Agh! Was unfortunately held at bay from the computer (ALL. DAY) by my family in major celebration mode, and as such only managed to take a rapid glance at my beautiful, shiny, KICKASS FICS (fics! Plural!) in the early morning. Have only just been able to rectify this sadness now--but all the same, it is rectified. SO. BEHOLD THE GLORY.

My main fic, Guardian (♥ ♥ ♥) is an absolutely wonderful piece of work written in Robin McKinley's Damar Series, and is comprised entirely of Luthe!reflection. Because you can never have too much Luthe in your life. (Come on, admit it.)

This was a wonderful, smooth read. The age of Luthe's voice shines through exceptionally well, and his interactions with Harry parallel nicely with his contemplation of the weight of a name, and his incredibly sad wish for normalcy in the face of that name, even as he recognizes the necessity not only for having powerful rulers, but also for guiding them to do well by their people. A particularly excellent cameo from spirit-Aerin at the end put a perfect cap on this one, and totally worked to feed my need for slightly more meaningful closure for Luthe. :D I'm so happy to have gotten this, I really can't even say. LITERALLY SHAKING WITH JOY. Now to read it again and again...

Also, I got an absolutely GORGEOUS treat, The Scent of Snow, for the equally gorgeous single-volume manga Blue.

This was such a beautiful, delicate fic--I pretty much squeed myself into delighted silence in my comment for this one, but just to touch on one very important thing I forgot to mention there--ANATOMICAL CONTEMPLATION. Kirishima sits down and thinks about all the bones in her wrist and arm by name, and if there's something cooler than this is the whole universe, I have no idea what it is. I loved the gentleness in the piece as a whole, and the detail, and--and I'm really just excited overall, and probably too tired to be writing anything coherent about these awesome pieces.

Will return tomorrow er, technically today, later in the morning and/or early afternoon with more recs. Hope it was a merry damn holiday for you, and that you managed not to fall asleep on the couch THREE TIMES throughout the festivities like some of us. >.>

( Posted! ) But the author's notes aren't showing up in the final link. D: Am hoping to get some answers in Yuletide admin.

Christ, nevermind. I should just not be allowed to function in public for a few hours after completing a fic. I always turn into an even bigger raving, neurotic lunatic than usual.

Because of course you don't want the author's notes in the fic pre-reveal. Duh.

Damn it, Yuletide broke again. And I was just about to upload, too. ;.;

(On that same note, it appears that I have failed once again to write a brief, eloquent story. But we shall refrain from speaking more of that until after I've successfully gotten the damn thing out of my hair.)

Sick again. WHAT THE HELL. Manji icon is there to be fierce in the face of my displeasure. (bitchbitch--where's my bitch bitch bitch tag?)

Finally got my sources this weekend to start work on the yuletide fic of doom, which is threatening to go epic on me again, and which I hope to beat with a dirty shoe in the future until it knocks that shit off. Right now I simply find myself asking and waxing quite philosophical--what is the sound of one having a hernia?

Will update again (and in greater depth) when I feel less angry with the world. And when I don't have a major presentation on glottogony looming on the horizon. So probably this weekend.

On a happier note, I've been looking for this online for a while now--"I Sit on the Ridge at Dusk," the first part of the Dirty Projectors' Getty Address. One of the single weirdest and most interesting things I've seen in my life (and very much an earworm).

Oh god. ( DYING HERE )

See, this is why I love my family; no one else would think it was quite as hilarious to send these sorts of chain e-mails. (Nerdy chemistry lab jokes are the best. ♥)

Okay, this is my first crack at writing one of these. Crossing my fingers that it's actually helpful and not just a steaming pile of fail.


~~~


Dear Yuletide Writer/Santa!

You. Are. AWESOME.

Just wanted to get that out there early. :D

First and foremost, fear not: I'm very rarely picky, particularly when people are doing kickass things like writing obscure fic for me. :) I love work of all ratings and most genres, from gen to romance to suspense, introspective pieces and character studies, one shots and epics, humor and (light) angst, surreal fic, continuations--really, I just love seeing individual authors flex their unique muscles from fandom to fandom. If you love what you've written, it shows; I really believe this. I'm fond of both het and slash, so no worries there. I have also read roughly as much smut as I have gen (and enjoyed my fair share of both), so don't be afraid to make with the sex if the story calls for it. :)

Things I particularly tend to like (none of which are in any way required, but would totally make my toes curl if I saw them), include in no particular order: seasonal fic (as in the passage of seasons), lyric fic (not purple prose, per se, but a sense of movement or poetry), things taking place at sunset/sunrise, anatomy, ancient myth/history, song lyrics sneaking in, nerdy intellectual jokes, a sense of nature, a sense of melancholy associated with the loss/decay of something once fantastic (concrete, like a civilization, or abstract, like a relationship), tea time (:D), happy endings sans people singing and making merry, intimacy between characters, family, layered dialogue, fate/inevitability, escapes, humor of all stripes (dark, light, dry, sarcastic), celebrations of culture--festivals, holidays, separation followed by reunion, karma, righteous punishment, little moments of domestic what-have-you (dinner, book reading), and detached and/or focused observation of small details.

Things that tend to make me a little cranky are rare, but nevertheless present: deathfic (I'll make exceptions for this, however. For example: CLAMP as good as says Ran's going to die in Clover, so if you want to explore something like that, no problem. Just no freak car accidents, pretty please), random acts of mischaracterization, pointless crack, dripping angst where the only point is to feel miserable, a lack of proof reading, mpreg without a really REALLY plausible excuse, soul mates, pejoratives, and cloying WAFF.

Really, though, so long as things make sense within the context of the fic/verse, or are otherwise explained, I'm happy to go anywhere with you. Promise. :)

Please, don't be afraid to disregard details in order to make your writing more comfortable; write the fic you feel, not the one you think will satisfy me while compromising your standards (and if the two should happily meet--you get to write a fic you love while simultaneously hitting one of the prompts--all the better!).

I would love to use the end of this letter to tell you what I think is so rocking cool about the fandoms I requested, and hopefully along the way give you some potential ideas to work from, but I'm going to restrain myself and separate them with some good healthy white space, because they got LONG, and this letter is already long by itself.

If you think more details will hurt rather than help, then by all means, leave off here, and good luck with your writing, and THANK YOU again! :D If you want more, however, then feel free to delve on beyond the tildes! :)

