Emerging bleary-eyed from a lot of reading, I bring reccomendations. (Well, the first part of them anyway. More to follow.) As for my own stories, both the recipients liked them and wrote lovely things about them at their own journals (their summaries of what the stories are about are better than mine, drat!), which makes me glad, but not too many other people so far bothered to check them out so far, woe. Ah well. Self, you knew this would happen, a rare fandom is a rare fandom, and within rare fandoms, at least in one case you picked a subject you knew maybe only recipient and yourself are interested in. (But I still want other people to read both stories, she sniffles, they mean so much to me this year!)

However, as a reader, I'm in unqualified ecstasy. Have a first bunch of recs (excluding, of course, my gifts which I have already talked about).

History/Hunger Games: The Sticking Place

Yes, you read the fandoms right. Someone wrote an ingenious fusion of the Hunger Games premise with the 15th century. In the Fifth Hunger Games, Lucrezia Borgia, Richard (III.) of York, Marguerite d'Anjou and poor Henry of Lancaster are all tributes. It sounds like crack, but the characters are played, err, written straight, and of course it has to end the way it does.

History: The most pleasant tale of Lady Bessy

Four titles Elizabeth of York never held, and one she did. The "Five Things" format applied to the woman who was the last Planatagenet princess and the first Tudor queen, but rarely gets fictional or biographical attention. This year, she got several stories. This one which applies the "Five Things" format in ingenious ways is my favourite.

A Place of Greater Safety: Parallel or Together

In which Camille Desmoulins tries to bring Robespierre and Danton together. It doesn't work out the way he expected. The characterisations ring very true to Hilary Mantel's novel, and it does something I've been secretly and not so secretly hoping for when reading the actual book, where it didn't but could have. :)

Babylon 5:

The Subtle Arrangement of Stones: the Babylon 5 story I never knew was missing in my life, but retrospectively it so was, and oh, how it wins at Yuletide! Set during the first season. Londo, G'Kar and Delenn are kidnapped by the Homeguard, and it's up to their valiant aides, Vir, Na'Toth and Lennier to rescue them. The characterisations and - as invevitable given the characters in question - the bickering are top notch, the format (Garibaldi interviewing everyone for the security files afterwards) ingenious, and it fits into canon beautifully. I loved this to bits.

The Price of a Favour: Timov in the days of Cartagia. I'm always thrilled to find fic dealing with my favourite B5 one episode character, and this was great.

In Flagrante: three times Londo and G'Kar are caught in the act. One happy, one angry, one sad. Alternatively funny and heartbreaking, as Londo and G'Kar are wont to be.

James Bond: Protégé

M passes on what she learned. Contains two of my favourite things, M backstory and Eve Moneypenny fleshing out. I loved it.

Elementary (which had 21 new stories in Yuletide - hooray!):

Three Anniversaries: A Love Story: Not all great love stories are about romance is the summary the author gives, and this one celebrates the (platonic) friendship between Sherlock Holmes and Joan Watson through the years. Present and future fic that feels true to where the characters are now and where they could be through the years, and has that same restraint and understated affection I find appealing on the show.

The Long Summer: this one is an ensemble fic that uses a frustrating case to show Holmes' relationships to Watson, Gregson, Bell and deliver an excellent Holmes character exploration to boot.

Greek Mythology: this year one of the requests was for a story about Ariadne and Icarus growing up together in Crete. This resulted in a dozen or so great tales, and it feels unfair to single one out, but this is my favourite of them all:

Thirteen Views Of A Labyrinth: They are not so very different, Ariadne and Pasiphaë, Icarus and Daedalus, Ariadne and Icarus. This has fantastic world building and awe-inspiring characterisations of everyone, is full of shades of grey and surprising yet sense making twists on the myths. I admire it so much.

The Count of Monte-Cristo: Constant.

It's a rare story which takes one of the source canon's villains - in this case Fernand Mondego, the later Count de Morcerf - and fleshes him out without going the excuse and woobiefication road. This story accomplishes it.

New Tricks: New Tricks for Old Dogs (or Five Alternate Universes Where Sandra Pullman Was Always Awesome)

What the title says. :) Wonderful banter and character voices in every universe.

Prometheus: Satellites: Three events in the life of Peter Weyland. Dysfunctional family relationships are my soft spot, and they rarely come more messed up than with Weyland, Meredith Vickers and David 8. This story gives us some background for this, in a Weyland, Meredith and David pov respectively, and it's fascinating.