, he learned early in life, meant people expected too much. A career at the MI6 Help Desk seemed the perfect way to guarantee a lifetime of obscurity, until he got a very unusual tech support call.
Why I like it: it's just very clever! Tech support!Q is delightfully snarky. The slow burn of their weird friendship-into-relationship-without-actually-meeting fills me with joy. And when the AU element finally transitions into canon, it's an excellent payoff. I reread this every time I'm in a 00Q mood, so, like...several times a year.

The Buried Treasure Racket by Dorinda
The Sting, Henry Gondorff/Johnny Hooker
Summary: After the events of the movie, Henry and Johnny take it on the lam, and run smack into a few complications and a few revelations.
Why I like it: YES I AM RECCING A FIC FOR THE STING. I do what I want. Look, this is one of my all-time favorite movies, and I absolutely request it every single goddamn year for Yuletide, because boy howdy, if this movie had come out in the past ten years, slash fandom would've been ALL OVER IT. And this is hands down the best Henry/Johnny fic I've ever read. The characters are spot-on, the con they run is exquisitely clever, and obvs the romance is A+. This is the sequel we deserved. (And if you haven't seen The Sting, GO WATCH IT NOW. RIGHT NOW. Charming, clever con artist movie with peak Robert Redford & Paul Newman.)

26 Pieces by Lanning
Sherlock (BBC), Sherlock/John
Summary: Mycroft gives Sherlock the apparently simple task of solving a puzzle box containing a stolen microchip. It isn't simple.
Why I like it: Ah, the golden era of Sherlock fic, when we only had one series to go by and the actual show hadn't tanked spectacularly yet. This is a fun little mystery with excellent characterization, and a great use of the hurt/comfort trope (which is one of my faves when done right). A bit more torture than I usually prefer, but handled well and never feels like whump for the sake of whump, and I just...really like the way they write these characters.

The Sparrowkeet Series by audreyii_fic
Avatar: the Last Airbender, Katara/Zuko
Summary: Ba Sing Se has fallen and Katara has been captured by the Fire Nation; a more adult take on the potential progression of S3. AU series of interconnected one-shots. Zutara.
Why I like it: This fic proves that ANY trope can be golden in the hands of a good writer. She tags it as "mildly dubious consent", which I agree with, and it's also underage (Katara is 15, Zuko 17, as per canon). Normally neither of these aspects appeal to me. This fic is the exception. Every single character feels 100% true to their canon characterization plus, you know, what actual teenagers are like (as opposed to the sanitized Nickelodeon children's TV version). Her Sokka voice, in particular, is hilarious and dead-on. And while the first fic in this series has sexual content (though not terribly explicit, IMO), honestly, the majority is about how all of these characters grow and evolve as people with the AU turn from the end of S2, and I honestly think the way she handles Aang's character arc through the final showdown with Ozai is smarter and more resonant than how the show handled it.

Time To Grow by zarah5
X-Men: First Class, Charles/Erik
Summary: In which you'll find chess dates which aren't dates (or maybe Charles is wrong about that). -- Based on First Class, this turns (slightly) AU during the beach scene.
Why I like it: The definitive XMFC fix-it fic. Gorgeous characterization, particularly of Charles. Just...so, so good. This is how I want to believe the movie ended.


Gonna stop there. There are so, so many more good fics out there. I should do a real reclist one of these days.

My Yuletide fic continues to be more or less nonexistent, with less than 36 hours to deadline, so that's a thing. But in the meantime, Secret Mutant fics have been revealed! I haven't been posting about this at all, because me and the free time this week haven't been very mixy, and I haven't read very many of the fics yet so I can't do a rec post -- um, not that I ever do rec posts, I suck -- but I did get the most fantastic gift EVER: Xmas in Connecticut, by the incomparable Yahtzee. It's already been recced all over the place, for good reason, but guys, it's REALLY REALLY GOOD. Charles/Erik on the homefront in WWII, Raven being SPECTACULAR, and very sweet background Raven/Hank. READ IT. LOVE IT.

