[Yuletide 2017] Dear Writer...

[antediluvian]

Hello lovely Mystery Yuletide Writer! I am so psyched you're going to be writing for me and please be reassured that I'm going to love my gift - I only ever request fandoms I feel super fannish about, so I'm going to be absolutely thrilled to receive a fic for them. This letter is meant in the spirit of suggestions intended to inspire; I want you to enjoy your Yuletide writing experience, so if you have an idea that doesn't match my desires exactly, please feel free to follow your heart (as long as it doesn't include any of my DNWs) and we will both have a brilliant Yuletide. <3
 
In general, I prefer fics written in third person and I don't mind whether it's past or present tense. I love character- and relationship-driven stories over plot-driven ones (not that I don't love a long and involved story, but I find the emotional beats in it a lot more satisfying than plot intricacies) and for Yuletide I strongly prefer happy endings, or at least hopeful/optimistic ones. I don't mind if you put the characters through hell first, but I need that to be resolved happily at the end and with enough length to enjoy the resolution.
 
I am happy with any rating and I love both genfic and shipfic. However, please don't break up existing canonical relationships or include non-canon pairings unless specifically requested.
 
Some particular things I love in fic: slice of life, found family, everyday and mundane themes combined with the extraordinary or magical, power dynamics with a positive impact on everyone involved, explicit and enthusiastic consent, slow burn attraction, loyalty kink, elaborate descriptions of scenery, competency kink ("they're so efficient and I'm so into it!"), pushing people around consensually during sex, daemon AUs, soulbond AUs, university AUs with elements of the canon world.
 
Things I Do Not Want: focus on character death (during or after), angst without happy endings, noncon, character bashing, humour fic, a/b/o, misogynistic dirty talk, misogyny in m/m, characters described as "slutty" or "trash", humiliation kink, angsty infidelity, descriptions of hipbones, lengthy/explicit poly negotiations (poly is very fine, just no long conversations about how the poly dynamic will work please), homophobia (internalised or external), holocaust fic
 

Age of Youth
Characters requested: Kang Yi Na, Yoo Eun Jae, Jung Ye Eun, Yoon Jin Myung (and very happy for Song Ji-Won to be included too, or to be the focus if she's your fave)
 
Note: I have only watched season 1, and won't have watched season 2 by Christmas, so please use s1 as your canon.
 
This is one of my absolute favourite dramas of all time. Five women living together at university, learning to have each other's backs and becoming a glorious found family full of love, loyalty, and squabbling? Hell yes. I love that even though most of the women have a Dramatic dark secret in their pasts (murder! loan sharks! stalkers! more murder!), the show spends much more time on their everyday trials and tribulations - stealing each other's clothes, mystery boxers found in the laundry, the endless balancing act that is one bathroom between five women, your housemate eating all your jam, etc. I love the way their relationships to each other deepen and change as the show goes on. It is really the perfect balance for me between tropey drama ridiculousness and delightful large slices of everyday life. 

While I am gently fond of the peripheral men and am happy for them to be in the fic, with the exception of Ye-Eun's abusive failure of a man, I also SUPER DIG the sheer amount of femslash potential holy shit. I don't think there's a combination of the girls that I wouldn't be open to shipping/reading (particularly Yi-Na/Ye-Eun cos that gifset holy moly but really truly I am keen for anything), and I would also be very OK with poly/multiple combinations. I would however prefer that the boys not be shipped with anyone apart from their canon partner/potential partner, but fine for them to be shipped with their girl and their girl to also be shipped with any/all the other girls, providing it is all consensual and there's no cheating angst.
 
And I would 100% also love gen/friendship fic - the friendships between the girls is probably my most vital takeaway from Age of Youth and I LOVE that every time they seemed to ramp up to what would've been a Love Interest Save in another drama, it was the girls riding in for each other instead. I LOVE THEM ALL SO MUCH.
 
Optional prompts: 

• Slice of life at university! Give me the girls studying at the library, working on assignments, cooking for each other - what's the next term at university like after the first season? Or slice of life during the show? What problems do they face? Is there any fallout from the revelations from season 1 (I know s2 may cover this but as I won't have watched it yet, I'm totally happy with canon divergence here)? Do they stay in touch with Jin-Myung while she's travelling? Does she think about them while she's travelling? What's her trip like?

