clearly, you are amazing!
Dear Yuletide Writer,
Thank you so, so much for offering one of these tiny-but-amazing fandoms! I'll tell you right off the bat that if you already have an idea, then don't worry about reading this -- just run with it! As long as you're having fun writing, I know I'm going to adore reading whatever you come up with.
But if you would like some more data about my preferences, well, here are my recs, though they're just a small subset of the stories I've read and enjoyed. As for more general thoughts, here are a few paragraphs cannibalized from my last year's letter and the one from two years ago:
The very most important thing to me in fic is character interaction. I often like world building and plot and atmosphere, but in the end, the key is almost always how the characters relate to each other. And what I really like to see is how relationships (of all types -- romantic, platonic, antagonistic, something else entirely, it's all good) develop. Established relationship fics can be wonderful, but in general the thing that really moves me is the getting there. I like it when things change, and the characters have to deal with that change, to interact with it, to drive it, to adjust to it.
Beyond that, I like a wide range of story types, characters, character interactions, plot points, narrative moods, settings, and kinks. I have a special fondness for UST, steadfast attachment, desperate sex, sincere sweetness and charm, affectionate snark with an edge, absurd and/or clever humor, comfortable banter, dysfunctional-but-hot co-dependency, complex motives, possibly reformed bad boys, power games and bdsm, fighting as foreplay, morally grey characters, and unexpected discovery (among others -- these are just the ones springing to mind at the moment). Obviously these don't usually all fit in the same fic, though I have to admit that I'm a sucker for any fic that somehow manages a good combination of hot and adorable. I do like angst and conflict, but usually I'm happiest when it eventually resolves in some satisfying way. I am generally more of a hopeful ending sort of person -- not the kind wrapped all tight with a bow, necessarily, but also not completely bleak. On the other hand, I have been known to appreciate wistfulness and sadness, there are some stories that really just need tragic endings, or at least less-than-optimistic ones. I can be a big fan of ambiguity if it's done well, and often like matter-of-fact realism... though I also like dreamy surrealism and sharp stylization and really a lot of different moods and styles. A wonderfully foreshadowed first kiss can make me just as happy as scorching hot explicit porn, as can any sort of well-drawn and vivid character interaction. I think interesting and believable character interaction is for me the most important aspect of fic.
I am relatively hard to squick, I believe, but I admit to not being particularly fond of mpreg or some of the more extreme kinks. One thing I will say is that though I'm usually a fan of AUs, part of what I love about all of these requests is the setting, so I'd rather have something more related to canon than not, though it also doesn't have to be super closely tied -- AUs that are more of the "what if this one thing were different" type would probably be fine, and creative, speculative future fic is totally encouraged, as is probably obvious from the prompts. (I can envision The Obnoxious Jerks and "Delilah" AUs more than the other two, I think.) And, as always, these are all vague guidelines rather than rules -- if a dramatic AU strikes you and it works with the character interactions, feel free to go with it! I just might love it.
Okay! Onto the specific requests:
Stephen Manes - The Obnoxious Jerks
Frank Wess aka Back/Joe Ippolito/Leslie Freeze
My absolute ideal here would be a post-book triad or threesome, but I would also be thrilled with gen friendship fic or a burgeoning het or slash relationship between any pair within these three characters, as long as the interactions between them all are central to the story and developed fairly clearly from the directions they were going in the book (not necessarily linear in the obvious way, but somehow convincingly related). Near-future, farther-future, whatever strikes your fancy. Relationship development is the key, and while some angst is welcome, a happy-ish ending is preferred.
One of my favorite books from when I was a teen. Full of smart, geeky guys revelling in their hilarious, geeky, anti-establishment brilliance, includes an equally smart and awesome female character, and is just fun. The characters are charming and endearing even when they're showing us their slightly jagged edges -- after all, it's high school. Jagged edges are pretty much a requirement. The essence of this book is humor, absolutely, but it's also about learning how to navigate relationships. And I love how these three characters interact. I love Frank and Joe's best friendness, I love Frank and Leslie's gradually building, possibly romantic relationship, I love Leslie and Joe's longstanding antagonism that just might be mellowing. I love the rest of the Obnoxious Jerks, too, so if you feel inspired to include them, please feel free! I just adore this book. (P.S. Here's the Amazon page. There are a ton of 1 cent used copies listed! Not a hard book to find.)