So then I wrote a thing. Or, well, two things, one for the exchange proper and one for Secret Mutant Madness. But both in the same 'verse. I feel like these are very obviously my fics, but because the main fic focused on an unpopular ship, not many people read them or would know to link them to me. ANYWAY.

tell them I ain't coming back (14186 words) by kaydeefalls
Fandom: X-Men: First Class (2011), X-Men (Movieverse), Firefly
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Relationships: Armando Muñoz/Alex Summers, Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier
Characters: Armando Muñoz, Alex Summers, Charles Xavier, Erik Lehnsherr, Raven | Mystique, Hank McCoy, Emma Frost, Angel Salvadore
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Crossover, Alternate Universe - Space, Families of Choice, Spaceships, Slow Burn, Plotty, POV Character of Color
Summary: In which the crew of Cerebro picks up a passenger on a border moon, Emma has a lead on an anti-mutant conspiracy, and Armando might be getting more than he bargained for. (Fusion with the Firefly 'verse.)

My recipient, unveiled, prompted: "Darwin and Havok IN SPACE!" -- which, for me, obviously meant a Firefly fusion, because there is nothing in the world I enjoy more than crossovers with Firefly. Plus, I've always liked Armando/Alex as a ship, but there are tragically few fics written about them, though it's moderately popular as a background pairing in Charles/Erik fics. So this was fun! I've written a fair amount of Alex POV through the Boden's Mate 'verse, but Alex in that AU has a backstory all his own, so it's not the same, and I've never written Armando POV at all. He was a bit tricky for me, because he's a very calm, likeable character by nature, but it was hard for me to work out what his driving motivations would be. And then, y'know, I made it a Firefly fusion, which meant I had to write the entire fic in the vernacular of that 'verse, which was a special challenge of its own. I rewatched a LOT of Firefly to get that voice sorted in my head. But I really fell in love with the fusion as I was writing it, and realized as I was sketching out an outline that I had buckets of backstory for various characters that didn't fit into an Armando/Alex-centric story, plus a whole category of plot notes that I labeled "SAVE IT FOR THE SEQUEL", so, um, this is a 'verse that I will likely return to. I kind of don't care if only like three other people will be reading it. In terms of Firefly, this fic is roughly concurrent with "Serenity" and "The Train Job", about five years after Unification; the crew of Cerebro works a slightly different route than that of Serenity, so while they may have a few associates in common, they don't tend to visit the same Rim worlds or pick up the same sort of jobs, though everyone passes through Persephone at some point.

And since I really liked ALL of unveiled's prompts (seriously, if I had the time, I would have written a fic for all four of them, they were that awesome), and my head was already filled to the brim with backstory for characters who weren't Alex or Armando, this happened:

burn the land and boil the sea (5410 words) by kaydeefalls
Fandom: X-Men: First Class (2011), X-Men (Movies), Firefly
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Relationships: Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier
Characters: Erik Lehnsherr, Charles Xavier, Hank McCoy
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Crossover, First Meetings, War, Romance, Alternate Universe - Firefly Verse, Prequel
Summary: In which the Unification War begins, Erik leads the Browncoats' mutant faction, and Charles searches for something worth fighting for.

This prompt was: "Charles is a world-weary activist and advocate. Erik is the idealistic firebrand who sets his life alight." SO YEAH THAT HAPPENED. I originally thought it'd be Charles POV, at home in the Core as war was breaking out, seeing vids of this random Browncoat mutant on the Cortex and becoming increasingly intrigued, and then maybe Raven introduced them somehow? But that never really took shape in my head, and the more I thought about it, the more it became Erik's story instead. I dunno. This one was written in a rush to make the Madness deadline -- most of it in one epic late-night writing session -- and I wish I'd been able to take more time with it, but I like it anyway.

I have to finish Yuletide and then Festivids, and the final two chapters of Queen's Gambit are next up on the docket -- I'd hoped to have one done before the seasonal challenge madness set in, but alas, that was not to be, although I've made decent headway -- but after that, I'm likely going to return to this playground for a while. It's been a while since I've been this excited about a fic idea, anyway. Continuing with using lyrics from the Firefly theme as titles, because at this point I may as well accept it, I know that "take me where I cannot stand" is Charles POV of the end of the Unification War, when he and Erik finally take down Shaw but lose the war anyway. Then probably "take me out to the black" is the crew of Cerebro gradually coming together in the first year or so after the war ends. I have BUCKETS of Angel backstory -- dunno if that'll fit in there, or if she'll get her own spinoff fic that no one will read. And then I want to start overlapping with the events of Firefly and Serenity more, following up the plot threads left unresolved at the end of the Alex/Armando fic. I know for certain that in this AU fusion, River Tam is also a mutant (telepath/empath -- she can't control people like Charles, but she has a much wider range, and some precognitive abilities). The Miranda broadcast at the end of Serenity will spark off a second revolution of some kind, which Charles&co will be heavily involved in. I haven't worked out the details yet. But yeah.

