Yuletide Letter 2023
Oct. 20th, 2023 01:23 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cyphomandraDear Yuletide writer,
I love Yuletide, as a challenge, a community and a tradition. I am thrilled to see what you come up with and I hope you enjoy creating it.
What I like hasn't changed much from previous years (including this sentence, its time come round again, slouching towards AO3 etc). I like humour that cares about the characters. I like characters who are outsiders in some way, but (even despite themselves!) become part of something larger - a relationship, a cause, a community. I like food as a way of showing character or worldbuilding (and for eating!). I like bittersweet endings. I like justified angst, pining, weirdness, and invention. I like pretty much any style of writing - epistolary, experimental, Dickensian - and even second person, if it works for the story. In a previous year I got IF for one story and that was fantastic. Artwise, I like quiet moments, possibly with tea or food, and prefer stylised to photorealistic. I am definitely open to treats.
I have no problem with sexual content as long as it fits with the characters, although pages of explicit anatomical detail are unlikely to be my thing. I like stories that make me remember why I love the original inspiration as well as stories that make me think about it differently (and both! both is great). And I do like the canons themselves. I like these characters being part of their worlds, even when they struggle against them.
With my noms this year I am happy with crossovers (with other noms or any fandoms I've written). For AUs see specific fandoms. If you are picking this up, Everything Everywhere All at Once is the shortest canon - it's one movie.
DNWs: child or animal harm &/or death as a major plot point. If you’re looking back through old letters I have previously excluded earthquakes but it’s been over ten years and now I’m okay with them but would like them tagged. No A/B/O or noncanonical trans characters, please.
Sons & Daughters - the Decemberists (song)
Worldbuilding
This is such a great song. I've always had a weakness for rounds, and this one is so specific and allusive; I'd love to know what's going on! "Fill our mouths with cinnamon" - is this a comfort, a favourite food, or is there some more unsettling ritual going on? Where have these sons & daughters come from? Whose bombs are those that are now fading away? I feel that there are genre elements here, sf or fantasy or horror, or maybe steampunk with the dirigibles - or something else entirely! You could totally play with form as well as genre here. AUs obviously definitely an option!
Worrals series - WE Johns
Joan "Worrals" Worralson
Becky "Frecks" Lovell
So fantastic! So action-filled, with so many sudden reversals - and Worrals & Frecks are great, competent and brave, but never over-confident or perfect. I would love more adventures and I would also love femslash, h/c, spies, plane dogfights/crashes, coping with being in some form of wilderness after a plane crash, space AUs, or even just a quiet moment between the two of them in-between adventures. Although I'd like to keep the WWII setting (unless you want to write a space AU) I would prefer not too much attention on the Nazis.
I have not read any of the non WWII ones (yet) but am open to post-war adventures or future fic - I feel that these two would not become more subdued with age!
Miss Marple - Agatha Christie
Lucy Eyelesbarrow
Miss Marple
Jason Rafiel
I've said any of these; they're all so good! I love Lucy's quiet practical competence, and how she's managed to carve out a distinct niche for herself and yet remain a little apart from society. I'd love to see more of her - possibly involved in a case herself? Tell me about some of her other jobs, how she's sorted out problems or solved difficulties, criminal or otherwise. What if she turned her own talents to crime? Or, if you wanted to veer from the detective genre into something else, is there something more to her? Is she entirely human? I would be very happy with supernatural or alien origins.
Miss Marple is also my fluffy-headed laser-sharp favourite. I love how she sees through things and how she gets older but does not lose touch. With her, I'd love to see a moment from her past - what was she like in her younger days? Did she have adventures that she hasn't chosen to tell us about? When did she first discover her talent for detection? And again, any crossover into a less realistic genre would be welcome. I am totally up for wingfic or psychic wolves. I am not a mad fan of coffee shops but I feel a tea shop run by either/both of these would be devastating :D
And Jason Rafiel. I really enjoyed his dynamic with Miss Marple, and I feel it's a great moment of connection between two people who might otherwise never have appreciated each other. I wish they'd had more time; he might give her a case in Nemesis, but I wanted more! An AU in which they work on a case together? Another moment in the Caribbean? I sort of ship them but am focussed more on the mutual recognition rather than romance. AUs of a more over the top nature would be great. I also wonder what Lucy and Jason would think of each other - maybe she takes a job working for him?
Hikaru no Go (anime)
Touya Akira
Shindou Hikaru
I was so thrilled to see them in the tagset. I love these two and this series, and I would love anything you wanted to write. I am pretty incompetent at Go (I've played it, at least, but very badly!) but I love their devotion to it and enthusiasm, their driving need to keep trying and get better (and defeat each other!). I love the whole cast. I love the way the series breaks my heart and is so good simultaneously.
I find it difficult to think of prompts! Anything, really, although I'd prefer later in the timeline rather than Shindou in his really young days. Does Shindou finally tell Akira about Sai? What happens with the two of them going forward? What are they like in 10, 20, 30 years? I totally ship them as a couple but am also happy with gen. AUs - yes if non mundane (space AUs always great).