Athena (comic)
Any
Wow. This is the first time I've ever clicked "Any" for characters in a request, so you can be sure that I really mean it. I love the gritty yet futuristic worldbuilding of Pan Athens, and I would adore seeing any of the characters dealing with changes, before, during, or after the comics are set. (Note that this is only 13 comic book issues, also available as two graphic novels, easily acquired from Dean Hsieh's website.) Every single one of these characters is fascinating and deeper than they first appear, and I love them all. You can focus on one, you can pair them up (I am especially partial to the canon couple of Athena/Kallie, but I would be happy to read pretty much any pairing, girlslash or slash or het, or gen, too, for that matter, there are some wonderful friendships in this series), you can put them in multiples (monogamy and polyamory both make sense to me, and group friendship fic is always welcome), whatever you like. I just want more of this world and these characters to exist.
What can I say, I love everything about this series. I love the wacky-fun hijinks of the first volume, with Athena's punk band and Dionysus's strip club and all their friends. I love the epically epic god-and-goddess level battle and the threat of world destruction in the second volume, not to mention all the relatives who put their hands in. I love every single character in this -- they're all so human! Especially for former Greek gods (or, you know, wacky modern gods based on technology and bureaucracy). (P.S. Here's the creator's webpage for the series, and here's where you can buy the comic book at discounted prices from him directly, including a complete set for $20, which is less than what Amazon has been showing me lately. This series is so good, I'm actually tempted to buy yet another copy.)
Mysterious Skin (movie)
Brian Lackey/Eric/Neil McCormick/Wendy
I would love post-movie fic about how Neil and Eric and Wendy absorb Brian into their lives. Gen and slash and het and monogamy and polyamory are all entirely welcome, though I'd prefer that neither of the characters who seem to be canonically gay are written to be in a het romantic relationship without some clear acknowledgement within the fic of the issues involved with that. There is a lot of darkness inherent in the source, but there is also certain sense of healing and hope at the end of the movie despite all the brokenness, and it would be wonderful if both the darkness and the hope were represented. Just one or the other is also fine, of course. But make it powerful.
This movie blew me away when I watched it earlier this year. I actually think most of us are fundamentally flawed in some way or another, and a central question in life is how to deal with it and still make a life for yourself. It's part of what makes us human. Neil and Brian dealt with something that broke them in such completely different ways, but it can be very hard to heal from something if you can't even remember or fully acknowledge what hurt you. The movie chronicles that first step of realization for Brian, and I think to an extent for Neil, too, for though Neil clearly thought about what had happened, could remember it, I am not sure he really let himself understand the impact of it on himself or on others until he actually said it out loud as he told Brian. So what happens after that? I would like to believe that Brian doesn't have to be alone as he deals with this, that Neil and Wendy and Eric would befriend him, and eventually love him, because he needs it. And they do too. (P.S. There's a brief summary on the wikipedia page here; it's on Amazon here, and on Netflix here. Do note that the subject matter of this film is extremely distressing. Though its handling of these difficult issues is truly top-notch, complex and subtle and thoughtful, somehow both brutal and delicate all at once, not everyone is going to want to see this film. It is amazing, though, in a way that's hard to put into words... the Rotten Tomatoes synopsis makes a pretty good effort, though.)
Delilah - Dresden Dolls (song)
Amanda/Delilah
There's an incredible intensity to this song, something wistful and desperate and despairing and pained, and all of it overlaid with an obvious deep affection. Girlslash would be fantastic, but a gen friendship fic could also be amazing. I would really, really appreciate it if "Amanda" were quite distinct from Ms. Palmer, as while I have no issues at all with RPF, it weirds me out a little when it's too close to home. So please just base the fic on the details within the song itself (and possibly from other songs by them or on Amanda Palmer's solo album) rather than on the actual people who make up The Dresden Dolls. I would love a hopeful ending, but there are other kinds of endings I could see working just as well, so go with whatever feels right to you. As long as some essence of the song and their relationship manages to come through, I'll be happy.
