By sheer coincidence, both my official assignment and the treat I hadn’t planned on writing are historicals – of a sort, since they aren’t direct historical fiction but fanfiction of historical (pro) fiction, so to speak. They even overlap in time, place and setting, while dealing with entirely different characters (and their interpretation). To wit: one – the unexpected treat – is having a go at Shakespeare’s history plays. Now I absolutely agree that the Hollow Crown ‘s production of Henry V. was the weakest of the HC productions, but by letting Falstaff’s page, referred to only as “Boy” in the play, survive into the John-Hurt-played Chorus (this is the final reveal of the HC Henry V), it gave me a fanon idea which I haven’t been able to dislodge from my brain since, to wit, that Falstaff’s page is, in fact, none other than Owen Tudor, aka that adventurous Welshman who got together with Henry V’s widow, had several children by her and thus without intending to ended up founding a new dynasty. (His grandson was the first to make it to the throne; everyone’s least favourite wife killing monarch was Owen’s great-grandson.) After I had kidded around with likeadeuce about this a couple of times, she ended up requesting it for Yuletide, and well, how could I not? Especially since, thinking about the premise further, it occurred to me that if Owen Tudor = Falstaff’s Page, it meant he’s also the sole surviving character of the Henriad to have experienced both Prince Hal living it up at the taverns and Henry V. winning Agincourt. He’d have had a front row seat at the Falstaff/Hal relationship and ended up living with Henry’s Queen for fifteen years. He even got old enough to see the Wars of the Roses start and thus lead into the next quartet of history plays.

When this occurred to me, I also knew which form my story would have, to wit, it would be Owen, on the eve of his execution, talking to the man he’d known both as Hal and as Henry. Whether he’s chatting with an actual ghost here (it’s Shakespeare fanfic, after all) or just having an inner monologue is up to you, dear reader. Owen – spelt the Welsh way, Owain, because I can – was great fun to find a voice for, which helped me overcome my inhibitions at tackling the Bard’s characters.

Gentlemen of the Shade (3155 words) by Selena
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Henry V - Shakespeare, Henry IV - Shakespeare, The Hollow Crown (2012), Shakespeare - History Plays, 15th Century CE RPF
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Owain ap Maredudd ap Tewdwr | Owen Tudor/Catherine de Valois, Sir John Falstaff/Prince Hal (Shakespeare), Sir John Falstaff & Owen Tudor, Henry V of England & Owen Tudor, Catherine of Valois/Henry V
Characters: Boy (Henry V), Owain ap Maredudd ap Tewdwr | Owen Tudor, Prince Hal (Shakespeare), Henry V of England, Sir John Falstaff, Catherine of Valois Queen of England, Fluellen (Henry V), Nym (Henry V), Pistol (Shakespeare)
Additional Tags: Ambiguous Relationships, Agincourt, Character Study, Messy, Yuletide, Yuletide 2016
Summary:

In which Falstaff's page has a chat with the late Henry V. about shared bed fellows (plural), accidentally founds a dynasty and changes the course of English history.

Meanwhile, when offering fandoms I was ready to write for, I included Sharon Penman’s novel The Sunne in Splendour, which deals with the Wars of the Roses from a distinctly Yorkist and Ricardian pov. Now The Sunne in Splendour is a novel I’d read for the first time when I was 20 or 21. And I fell in love instantly. Decades later, I freely concede its flaws to anyone grumbling about them – the pseudo medieval language at times (which Penman ditched in later novels), Richard as the hero is verging on too good to be true ness, a bit odd pov choices (Penman is prone to include more than necessary every time), etc. But. But. The reasons why I loved it so much in my early 20s to begin with are still there. Penman’s great with the family dynamics of both the Plantagenets and the Nevilles. She was the first author I’d read who does more with Edward IV than “playboy king”, and her version is still the most interesting Edward of them all to me, just as her Elizabeth Woodville is my favourite Elizabeth Woodville (way more interesting than Philippa Gregory’s who is meant to be the heroine, btw). The Edward and Richard dynamic pushes my button for sibling relationships. I love that while being pro York, her pov chapters for various Lancastrians – Edmund Beaufort, the Duke of Somerset, and Marguerite d’Anjou herself – makes them not just human but sympathetic. (Yes, Marguerite is a villain from Yorkist pov chapters, but not in her own, and not in a villainous monologue way, either.) Her solution to the “What happened to the Princes?” mystery makes sense to me. And I still can’t get through the last chapters without crying.

