potentialities

I got two stories this Yuletide, both for The Idylls of the Queen by Phyllis Ann Karr, and both exquisitely tailored to me!

The Lay of Sir Marroc (2026 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: The Idylls of the Queen - Phyllis Ann Karr
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Characters: Kay - Character, Mordred
Additional Tags: casefic, Post-Canon, Ambiguous or Implied Relationships
Summary:

Since their return from Astolat, Mordred has plagued Kay with his opinions whenever they were least requested-- so why should this latest story of a Companion of a Round Table gone mysteriously missing prove any different?

In Reginensi atrio (1476 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: The Idylls of the Queen - Phyllis Ann Karr
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Kay/Mordred (Arthurian)
Characters: Sir Kay (Idylls of the Queen), Mordred (Idylls of the Queen)
Summary:

I pray you, my masters, be merry

Happy Yuletide and/or merry Christmas to all!

My Yuletide gifts are completely amazing and everyone should read them and shower them with love.

Trixie Belden and the Sorrowful Sisters (9515 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 4/4
Fandom: The Trixie Belden Mysteries - Julie Campbell Tatham & Kathryn Kenny
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Trixie Belden, Honey Wheeler
Additional Tags: Mystery, buried treasure, Wait for it, Setting: Pre-1960
Summary:

Trixie and Honey discover a mysterious message in the woods, referring to estranged sisters and a 'treasure' waiting for one of them. But all may not be as it seems... (This story intended to be accessible to readers new to the canon.)

Someone wrote me 10k of shippy Trixie Belden casefic! The best thing about it is that it is absolutely written in the style of the books, including all the information you need to read it if you haven't ever read the Trixie Belden books, but you do like vintage juvenile mystery series and best friends who are opposites.

Frog And Toad Write Fic (1113 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Frog and Toad - Arnold Lobel
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Toad (Frog and Toad), Frog (Frog and Toad)
Additional Tags: Characters Writing Fanfiction, Yuletide Is Awesome
Summary:

Frog and Toad do almost everything together, so why not Yuletide too?

It's Yuletide meta fic! Very meta, since Frog and Toad wrote this treat together while they were waiting for the archive to open, which was extremely thoughtful of them. ;)

Frog and Toad Forever (1148 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 4/4
Fandom: Frog and Toad - Arnold Lobel
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Frog/Toad
Characters: Frog (Frog and Toad), Toad (Frog and Toad)
Additional Tags: Non-Explicit Sex, negotiation, Begging, Easy Reader Diction, Friends to Lovers
Summary:

Or, Frog and Toad are Friends with Benefits.

This is an absolutely pitch-perfect mimicry of the Frog and Toad books that also includes anatomically-correct frog foreplay and frog sex. Honestly, I think that you need to read it to believe it And you should definitely read it, because it is amazing.

Fair Trade (100 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: The Trixie Belden Mysteries - Julie Campbell Tatham & Kathryn Kenny
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Trixie Belden, Honey Wheeler
Additional Tags: yumadrin, Drabble

And one perfect drabble in the Madness collection!

I haven't gotten to many stories that aren't mine just yet, but the ones I have read so far have been amazing.

I was hoping to have the Phèdre/Hyacinthe story I'm writing as a present to Bevy ready to post on my birthday, but between one thing and another, that … will not be happening today. Soon, though!

I think I'm finally completely over the crud I came down with on the 31st, as I managed to make it through my delightful birthday lunch without noisily rearranging any bodily secretions, which is not appreciated in public and especially not in intimate, classy restaurants. (I had the pheasant pot pie. Heaven.) Luckily, I was housesitting for a family friend until two days ago, so I was able to convalesce in peace with a nice fireplace, cozy dogs and vintage copies of the complete Swallows and Amazons books for lovely untaxing reading, but still.

Still have not made it to the Hobbit movie, or indeed through my re-read of The Hobbit. I literally do not understand what it is about The Hobbit that compels me to put it back down after maybe a chapter or two, whereas I find any of the LOTR books completely gripping. Maybe it would be working better for me if someone was reading it to me at bedtime? I'm well-past a third of the way through, though, so I suppose I'm fine for this installment of the movie regardless.

I have, however, seen the Les Misérables movie, and I am currently in a state of having far, far too many feelings about Javert/Valjean. I mean, I've sort of passively shipped it since I saw the show, which was also around the time I discovered slash fandom by googling LOTR things, and I've always enjoyed the music and can sing most of most of the songs and such, but lately I've been spending hours mooning about their doomed obsession (and also being annoyed by people who ship it wrong because Javert so clearly has a massively repressed desire to be dominated, argh).

I'm sure I haven't come close to plumbing the fandom's online presence, mostly because I'm pretty sure I don't know where most of it is, but I do have one insta-rec:

Three Days (or The One Where Javert and Valjean Take a Road Trip Through France and Raise a Child) (7184 words) by zamwessell
Chapters: 2/8
Fandom: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Miserables - Schönberg/Boublil, Les Misérables (2012)
Rating: Explicit
Warning: Author Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Javert/Jean Valjean
Characters: Inspector Javert, Jean Valjean, Euphrasie "Cosette" Fauchelevant
Summary:

Javert calls what he thinks is Valjean's bluff about needing three days to find the child Cosette and intercede for her. The Inspector comes along for the ride -- and gets much more than he bargained for, in the process.