< / blather >

I completely forgot I hadn't posted anything about Yuletide! I received an AWESOME fic, Hear That Call, which is League of Their Own fic that made me super, super happy, and which I will surely reread a whole bunch. I only watched that movie for the first time sometime in September, and I don't know why it took me so long -- WWII ladies kicking ass and playing baseball, all of these things are right up my alley! And this fic is Dottie/Jimmy, which I sort of guiltily shipped during the film but the author made it work, with hints of Mae/Doris in the background (my primary OTP, ugh I love them so), and, yeah. You should read it!

Still a little time left before reveals, but for the first time, my own recipient has not responded to the fic at all, and that does sour it a bit for me. :/ I mean, I've received gift fics for Yuletide and other challenges in the past that haven't been great (NOT THIS YEAR, OBVS, SEE ABOVE), but I always, always find something nice to say to the author and thank them for writing, because this is a thing that they made for me, and that's a wonderful gift regardless. So now I'm really worried that the fic I wrote is really, truly bad, and I feel guilty about having written something crappy for someone else, and at the same time I'm slightly annoyed because the prompt was interesting but not an easy one for me to write, and I really tried to give the recipient what she'd wanted, and it's a fandom and character that I do love quite a lot, and just ugh. I'm probably being petty, and it's really not a big deal at all, but it is kind of a letdown.

But the fic I received really was amazing, so I shall console myself by rereading it a bunch because it makes me happy.

secret_mutant authors have been revealed! Oh, man. A couple of those I totally guessed; others, I'm kind of smacking myself in the forehead for not figuring out immediately. And then, y'know, a bunch of authors I wasn't familiar with before, who now I obviously need to check out. If you like Charles/Erik and you haven't taken a look at this exchange yet, you really should. Ninety-five new fics, many excellent. Huge kudos to pocky_slash for organizing and running the damn thing.

And now I can properly thank argyleheir for her excellent gift, Practical Applications of Radioactive Material. READ IT! Erik and Charles keep running into other superheroes on their recruitment trip; I particularly adore Sue Storm in this one, but really, it's all just great fun and awesomeness. ♥

Also, I wrote some stuff?

Celestial Navigation (9470 words) by kaydeefalls - or on LJ
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Relationships: Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier
Characters: Charles Xavier, Erik Lehnsherr, N'Dare Munroe, Ororo Munroe
Summary: Not everything has to be life or death. Sometimes it snows in September, just because a little girl wills it so.

From the sign-ups, it was pretty clear that ginbitch and I have pretty damn similar tastes in terms of canon fics set in the 1960s; I definitely got my period research kink on writing it. The prompt was for snow, which to me, obviously meant bb!Ororo had to be in there somewhere, which wound up mostly involving her mother, N'Dare Munroe. I kept their family backstory as close to comics!canon as possible -- N'Dare was Kenyan, one of long line of priestess-sorceresses; she married an American photojournalist, and Ororo was born in Harlem. They move to Egypt when Ororo is very young. I couldn't find anything suggesting N'Dare was herself a mutant, so that bit's all mine. Also, it's kind of a love letter to New York City (my hometown), and it let me get inside Charles's enormous head way more than I've ever really thought about before. Telepathy is weird, guys. So that's that one.

&

I Ain't Scared of Lightning (13107 words) by kaydeefalls - or on LJ
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Relationships: Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier
Characters: Erik Lehnsherr, Charles Xavier, Alex Summers, Moira MacTaggert, Armando Muñoz, Angel Salvadore, Hank McCoy, Raven Darkholme
Summary: Canon!AU. "Shaw has someone very dear to me," Charles said in a low tone. "You're not the only one playing for keeps, Erik."

Pinch hit of doom! I have no fucking clue where this came from, except that I had this image in my head of Charles on the Coast Guard ship flanked by Darwin and Angel, and Erik being like, daaaaamn. But it was kind of an intense ride for me -- most of it was written frantically over the course of last weekend, as, um, you might have noticed. I'd originally intended to include flashbacks of Charles & Raven's altered backstory, but when I realized how massive the main plotline was becoming, I cut them all out. Possibly there's another fic in there; possibly there's also another fic continuing the AU version of events through the end of the movie. Possibly I should just leave it be. My main regret with this is that I didn't have the time to fully explore the changes in Charles's outlook on the world due to losing Raven so early on -- I think he'd be much more pragmatic and less optimistic about the Shaw situation, and far less scrupulous about his own use of his powers to achieve his goals. And, on the flip side, he would actually be able to understand Erik's point of view much better -- there wouldn't be such a wide chasm of miscommunication between them, which would serve both them and the team much better in the long run. I'm not sure how well any of that came across. But it was interesting to explore. (Original prompts from confusedkayt: badassery leading to kissing, holding one another, Erik connecting with Alex. I did manage to incorporate all three!)