• Post-university future fic! What do they all end up doing? Do they stay in touch? Are they happy? Do they have quarterlife or midlife crises and if so do they find each other to help each other through them? Do they set up a detective agency of incredible women to take down corrupt authority figures, using their flawlessness and unique skillsets?

• Magical Girl AU! Feel free to go the Sailor Moon-style magical girl route, or freestyle it - whatever hits your fancy. I definitely don't want a crossover but omg magical transformations and fighting against evil and discovering your hidden powers YES PLS

• Vampire/demon/monster-hunter AU! Who are the hunters? Who are the monsters? Who gets to be the plucky sidekicks? I'd like it to be set in South Korea rather than a fantasy world. 

 

Jewish Scripture & Legend
Characters requested: Esther, Vashti, Yael, Bathsheba (Please feel free to write one or any combination of these)

These women are very dear to my heart and I feel as though they're all kind of thematically linked by having to deal with the nonsense and abuse of various bone-headed men (with the exception potentially of Yael, I guess, who just murders them). As I said above, I'm very happy for you to pick and choose among these women for your fic. I'm not wedded to historic or Tanakh accuracy and I'm very happy for you to take all kinds of liberties with any of the source canon or Midrashic interpretations. Friendship, allyship, or femslash are all options I would welcome with every fibre of my being! :')

I would be particularly keen on re-tellings or re-interpretations of any of their stories. What they were they like as children, before they became legends? Or at the beginning of their stories? What happens to them afterwards? How do they feel about their own stories while they're taking place? How do they feel about their husbands? As I said, I am very happy for you to play with your own interpretation of their stories – there are so many different possibilities! I would also love it if you wanted to include other elements of Jewish legends in here, such as shedim, golems, dybbukim, ibbur, etc.

Optional prompts:

• What is it like for Esther when she has to marry Ahasuerus and when, in the beginning, she pretends not to be Jewish? Does she hear about Vashti? What does she think of Vashti? What is her life like after the Purim story? Or before?

• What was Vashti's life like before Ahasuerus? What is it like after? Does she ever think of Esther?

• What was Yael's life like after killing Sisera? Was she caught up in her husband's politics, as some critics claim, or was it her own political savvy? Did she treat with Barak afterwards?

• What did Bathsheba think when David summoned her? Was she happy with him? Or was it dreadful? Did she have any guidance in the life he claimed her for? I feel like there are parallels between her and Helen of Troy – their beauty brings them both so much tumult and pain. (If you wanted to stick Helen in this somehow, that would be totally OK!)

• REINCARNATION FIC IN THE MODERN DAY I don't even know how this would work but I would love either them reincarnating and KNOWING who they are or their reincarnations living modern day parallels to their legendary counterparts (but please no detailed links to contemporary political situations my heart can't cope with it)

Jupiter Ascending
Characters requested: Jupiter Jones, Caine Wise

This film hit so many notes on the scale of my id I cannot even. I rewatched it for letter-writing purposes and oh. my. god. I came out with a Lot of Jupiter/Caine feelings and also a Lot of feelings about Space Bureaucracy and also about praise!kink wolf fucking. I have no idea how to punctuate that latter, sorry dear writer. I'm also totally and enthusiastically on board with knotting for this pairing, but please no reference to wanting to breed someone or filling them with cum.
 
I love how Jupiter is so into Caine calling her "Your Majesty", but also I really like that while he's veeery deferential and sweet, Caine isn't passive and also doesn't read as that subby to me. I loved the bit on the Aegis where he turns her down after the truly immortal "I love dogs" line and she makes this agonised little whimper after he's left (truly, who has not whimpered at their own awkwardness?) and he hears it and grins a bit to himself. I loooove how his mission reorients itself around keeping her safe and happy.
 
I also loved the juxtaposition between the mundanity of Jupiter's job on Earth and her OWNING the Earth and being Space Royalty. I loved the bees swarming in lazy spirals around her, that GLORIOUS space bureaucracy scene when she's trying to get her wrist seal as Seraphi's resurgence, and the sheer glorious magnificence of all the potential worldbuilding around the splices, the politics, the Aegis, the Skyjackers, the Entitled and the Houses etc. I really loved the closing scene with Jupiter and Caine flying around the sky together. <3

Optional prompts:

• SPACE BUREAUCRACY OMG give me Jupiter navigating all the RIDICULOUSNESS that we've already had hinted at through the movie! Does Caine help her? Or just follow her around patiently between departments? Does she have bodyguards and is it really annoying for her? Unreasonable quantities of sheavework? COMPLEX POLITICAL NEGOTIATIONS?