Now, my recipient’s request for this story was that she wanted more about the Richard/Anne relationship, with Richard and Anne being supportive of each other, the way they are in the novel. (She also suggested maybe the wedding and subsequent nights fleshed out, but I can’t write sex. Truly, I suck at it, and not in the fun way. So emotional exploration it was.) Well, the Richard/Anne relationship is of course pretty central in the novel and thus already well covered by Penman, BUT remember those odd pov choices? One of them is that we don’t get Anne Neville’s until after she’s widowed the first time (before that, she’s described from either Francis Lovell’s, or her sister Isabella’s), and Richard’s only intermittently, and not at all at what must have been turning points for the relationship. Which gave me something to work with in a missing scenes & alternate pov kind of way. It also provided me with a friends-to-lovers arc, and the challenge I gave myself, to write the development of the Richard and Anne relationship in a way that I hoped would work both for readers of The Sunne in Splendour and for people who haven’t read a word of the novel but are interested in the era.

Still: it’s meant to be a Penman derived fanfiction, and thus I was of course bound to her narrative choices (Anne’s first marriage: not a happy event, to put it mildly), including her choices of (nick)names. (Or full names; that Anne is the only one in their families close to Richard who doesn’t call him “Dickon” but “Richard” is important in the novel, and of course I stuck with it.)

Below is the result: Plantagenets, Penman edition.

Troth (9410 words) by Selena
Chapters: 4/4
Fandom: The Sunne in Splendour - Sharon Kay Penman, 15th Century CE RPF
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: Anne Neville Queen of England/Richard III of England, Anne Neville Queen of England & Richard Neville Earl of Warwick, Edward IV of England & Richard III of England, Richard III of England & Richard Neville Earl of Warwick, Edward of Lancaster | Prince of Wales/Anne Neville Queen of England
Characters: Anne Neville Queen of England, Richard III of England, Edward IV of England, Richard Neville Earl of Warwick, Edward of Lancaster | Prince of Wales, George Plantagenet Duke of Clarence, Isabel Neville, Marguerite d'Anjou | Margaret of Anjou
Additional Tags: Missing Scene, Dysfunctional Family, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Regicide, Yuletide, Yuletide 2016
Summary:

Four times the relationship between Anne Neville and her cousin Richard Plantagenet changed, and yet remained the same.

ssrconfidential's authors are reaveled, and this is the story I wrote:

All of Me (2394 words) by Selena
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Agent Carter (TV)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Ana Jarvis/Edwin Jarvis
Characters: Anna Jarvis, Edwin Jarvis, Howard Stark, Peggy Carter, Whitney Frost, Rose Roberts, Zsa Zsa Gabor
Additional Tags: Character Study, Backstory, Hurt/Comfort
Summary:

Between countries, between languages, between death and life: Ana Jarvis has been all of this for years. Portrait of a survivor.

Ana Jarvis, whose existence we learned of in season 1 - that we didn't see her then caused me to have an elaborate theory about her being identical with Dottie which of course turned out to be sheer nonsense - finally got introduced to us in season 2. She had only a few scenes, all in all, but she was fabulous in them, and I was delighted to have the chance to write about her. The recipient never bothered to comment, alas, but a lot of other kind people did, which made me one happy writer. Especially since writing the story brought back memories of interviewing several of the old exiles in Los Angeles when I was there for a few months in the mid 90s.

Not the Agent Carter story I'm supposed to be working on, but it wanted to be written, not least due to a certain movie. Also, it's another of my meta-disguised-as-fanfiction efforts, this time on Howard Stark.

The dreams in which I'm dying (3348 words) by Selena
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Agent Carter (TV), Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Relationships: Howard Stark & Maria Stark & Tony Stark, Peggy Carter & Howard Stark, Steve Rogers & Howard Stark, Howard Stark & Tony Stark, Nick Fury & Howard Stark, Howard Stark/Maria Stark, Howard Stark & Joey Manfredi
Characters: Howard Stark, Peggy Carter, Maria Stark, Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, Joey Manfredi, Nick Fury, Edwin Jarvis, James "Bucky" Barnes
Additional Tags: Backstory, Character Study, Non-Chronological, Non-Linear Narrative, Bisexual Male Character
Summary:

Past, present, future: fourteen memories Howard Stark experiences in the minutes before his death.