I love Yuletide, as a challenge, a community and a tradition. I am thrilled to see what you come up with and I hope you enjoy creating it.
What I like hasn't changed much from previous years (including this sentence, its time come round again, slouching towards AO3 etc). I like humour that cares about the characters. I like characters who are outsiders in some way, but (even despite themselves!) become part of something larger - a relationship, a cause, a community. I like food as a way of showing character or worldbuilding (and for eating!). I like bittersweet endings. I like justified angst, pining, weirdness, and invention. I like pretty much any style of writing - epistolary, experimental, Dickensian - and even second person, if it works for the story. In a previous year I got IF for one story and that was fantastic. Artwise, I like quiet moments, possibly with tea or food, and prefer stylised to photorealistic. I am definitely open to treats.
I have no problem with sexual content as long as it fits with the characters, although pages of explicit anatomical detail are unlikely to be my thing. I like stories that make me remember why I love the original inspiration as well as stories that make me think about it differently (and both! both is great). And I do like the canons themselves. I like these characters being part of their worlds, even when they struggle against them.
With my noms this year I am happy with crossovers (with other noms or any fandoms I've written). For AUs see specific fandoms. If you are picking this up, Everything Everywhere All at Once is the shortest canon - it's one movie.
DNWs: child or animal harm &/or death as a major plot point. If you’re looking back through old letters I have previously excluded earthquakes but it’s been over ten years and now I’m okay with them but would like them tagged. No A/B/O or noncanonical trans characters, please.
Sons & Daughters - the Decemberists (song)
Worldbuilding
This is such a great song. I've always had a weakness for rounds, and this one is so specific and allusive; I'd love to know what's going on! "Fill our mouths with cinnamon" - is this a comfort, a favourite food, or is there some more unsettling ritual going on? Where have these sons & daughters come from? Whose bombs are those that are now fading away? I feel that there are genre elements here, sf or fantasy or horror, or maybe steampunk with the dirigibles - or something else entirely! You could totally play with form as well as genre here. AUs obviously definitely an option!
Worrals series - WE Johns
Joan "Worrals" Worralson
Becky "Frecks" Lovell
So fantastic! So action-filled, with so many sudden reversals - and Worrals & Frecks are great, competent and brave, but never over-confident or perfect. I would love more adventures and I would also love femslash, h/c, spies, plane dogfights/crashes, coping with being in some form of wilderness after a plane crash, space AUs, or even just a quiet moment between the two of them in-between adventures. Although I'd like to keep the WWII setting (unless you want to write a space AU) I would prefer not too much attention on the Nazis.
I have not read any of the non WWII ones (yet) but am open to post-war adventures or future fic - I feel that these two would not become more subdued with age!
Miss Marple - Agatha Christie
Lucy Eyelesbarrow
Miss Marple
Jason Rafiel
I've said any of these; they're all so good! I love Lucy's quiet practical competence, and how she's managed to carve out a distinct niche for herself and yet remain a little apart from society. I'd love to see more of her - possibly involved in a case herself? Tell me about some of her other jobs, how she's sorted out problems or solved difficulties, criminal or otherwise. What if she turned her own talents to crime? Or, if you wanted to veer from the detective genre into something else, is there something more to her? Is she entirely human? I would be very happy with supernatural or alien origins.
Miss Marple is also my fluffy-headed laser-sharp favourite. I love how she sees through things and how she gets older but does not lose touch. With her, I'd love to see a moment from her past - what was she like in her younger days? Did she have adventures that she hasn't chosen to tell us about? When did she first discover her talent for detection? And again, any crossover into a less realistic genre would be welcome. I am totally up for wingfic or psychic wolves. I am not a mad fan of coffee shops but I feel a tea shop run by either/both of these would be devastating :D
And Jason Rafiel. I really enjoyed his dynamic with Miss Marple, and I feel it's a great moment of connection between two people who might otherwise never have appreciated each other. I wish they'd had more time; he might give her a case in Nemesis, but I wanted more! An AU in which they work on a case together? Another moment in the Caribbean? I sort of ship them but am focussed more on the mutual recognition rather than romance. AUs of a more over the top nature would be great. I also wonder what Lucy and Jason would think of each other - maybe she takes a job working for him?
Hikaru no Go (anime)
Touya Akira
Shindou Hikaru
I was so thrilled to see them in the tagset. I love these two and this series, and I would love anything you wanted to write. I am pretty incompetent at Go (I've played it, at least, but very badly!) but I love their devotion to it and enthusiasm, their driving need to keep trying and get better (and defeat each other!). I love the whole cast. I love the way the series breaks my heart and is so good simultaneously.
I find it difficult to think of prompts! Anything, really, although I'd prefer later in the timeline rather than Shindou in his really young days. Does Shindou finally tell Akira about Sai? What happens with the two of them going forward? What are they like in 10, 20, 30 years? I totally ship them as a couple but am also happy with gen. AUs - yes if non mundane (space AUs always great).