~~~

Well! I'm assuming you're here because details do help you and you decided to carry on, so let's start with what exactly I thought was awesome about...

( blue )

( clover )

( twelve kingdoms )

( the damar series )

And that, as they say, is that! On the heels of that small novella (my apologies if it's overwhelming--I tried, I really tried, but my fingers just go on and on...), let me just say thank you again from the bottom of my heart, and GOOD LUCK! Have more fun than humans should be allowed. :)

Form! Is! Submitted! (and I lost control of my exclamation points somewhere along the way!)

...ohhh, I can already feel the paranoia seeping in. The fear. The horror of signing up for that ONE FANDOM.

Time to lie down in the dark for a while.

ALSO: Santa letter should be up sometime tomorrow (this time I got smart and drafted it before the fear could kick in). Good thing it's a holiday in these here parts. ;)

...so, I still find it a bit disconcerting to scroll casually to the bottom of this page and find entries from almost a year ago down there (including most of my posts from last year's Yuletide :o), but I guess that's just what happens when you go digitally extinct for a year, hm?

I am LATE with my prompts/letter. I just found out that my linguistics class got cancelled for the afternoon, however, which means more time for writing! And reading! And maybe not submitting my form three minutes from the deadline! (Goddamnit, I know I wasn't this late last year. What's going on?)

Have been tearing through Stirling's Dies the Fire for the last few days in my spare hours and coming away with mixed feelings. On the one hand, the guy's come up with a kickass, incredibly interesting, opportunity-filled universe. On the other, the guy seems totally caught up in the kickass-ness of this 'verse, to the point where he skips periods of time I really would have liked to see fleshed out in favor of getting to a more action-filled part. Furthermore, his female characters grate at me--not as much as, say, Dumas, but there's the definite flavor in there of an author who's trying too hard to make his women just as interesting as his men, and running into problems in the effort. I'm hoping this gets worked on in later volumes (or better yet, that I'm crazy and just taking general feelings of dissatisfaction out on an otherwise innocent book).

( oh, and I forgot to toss this out from hiding. oops? )

ALRIGHT. BACK TO THE PROMPTS. Will possibly post again later tonight.

ALSO: Does anyone have any idea what happened to the user info layout? Or, more importantly, if this change can be switched back?

ALSO ALSO: Journal has been taken off f-lock through the end of this year in order to make Yuletide a wee bit easier. :) It will return to being entirely f-locked at the beginning of January.

Oh my god. OH MY GOD OH MY GOD. IT'S LIKE MAGIC, ONLY QUITE POSSIBLY BETTER.

I'm just at a total loss for words. There was a huge mob of students running down into Bellingham screaming for joy, and my sister and I ran with them as far as we could. I don't know how to describe it, it's just--electric, and I'm just joyful beyond all words.

God, it's like a dream.

YULETIDE IS OPEN!!!!!!

Please excuse me while I remove myself to a corner and die with joy.

This fantastic thing actually happened yesterday, but what's time in the face of the joy that is Yuletide? Besides, this last week has been sort of indescribably unpleasant, and midterms loom in the next two days, so this joy is rather magnified at the moment. It's helpfully distracting.

Goals for this year include:
- Not being an asshole by: posting a Dear Santa letter.
- Not being an asshole by: responding to any people who might comment on my fic(s) (as well as to the people who already have--retroactive letters are lame, but they still get a smidgen of one's lame gratitude across, right? Right? D:)
- Getting my offers/requests list finished within the next day.
- Being less paranoid and neurotic.
- SHOWING BRAVERY IN THE FACE OF ADVERSITY, MEN.

And that, as they say, is that. Now I return to my pre-16th century lit in the hopes that I'll be able to concentrate enough to absorb all the right info for my exam tomorrow.