• Does Caine get a pack again now he has his wings back? How does that work? What does Jupiter think about it? 

• PRAISE!KINK WOLF FUCKING (knotting optional but v welcome) I don't even have a deeper premise for that but do I really need one?

• Does Jupiter eventually give her life up on Earth and go to the stars? Does she bring her family with? Does she ever see Seraphi's remaining children again? Please don't bring Balem back to life, but Titus and Kalique are both welcome to be included - I don't mind shipping either/both of them with Jupiter (I'm not saying that Jupiter/Kalique isn't my other main ship but um it totally is I bloody love Kalique), but please don't break her and Caine up and please have it be consensual within her relationship with Caine. 

Sated
Characters requested: Keira Kenney, Daniel Song
 
This is by far my favourite of Rebekah Weatherspoon's trio of fitness instructor bdsm novellas because I just loved Keira and Daniel so much; a nerdy kickboxing instructor who is into fandom and a one-handed pyrotechnic artist who is into bdsm enthusiastically exploring their sexualities together? YEP. I loved so much in this story: them meeting at Galaxicon (a convention for Keira's favourite show, Galaxis), watching boxsets together, Daniel being totally into Keira's nerdiness, Keira getting to explore all her different fantasies with Daniel and how very sex-positive this story was.

I would love to see fic which explores more of their lives together either during or after the book. While the book itself is pretty explicit, I'd be very happy with non-explicit shippy fic exploring Keira's interest in Galaxis fandom or kickboxing, or Daniel's interest in pyrotechnics, but I would also love super porny fic too. One of the things that I found frustrating with Sated was that the initial dynamic I really liked at the beginning, where Keira topped and Daniel subbed, very quickly seemed to change by the end into Keira subbing all the time. So I would love to see more of Keira topping and getting to explore her fantasies with Daniel. 

Optional prompts:

• Keira and Daniel go to another Galaxicon together. Does Daniel cosplay too? What panels do they go to? How does Keira introduce him to her fannish world?

• Daniel and Keira go on a tour of some of the world's most famous fireworks displays. Daniel probably knows all the cool fireworks artists. Why did he get into pyrotechnics?

• Since Daniel took over the club, has Keira come onto the bdsm scene more formally? Does she end up bonding with Nailah and Violet? How does she feel about being more involved with the same scene as Grant and Armando?

• Daniel and Keira discuss fantasies they haven't explored yet – what are they? Preferably with Keira topping, please!

Spirited Away
Requested characters: Ogino Chihiro, Haku

This is basically one of my forever requests. I've been lucky enough to have some really amazing gifts for it already, but as this is the Ghibli film of my HEART, I am always hungry for more. This film has basically all of the things I love: protagonist leaving her everyday world for a stranger magical one, magic (a bathhouse of the gods!) alongside everyday mundaneity (CLEANING the bathhouse of the gods!) in that world, DRAGONS, coming of age themes, all the tiny magical elements of a Miyazaki film...

I would love to see future fic for this film about Chihiro as a teenager, a university student, an adult, any stage of her life really! Does she ever get to go back? What about Haku? I ship them like burning and would love to see their reunion (and perhaps courtship and eventual wedding and divine domestic bliss) but I would also be tremendously gloriously happy with genfic about Chihiro's life post-film. What does she do? What is her life like? How does the Land of Spirits bleed over into her life? Does she ever see Zeniiba again? What about Rin? Does anyone apart from Haku ever visit her? (I am recycling this from my previous letter because I just really, really love asking for this over and over again I don't think I will ever have enough of it!)

(also I am totally OK with Chihiro and Haku banging when he's a dragon ok)

Optional prompts:

• Chihiro encounters Haku again when she's at university, or as an adult. How has she changed? How has he changed? What is she studying? I kind of imagine she would do something relating to sustainability and the environment. Does she encounter any other spirits/gods since she left the Land of Spirits?