The Art of Letting Go (2957 words) by Selena
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, Dooku & Yoda, Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker, Dooku & Qui-Gon Jinn, Qui-Gon Jinn & Obi-Wan Kenobi
Characters: Yoda, Dooku | Darth Tyranus, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker | Darth Vader, Ahsoka Tano
Additional Tags: Master & Padawan Relationship(s)
Summary:

From Yoda to Dooku to Qui-Gon to Obi-Wan to Anakin to Ahsoka: betweeen Master and Apprentice, letting go is the hardest of lessons.

Because I'm not nearly done yet with Master-Padawan relationships and their messed up intensity. Irreverent alternative title of this one: How Screwed Up Are The Jedi?

Alexandria Leaving (8845 words) by Selena
Chapters: 5/5
Fandom: Hand of Isis - Jo Graham, Historical RPF, Ancient History RPF, Classical Greece and Rome History & Literature RPF, Roman History RPF
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa/Charmian (Hand of Isis), Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa/Julia the Elder, Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa & Gaius Octavian
Characters: Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, Charmian (Hand of Isis), Julia the elder, Gaius Octavian, Octavia of the Julii, Livia Drusilla, Marcellus, Demetria (Hand of Isis)
Additional Tags: Aftermath, Survivor Guilt, Redemption
Summary:

Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa will always choose Rome. But he returns to Alexandria to confront the past. And he doesn't come alone.

This was the treat I wrote, inspired both by affection for the Numinous World novels by Jo Graham and by a decades long fascination with that particular century in Ancient history. I hope it works both if you've read Hand of Isis and if you haven't, but are interested in history.

Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa doesn't often get a starring role, in part, I think, because his life doesn't fit with the most popular tropes it could/should have fallen into and in fact downright defies them. He was the most talented military strategist of his generation, and yet neither tried to use that in order to make himself ruler of the Roman Empire, nor did he crash and burn trying. Nor was he someone who could only function in war: his "civilian" projects - aequaducts (including some that are still used, like the one getting water to the Trevi fountain in Rome), roads, temples, the change of the Campus Martius from a swampy health risk to to a park and buildings highlight of the cityscape, etc. - are impressive, and if Augustus by the end of his life could boast that he found Rome a city made of bricks and left it a city made of marble, it was Agrippa who had done much of the actual work. All this being said, Agrippa, while being as close to the Roman ideal as you could get in real life, can't have been without ambition: his three marriages were all proof of that (first he married money, then he married into the Julian family, and then he basically married the succession), and while he seems to have been content to be Octavian's/Augustus' right hand man, he definitely drew the line at the prospect of Augustus' nephew Marcellus being in command, leading to an estrangement betwen himself and Augustus that . Also, as I have him observe in less anachronistic terms than these, no one remains the second most powerful man of the world for such a long time in the most cut throat of surroundings if he doesn't know how to deal with power.

So Agrippa remains an enigma worth exploring to me. In Augustus-friendly fictions, he's usually the devoted sidekick without second thoughts; in Cleopatra-friendly fictions (by far the majority these days), he's either a brute ("Lily of the Nile"), the wrong age (the famous Elizabeth Taylor starring Cleopatra has him show up as a grizzled veteran with probably only two lines), or not present as a character at all. In the recent tv show Rome (definitely a Roman pov tale) he's basically Sam Gamgee who has wandered into entirely the wrong narrative for him. (Seriously, the actor looks a bit like Sean Astin as Sam.) And has an ill-fated brief romance with Octavia, which should make things awkward a few years later when he marries her daughter, but then said daughter doesn't exist in Rome.

Hand of Isis, which is narrated by Charmian, Cleopatra's handmaiden and in the world of the novel also her half sister, is an exception in that it's definitely on the Cleopatra side of things, but Agrippa, who has a supporting role in the narrative, is still presented as a tragic and sympathetic character. The one big change/addition the novel makes to history as far as Agrippa is concerned is to let a very young Agrippa be present among Caesar's staff in Egypt and to give him an affair with Charmian. (Spoiler: it doesn't end well.) However, he's actually not that often present in the novel (leaving dreams aside), and most important in the effect his siding with Octavian has. Because we're in Charmian's pov, Agrippa choosing to follow Octavian (whom Charmian despises, and who thus isn't given any positive qualities) is just barely comprehensible by Agrippa's Roman-ness.