It's a WIP, but it's already updated twice in two days, like almost as soon as I hit the subscribe button. ♥

I'm nearly done with my first pass through the Yuletide archive after reading feverishly for the last few days. (Literally feverishly, although sometimes also figuratively so. I came down with some kind of crud somewhere along the Family Christmas Roadtrip.) There is, as always, so much good stuff to read.

Some amazing person wrote me Love and Pfriendship, an utterly adorable modern-day (American) college AU Mike/Psmith story. All the little transposed details are just perfect and will fill the devoted fanperson with squee, but you could just as easily read it with no fandom knowledge whatsoever.

And you should, because it is hilarious and sweet and sexy!

Yuletide is kicking my ass, as per usual, but mostly in a good way! I'd much rather have a story that I'm not sure how I'm going to finish in time than a story that I'm not sure how I'm going to start in time. Especially a story that I'm not sure how I'm going to finish because I want to put in ALL THE THINGS, as opposed to a story that I'm not sure how I'm going to finish because I can only seem to string together three consecutive words at a sitting.

In the meantime, if you're in the mood for rare fandoms, virgofolkiehas posted her latest Virgil/Dante story in two parts: The Shade Trees of Lucca Part I and Part II. This is the second part of a story triptych which traces its inspiration in some small part back to my own Virgil/Dante story and takes place, accordingly, in the same 'verse. It is lovely.

Oh, I got such an excellent story this year for yuletide! I feel really bad that I honestly can't recommend that you read it at all if you don't know the canon, which is A. S. Byatt's new book from last year, The Children's Book. Which I do recommend, very much, as the Byatt book that you are most likely to enjoy if you loved Possession, and if you haven't read Possession I just don't even know where to begin with you. It will certainly take longer than can be managed between now and New Year's Day.

So, my story is The Indian Rope Trick, and it so perfectly satisfies my desperate and incoherent desires for what happens next. It's the story of Julian Cain, ( cut for spoilers. )

If you can read this story, please do, because it's beautiful.

In May I visited the amazing Minneapolis Arts Institute with my father and brother, the latter of whom was getting ready to leave the Twin Cities after graduation and doing a last hurrah tour as well as entertaining his out-of-town family.

While we were wandering around, perpetually gobsmacked by gallery upon gallery awesome, I suddenly squeaked and darted in the direction of one painting in particular, which turned out to be separated from me by an atrium that necessitated a severe course correction before I found myself standing in front of a familiar canvas: Six Tuscan Poets.

Not familiar enough, however. Upon reading the placard, I realized that, in my initial Google images search, I had been too readily seduced by the appealing composition and sexy hand-porn, and my Virgil/Dante icon turns out to be more of a Guido Cavalcanti/Dante icon, and oh, man, I'm not saying I wouldn't read it, hot young Italian love poets in sweet new love, but talk about your rairpairs.

So I should probably get around to making a new Virgil/Dante icon, but I haven't done so yet. This one is going to have to do for posting about Thrice Purified, virgofolkie's Virgil/Dante set in the same continuum as mine.

I loved the idea when virgofolkie floated it, and now that it exists, I love it even more. A sweet, sensual sexual interlude in Canto I of Purgatorio, with lovely crisp metaphors, poetical banter and philosophical musings, and further sequelae to come!

If you're a Divine Comedy slasher, you should totally check it out.

idlerat has similar thoughts about what makes me less excited about Dollhouse, a certain lack of originality, inasmuch as originality is even a useful concept, and particularly the similarities to early Alias that makes me want to get out my DVDs and watch them instead.

At the same time, lotesseflower never fails to point out what the show is succeeding at already and has potential to improve upon, and has written a lovely Echo/Boyd ficlet that plays with and against the rampant issues of trust and consent, manifest particularly in 1x02 The Target: Yet shee will bee false, ere I come, to two, or three, PG-13, dubcon.

I fell head over heels with Firefly on DVD, so ultimately, I am inclined to give all kinds of benefits of the doubt to Dollhouse as shown on Fox with who knows what kind of editorial tinkering and bizarreness. I really do hope it grows into a show that I unabashedly adore.

My yuletide santa is nothing short of a magician, I swear! They took two of my requests, complete with my daft squicky beloved pairings, and crossed them over in a work of sheer fucking genius that is lush, evocative, sensual, gorgeously characterized, everything.

I'm just incredibly touched by the extent to which someone went to the effort, not merely to write a story for me, but to write a story so completely and utterly tailored to be everything that I adore. You are simply amazing, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Go and read!

The Language of Birds
R. The Once and Future King by T.H. White/Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke.
All magicians lie, and the Raven King, like Merlyn, is fond of tall tales and impossible deeds.

I have read so much other goodfic in the car on the way home, and I've not got through a fourth of my tabs, much less go back and compose feedback and compile recs! Merry yuletide, all!

I suck so much (ha ha ha) because I ended up asking for an extension to June on my Worple/Sanguini fic for pornish_pixies because I was writing Prince of Tennis fic instead. I am, like, the living recapitulation of that stupid kerfuffle from a month ago where Tenipuri is killing Harry Potter.

But that is not important. What is important is that everyone who has the vaguest ability to comprehend it go and read marksykins's BSC/Tenipuri AU this very minute. It is the two things that have been making me ridiculously happy, combined, and it is genius.

Also, tonight is the finals of the Scripps national spelling bee, which my mom and I will be watching. And if no one else writes the Akeelah and the Bee OT3 fic, I may have to do it.

EDIT: I am totally rooting for the homeschooled boy. Because, a.) homeschoolers and former homeschoolers represent, and b.) he looks eerily like wee!satyadasa.