So...yeah. That happened. :)

I may be crap at reccing awesome fics, but this MUST BE DONE. It's already being recced all over the place, but if you've somehow missed it, Pairing Pendragon/Merlin, by anonymous author of awesometasticness.

Look, I'm a sucker for Merlin AUs, it's the only fandom I genuinely love AUs for. And this is just -- Arthur is a fandom BNF. Merlin is his beta. It pokes fun at fandom in all its ridiculous glory, and yet with such love, and Merlin's beta comments, and the twitter feeds, and GWEN COSPLAYS UHURA OMG WHY ARE YOU STILL READING THIS POST AND NOT THE FIC.

So, that.

Unrelatedly, can we has festivids yet? How about now? I'm going to be in NYC for the weekend, but I'll still probably hole up in a corner somewhere and watch ALL THE VIDS once it goes live. \o/

STOP WHAT YOU ARE DOING.

RIGHT NOW.

Because this is the most brilliant and hilarious and spot-on perfect vid you will ever watch.

Tenth Doctor: the Musical, by di_br.

TRUST ME ON THIS.

HOLY CANON SLASH, BATMAN. That would be a link to an article about Jack/Ianto, my friends, with one of the hottest pictures of Ianto I have ever, ever seen. (Totally PG-rated and nonsexual, incidentally.) Also, some spoilers for Torchwood series 3, so, that. This show cannot happen soon enough.

WE WANTS IT, PRECIOUS.

On a different fandom note, have a spot-on hilarious Star Trek: Reboot parody.

ETA: I totally didn't realize that comm was locked. Whoops. Links to the individual article/pics in comments instead.

It's been a very long couple of days. I got three hours of sleep last night before having to haul myself out of bed for an eight-hour shift house managing, and then I got distracted by a Borders on my way home for a while. I'm finally now checking my flist for the first time today, and realize, hey! Remix reveal!

So, yes. I am responsible for Staging (Rebel Without a Cause), a remix of thedeadparrot's most excellent fic Stage Five. I must have spent DAYS reading and rereading her House fics for something I could remix without making an utter ass of myself, and I kept coming back to that one, so. I'm not good at remixing, but I'm a lot happier with this remix than I usually am, so that's good.

Also! I should have flailed about this earlier, but remixes were posted while I was doing Passover, and it just slipped past. rian219 remixed my fic Logical Deduction as Gravitation (The Logical Conclusion Remix), and it is TWELVE THOUSAND KINDS OF AWESOME. She took my silly crack-addled Sirius!fic and made it aching and funny and brilliant and REMUS, and I am kind of in love. If you read this, rian, THANK YOU.

I can has sleep now?

(Also, BSG? OMGWTFCHIEF & CHIEF/BOOMER. That is all.)

Ahem. Since a few people seemed to be interested.

kaydee's somewhat self-indulgent and random but still potentially helpful guide to seeing new york city on limited time and budget
a.k.a. Well, we got here, and the trip to the top of the Empire State Building was a total rip-off, so NOW what the fuck do we do?

( well, i've got a few suggestions, in no particular order... )

I should've pimped this long ago, but the newest installment kicked my ass all over the plce and made me insanely happy, so if you live under a rock and haven't yet checked out shoebox_project, then for god's sake get over there NOW. HP, Remus/Sirius, Marauders era, the best-written, funniest, and most realistic take on the Marauders I've ever read, and it's absolutely fucking brilliant. Yes. Go.

REMIXER, I LURVE YOU. Omigod. It's, like, all the Elijah backstory I never put in, and his character is EXACTLY right, and <3 <3 <3.

I also sort of have a guess, because the style is very familiar, but on the other hand, there are so many people involved this year that it might be some Viggorli author I've never read until now, in which case I should have been reading her, because OMG SO GOOD.

I've never been much of a Rosie fan (I like her well enough, but am somewhat indifferent towards her in terms of fandom). That said, get thee hence to monkeycrackmary's journal. Five things that never happened to Rosie Cotton. NOW.

I don't rec things enough. So, I'm reccing this. New good Domlijah, so rare, yet so beautiful. Get thee hence.