• Does Chihiro ever go back to the Land of Spirits? Has it changed since she was last there? Has her relationship with it changed?
• Are there other places in the world with thin skins between our world and the Land of Spirits? Does Chihiro ever find any of them? What are they like? Is Haku with her?

• Domestic bliss! Do Chihiro and Haku ever get to spend the rest or part of their lives together? Do they get married? Do they have tiny demi-god children? How does Chihiro introduce Haku to her family – DOES she introduce him? 

The Watchmaker of Filigree Street
Requested characters: Grace Carrow

I really love Pulley's writing style, and I was very happy Thaniel and Mori ended up together at the end, but I came out of this book desperately wanting more about Grace. I was so thrilled by her, because I don't very often read books with academic, reserved, difficult and potentially dislikeable young women in them. I had a huge amount of sympathy for her throughout, even when she was trying to engineer Mori's downfall: she is young, determined, and passionate about her pursuit of science, and yet her life is not wholly her own because of the time she lives in. I think she and Thaniel might have been terrible for each other if they had remained together - I flinched so much when Grace cut down the trees wrapped in Mori's golden vines, and Thaniel's clear distress but inability/refusal to articulate it to her.

I've had so many discussions with friends about the end of the book. My initial feeling was that it was kind of a happy ending for Grace - she gets her independence and Matsumoto invites her to live with him in Japan, so she would presumably be able to continue to science with Matsumoto as kind of a friend!patron. But then one of my friends pointed out that Matsumoto is basically inviting Grace to be his mistress as he's already said he won't marry her, and effectively what Mori does when he shows her the train bolt is warn her that he wants her to leave, so Grace is in effect exiled from her familiar society and position. Being someone's mistress wasn't part of her plans for herself. 
 
So what I would really, really love is future fic for Grace exploring her life after the book. Reference to Thaniel and Mori is fine, but I would prefer them not to form a significant part of the story as I feel the book already made a sufficient case for both of them. I would like Grace to get to achieve her dreams of Continuing to Study Science & Conduct Strange Eldritch Experiments, but beyond that I am open to speculation... does she become Matsumoto's mistress? Does she just go as his friend and he acts as her wealthy patron? Does she make some other women friends once she's out of her usual milieu? Does she take up with an eccentric and wealthy OFC? Does she stay in Japan or does she keep travelling? Does she do her best to forget Mori or does she try to investigate the phenomenon of his abilities more closely? Does she ever see him and Thaniel again? 

Optional prompts:

• Grace goes to Japan and becomes Matsumoto's mistress, while also getting to continue her research. How does she feel about this? How do her experiments go? And if and when Matsumoto gets married, how does this change things for her?

• Grace goes to Japan but does NOT become Matsumoto's mistress. She allows him to host her while she explores an interesting and perhaps underground world of groundbreaking research in a niche part of the Japanese scientific community.

• His Dark Materials crossover/AU – it struck me when I was reading about Grace's research that it reminded me a bit of the research in the Northern Lights trilogy. What if the events in the Watchmaker of Filigree Street took place there? Or what if Grace somehow broke through the boundary between worlds into that world, as Lyra did with ours?

• Grace continues to research the phenomenon of Mori's powers, and while researching them discovers that Mori is not the only monster in the world.

Comments

[abluestocking]

Your Jewish Scripture & Legend prompts are amazing!! I hope every single one of them gets written. :D And I cracked up at "with the exception potentially of Yael, I guess, who just murders them".

Also, I have never watched Jupiter Ascending, and I don't think the wolf fucking would be my thing, but man, all your references to Space Bureaucracy are trying to suck me in. Space Bureaucracy is the BEST. And it has complex political negotiations too??? *is very tempted*

[antediluvian]

Thank you so much! I can't believe I'd never noticed Jewish Scripture and Legend as a Yuletide fandom before. Full disclosure, I had to play Ahasuerus in one of our Purim plays growing up and so I have some particular spleen towards him. He deserved neither of his excellent wives. >:( I'm excited to see the other requests for it!

I would definitely recommend Jupiter Ascending! It is a vast, glorious, rather ridiculous story of space royalty. And in total fairness, the wolf fucking is very minimal in it - mostly they have a few smooches and share lingering looks! So you could ignore that part of the fandom entirely and just bask in all the politics and bureaucracy.