This, then, provided an immediate fertile ground for me to grow my own story from. Agrippa from his own pov, which would explain why he does what he does, and would without refuting anything that happens in Hands of Isis also present a different take on both Rome and Octavian than Charmian has. Another important reason for me to choose this story to write, though, was that I've always been curious about Agrippa's later, post-Actium life, and about his third marriage, to Julia (Octavian's/Augustus' only daughter), whom I freely confess I have a huge soft spot for. Suetonius basically sees Julia as the occasion for massive slutshaming and no more than that, but I've always liked the take on her we find in Metrobius' "Saturnalia":

"She was in her thirty-eighth year, a time of life when if she had behaved reasonably she would have been almost elderly; but she abused the indulgence of fortune no less than that of her father. Of course her love of literature and considerable culture, a thing easy to come by in that household, and also her kindness and gentleness and utter freedom from vindictiveness had won her immense popularity, and people who knew about her faults were amazed that she combined them with qualities so much their opposite.
Her father had more than once, speaking in a manner indulgent but serious, advised her to moderate her luxurious mode of life and her choice of conspicuous associates. But when he considered the number of his grandchildren and their likeness to Agrippa, he was ashamed to entertain doubts about his daughter’s chastity. So Augustus persuaded himself that his daughter was light-hearted almost to the point of indiscretion, but above reproach, and was encouraged to believe that his ancestress Claudia had also been such a person. He used to tell his friends that he had two somewhat wayward daughters whom he had to put up with, the Roman republic and Julia.
One day she came into his presence in a somewhat risque costume, and though he said nothing, he was offended. The next day she changed her style and embraced her father, who was delighted by the respectability which she was affecting. Augustus, who the day before had concealed his distress, was now unable to conceal his pleasure. “How much more suitable”, he remarked, “for a daughter of Augustus is this costume!” Julia did not fail to stand up for herself. “Today”, she said, “I dressed to be looked at by my father, yesterday to be looked at by my husband.”
Here is another well-known story. At a gladiatorial show Livia and Julia drew the attention of the people by the dissimilarity of their companions; Livia was surrounded by respectable men, Julia by men who were not only youthful but extravagant. Her father wrote that she ought to notice the difference between the two princesses, but Julia wittily wrote back, “These men will be old when I am old.“

End of Metrobius quote. Julia and Agrippa had five children together, the last one born after his death, and their birth places were spread across the Roman Empire because she was travelling with him, which doesn't necessarily guarantee they had a good marriage, but makes it at least possible. Moreover, given what Julia's father and her third husband, Tiberius, ended up doing to her eventually, it was probably the happiest time in her life, and I enjoyed writing her in that phase, where she also made an excellent narrative foil for an older Agrippa trying to come to terms with his past.

I've always been a fan of stories about survivors of tragedies (with and without guilt to carry), who have to get on with their lives and have to decide what they do next, not by forgetting or ignoring the past, but by trying to reconcile it with the present. Agrippa, in my story, attempts to do this. Read on whether he succeeds...

A few months ago, when the History Exchange announced itself, I looked at the conditions, saw that the minimum word count was only 500, and thought, hey, I'm busy, but I can easily do that in between stuff. If I volunteer for people I already know about, I won't even have to do research.

Famous last words, etc. The end result was one of the longest things I've written outside Yuletide, and I don't regret a single thing. Eleanor of Aquitaine will do that to you. The prompt asked for an AU, which got me thinking not of one AU but several. Well, there's a certain format for this. I've repeatedly written "Five Things..." tales about fictional characters; there was no reason not to do it for a rl one. Especially since said format, at least in the way it works for me, also provides the opportunity to portray the main character "in canon", so to speak, via several angles.

So, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Queen of France, Queen of England, survivor extraordinaire who still travelled across the Pyrenees on political missions when in her 70s, something that would be remarkable even today, let alone in the Middle Ages. Her life was often so unlikely that fiction couldn't trump it. However, of course there were plenty of opportunities where with just one circumstance changed, her resulting existence would have been just as remarkable (imo), if in a different (or not?) way. After mulling it over (and reading one of the newer biographies, since the last time I did research on Eleanor was more then 20 years ago), I came up with five scenarios which each became its own story. You can read all five here:

Time and Chance (16069 words) by Selena
Chapters: 5/5
Fandom: 12th Century CE RPF, When Christ and His Saints Slept - Sharon Kay Penman, Devil's Brood - Sharon Kay Penman, Historical RPF, Henry II Trilogy - Sharon Kay Penman, The Lion in Winter (1968)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Eleanor of Aquitaine/Henry Plantagenet, Eleanor of Aquitaine/Louis VII of France, Eleanor of Aquitaine & Thomas Becket, Eleanor of Aquitaine & Matilda I of Boulogne, Eleanor of Aquitaine & Raymond of Antioch, Peter Abelard/Heloise (background)
Characters: Eleanor of Aquitaine, Henry II of England, Thomas Becket, Bernard of Clairveaux, Petronilla de Chemillé, Mahault of Anjou, Matilda I of Boulogne, Stephen of England, Eustace IV Count of Boulogne, Louis VII of France, Robert de Dreux, Raymond of Antioch, Melisande of Jerusalem - Character, Thierry Galeran, Henry the Young King, William X. of Aquitaine, Petronilla of Aquitaine
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Historical, POV Female Character, Female Friendship
Summary:

Five lives which Eleanor of Aquitaine never lived.

A few more remarks on those five roads not taken: ( Hidden under a cut. )

From intrigueing and muccamukk:

In a new post, list ten fic that have stayed with you in some way. Don’t take but a few minutes, and don’t think too hard — they don’t have to be the “right” works, or even all the same pairing or fandom, just the fics that have touched you or that stuck with you somehow.

I'm sure I could come up with ten more, but these are the ones that came immediately to mind (and which I could find again online!):

1.) From Me To Q by Julia Houston (Star Trek: The Next Generation). Star Trek in its first three incarnations is one of my oldest fandoms, and the time when TNG and then DS9 were broadcast was when I started to get aquainted with fanfiction, first via fanzines and then via the earliest online archives. Finding this particular story was like striking gold. It's TNG; it's plotty, like a well written episode complete with ethical dilemmas; it's Picard/Q (which was what I was looking for when finding the story) but uses the entire TNG ensemble well; it takes the most reviled of fanfic clichés, the Mary Sue, and gives it a highly original twist. (Well, back then it was original, for all I know, it's been often imitated since.) Also, the dialogue sparkles. In short, I fell in love, so much so that I gave Voyager, which I had almost given up upon, another shot, simply because Julia Houston back then was also writing Voyager reviews and I adored her writing that much.


2.) Last Set Before Closing, by Kat Allison. (Highlander: The Series). HL was another early online fandom of mine, and this story left me shaken and breathless the first time I read it. On the surface, not much happens in this tale, which is set several years after the series ended; Joe Dawson is very old, not far from death, and his mind has started to wander; Duncan visits. Behind that simple description hides one of the best and most gutwrenching stories I've read in any fandom, which at once gives us the relationship between Joe and Duncan, and how both of them relate to Methos, about friendship, about mortals and immortals, and at the same time manages to say something very personal to anyone who has an older relative. (Until then, I don't think I had ever read fanfiction tackling a rl subject such as aging, its physical and mental decline, so unflinchingly, and with a beloved character, no less.) Another reason why I love it is this: at the time when it was first posted, its take on Methos was pretty much unique and went directly against how most fans then wrote him. (Probably still does.) And yet I find it entirely plausible.


3.) Changed Utterly by Parda (Highlander: The Series). Another HL story. Parda was a writer I interacted with a lot during my HL days, both as a reader and as a writer. This story is still my favourite of hers, and at the time it was first posted struck me as one of the best meditations onf grief and surviving I had read i nthe fandom. It's set about a year after the show ends, wherein Duncan is still dealing with Richie’s fate, when he sees Cassandra again. Not present in body but very much in thought are Methos, Connor and Richie. What to do when you’ve both done and experienced the unforgivable is a question with a dozen answers and none, and all the characters here are dealing with it. Poetic and profound.


4.) Father's Heart by Fernwithy ( Star Wars). Still my favourite Star Wars story, many years later (this was written shortly after The Phantom Menace was released). Set between trilogies, it pulls off something a lot of people tried since, and does so in a credible way: Vader and the child and later teenager Leia forming a tentative friendship, which falls apart with a vengeance as she grows older and experiences the Empire at its worst. In addition to a terrific take on Leia and Vader, Bail Organa and his wife (who in this version is one of the former handmaidens, Sabé) as well as some original characters are compellingly written. ( Not to mention it caters to two of my narrative soft spots: non-romantic intense relationship, relationship that breaks up because of politics and ethics (and rightly so). ) I was only ever at the periphery of SW fandom, not least because I happen to like the prequels, but this story made me search for and read a lot of SW fanfiction for a while. It was years before I found its match.


5.) Freefall by Penknife (X-Men movieverse). This is an X2 AU, ensemble story, Scott pov, and one of the earliest penknife stories I read. X2 had just been released. As after X1, I hunted for stories that weren't Wolverine/Rogue. Hard to imagine for current day fans, but back then it was actually difficult to find Magneto/Xavier stories, or stories that featured Mystique in a prominent role, or stories that featured Scott at all. Bingo, thought I, when I found this one, and little did I know I had also found a favourite writer in many fandoms more. Oh, and I think this was the first AU I really liked (the twist is that Scott realises a bit sooner what's going on during the prison visit at the start of the movie, with the result that he and Xavier end up as fugitives together with Magneto and Mystique; it's Jean who gets captured instead). Until then, I had avoided AUs. After reading it, I gave them a shot.

6.) Ten Thousand Candles by Andraste. This is another early story by a future favourite writer; Charles Xavier post X2, trying to cope with all that happened (read: ( spoiler for big X2 twist )). Back then, Charles Xavier centric stories were incredibly rare; stories in which he wasn't either the wise mentor type or trying to win Erik back were even rarer. What he experiences in X2 is pretty horrifying, and I loved finding a story which addressed that. Of course, Andraste turned out to be the biggest Xavier expert in the planet, but I didn't know that then. :)


7.) Bed of Bones by Roz Kaveney (Buffy the Vampire Slayer): I had spotted Roz on a couple of Buffy discussion mailing lists (remember those?), but this was the first BTVS or fanfiction in any fandom tale of hers that I had read, and it was sharp, poetic, and made the First Slayer(about whom at this point we only knew what Restless had mentioned) into a fascinating character. I was wowed. It also raised my standard of expectation re: fanfiction creating mythology in present day or futuristic fandoms to no end.

8.) Queen of Spades by Astolat (James Bond: Casino Royale): Ah, ye golden days when the Craig Casino Royale had been released and for the first time in my life I actually went and looked for Bond fanfiction, because Dench!M and Craig!Bond dynamic in that movie had gripped me in and fascinated me. (I had also loved Eva Green as Vesper and her relationship with Bond, but not in a way that made me look for fanfic.) And again, I hit gold. I think this probably was the first Bond/M story online. It set a most pleasing trend - for the next few years, you could rely on Yuletide including some great and sharp Bond and M fanfiction. (And then came Skyfall which brought the avalanche of Bond/Q and the Bond movies were no longer qualified for Yuletide, but that's another story.) Now, most combinations that have one character in a position of power over the other character are hard to sell to me as pairings, but there are exceptions, and Queen of Spades made me realize Dench!M and Craig!Bond were such an exception for me, because wow. (It also made me realise that I had a new story or rather old story archetype, not necessarily always as pairings, I love the gen variations, too, but: Morally ambiguous queens and their morally ambiguous battered knights, bring them on! Though only if the Queen is the older of the two. Read: Dany/Jorah does nothing fo rme.)


9: Working Order by Eatscissors (Terminator: the Sarah Connor Chronicles). John/Cameron is a pairing that intrigues me but which I find more interesting on the actual show than in most of fanfiction, because, imo as often, fanfic tends to simplify and dispense with much that makes this particular relationship so layered, starting with the fact that Cameron is a machine, no matter what she looks like.( Some spoilery ramblings about John and Cameron on the show ensue. ) Working Order, by contrast, addresses this and the other issues between them head-on while also being one of those stories where the explicit sex is part of the character exploration instead of reading as just being there for its own sake. For a reader like me who often finds sex scenes (both slash and het) reading like involuntarily funny gymnastic mannuals, with the participants interchangable to other fandoms and thus not very interesting, this was an eye opener. Really well written.

10.) Petrarchan Sonnets from the Vatican by Petra (The Borgias): I was and am grateful for all the stories I got in exchanges, and often loved them to bits, but this one will always remain special. Its just that awesome. It's a story in the guise of a fake article about the discovery of sonnets between L.B. (now who could that possibly be in Borgias fandom?) and person unknown, female and apparantly her tutor. Complete with the sonnets. And the commentary. Absolutely delightful, needless to say, poetic (my Yulewriter's ability to compose Petrarchan Sonnets with clever allusions to events from the show's first season still stuns me), and full of subtlety, and the wit and love for language that the characters in question display on the show as well (and did in history). (And now I'm grieved again that the Lucrezia and Guilia relationship post s1 fell by the wayside on the show, but never mind me.) If I could ensure that just one bit of Borgias fanfiction survives, this would be it.

Aka the siblings tale in the X-Men Movieverse I wanted to write for ages, for yetanothermask.


Longer than the road that stretches out ahead (5417 words) by Selena
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: X-Men: First Class (2011), X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Raven | Mystique & Charles Xavier, Erik Lehnsherr & Raven | Mystique
Characters: Raven | Mystique, Charles Xavier, Erik Lehnsherr, Sharon Xavier
Summary:

Raven and Charles: the ties that bind when you grow up together and still remember the past in two different ways.

L.A. Confidential has been nominated at the SunnyD Awards ! In the categories: Best Comedy, Best Gen Fic, Best Characterization. Whoever did that: thank you so much! I'm one happy author.




And now I have a whole new rec list of stories to check out via the other nominees on the list.

Five Times Hank McCoy Tried To Propose To Abigail Brand (2916 words) by Selena
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Astonishing X-Men, X-Men (Comicverse), Marvel
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Abigail Brand/Hank McCoy
Characters: Hank McCoy, Abigail Brand, Norman Osborn, Scott Summers, Emma Frost


Some years ago, I was getting heavily into X-Men comics for a while, and one of the reasons was Joss Whedon's run of Astonishing X-Men. (I still think it's the best thing he did post Buffy, at least until the Avengers). I also enjoyed Warren Ellis' ensuing run of AXM, tried to keep up with other X-comics (written at that point by Matt Fraction, I think), and with the Marvelverse at large (this was the aftermath of Civil War and the Skrull Invasion) and was thrilled my favourite Joss-invented character from AXM got her own brief spin-off series by Kieran Gillen. So naturally, I also wrote some fanfiction.

I can't swear to being the first, but I must have been one of the earliest online people to comment on the fact Hank "Beast" McCoy and Agent Abigail Brand (the above mentioned Joss contribution to the Marvelverse) increasingly seemed to have that kind of verbal sparring interaction that translates into shipping more often than not. And lo, I shipped them. They were an idealistic hero (Hank)/ ruthless morally ambiguous spy (Abigail Brand) type of pairing, which if done right (i.e. what the morally ambiguous person has done isn't overlooked, the idealist doesn't suddenly lose all his/her ethics) is extremely appealing to me. Mind you, Brand had been introduced as an antagonist who ends up an ally-by-necessity, and Hank was one of the original X-Men, i.e. a Marvelverse stalwart whom Joss presumably only had limited liberty with, so I wasn't sure this would actually go anywhere more than bickering on the page. But in the final issue of Joss' run, it did. And then Ellis and the other X-writers did not end the relation but continued it. Gillen even made it central to the shortlived S.W.O.R.D. spin-off. I was very happy indeed. Now it's been years since I've followed the X-comics, so I have no idea whether Beast/Brand are still an item, but back then they were, and it was one of the few times where I had all the shippery feelings about a couple - I was thrilled by every mention of them, grabbed every hint about Abigail B.'s mysterious backstory (she's an alien/human hybrid) and looked for fanfiction. I found one good author, and.... not much else, either good or bad. So this was definitely a minor pairing. And it grabbed me like nothing in the X-verse, comics or movies, had done since my original encounter with Xavier/Magneto in their Stewart/McKellen incarnations.

( The rest of the days )