I first heard this song at the SF Great American Music Hall in April of 2005, just about a year before Yes, Virginia came out. It was a fantastic show overall (hard for it not to be with Vau de Vire collaborating with them on some songs), but this is the song that struck me most out of the several new ones they played that set. The background vocals were strikingly haunting and pretty, and the entire song just gorgeous, and full of such palpable emotion. Who hasn't felt something like this? The way it can hurt to truly care about someone, but caring about them isn't the thing you would change. That bond of friendship or something more is the thing I want to see.
Note: I really mean it about preferring that "Amanda" does not actually = Amanda Palmer, even though she wrote the song and presumably it could be read as autobiographical in some way. But the narrator calls herself "Amanda" in many other songs by the Dresden Dolls and in her solo stuff, yet not necessarily to be literally autobiographical -- see "Mandy Goes to Med School" for an example. I basically lived in Boston for too long at the just right times and tangential to the right social circles that now reading actual Dresden Dolls RPF tends to make me want to go like this: /o\. So please just try to make sure she's a fictional character based specifically on the song, rather than one based on Amanda Palmer herself RPF-style.
(P.S. You can hear the song here on My Face In A Tube youtube, though the sound is a little tinny -- it's probably a live recording. It's better here on Lala, much richer and rounder, though you might only be able to listen to it once. Here are the lyrics off their official website. And If I can convince my computer to behave I'll be back with a dl link. I really, really, really hope my computer behaves!)
The bottom line is: I like a huge variety of stuff (and am all in favor of experiments, creativity, and unusual things), I'm harder than usual to squick, and I'm willing to try almost anything. Please just enjoy the writing, and I know I'll have fun reading it. :)
much love,
athenejen
Thank you so, so much for offering one of these tiny-but-amazing fandoms! I'll tell you right off the bat that if you already have an idea, then don't worry about reading this -- just run with it! As long as you're having fun writing, I know I'm going to adore reading whatever you come up with.
But if you would like some more data about my preferences, well, here are my recs, though they're just a small subset of the stories I've read and enjoyed. As for more general thoughts, here are a few paragraphs cannibalized from my last year's letter and the one from two years ago:
The very most important thing to me in fic is character interaction. I often like world building and plot and atmosphere, but in the end, the key is almost always how the characters relate to each other. And what I really like to see is how relationships (of all types -- romantic, platonic, antagonistic, something else entirely, it's all good) develop. Established relationship fics can be wonderful, but in general the thing that really moves me is the getting there. I like it when things change, and the characters have to deal with that change, to interact with it, to drive it, to adjust to it.
Beyond that, I like a wide range of story types, characters, character interactions, plot points, narrative moods, settings, and kinks. I have a special fondness for UST, steadfast attachment, desperate sex, sincere sweetness and charm, affectionate snark with an edge, absurd and/or clever humor, comfortable banter, dysfunctional-but-hot co-dependency, complex motives, possibly reformed bad boys, power games and bdsm, fighting as foreplay, morally grey characters, and unexpected discovery (among others -- these are just the ones springing to mind at the moment). Obviously these don't usually all fit in the same fic, though I have to admit that I'm a sucker for any fic that somehow manages a good combination of hot and adorable. I do like angst and conflict, but usually I'm happiest when it eventually resolves in some satisfying way. I am generally more of a hopeful ending sort of person -- not the kind wrapped all tight with a bow, necessarily, but also not completely bleak. On the other hand, I have been known to appreciate wistfulness and sadness, there are some stories that really just need tragic endings, or at least less-than-optimistic ones. I can be a big fan of ambiguity if it's done well, and often like matter-of-fact realism... though I also like dreamy surrealism and sharp stylization and really a lot of different moods and styles. A wonderfully foreshadowed first kiss can make me just as happy as scorching hot explicit porn, as can any sort of well-drawn and vivid character interaction. I think interesting and believable character interaction is for me the most important aspect of fic.
I am relatively hard to squick, I believe, but I admit to not being particularly fond of mpreg or some of the more extreme kinks. One thing I will say is that though I'm usually a fan of AUs, part of what I love about all of these requests is the setting, so I'd rather have something more related to canon than not, though it also doesn't have to be super closely tied -- AUs that are more of the "what if this one thing were different" type would probably be fine, and creative, speculative future fic is totally encouraged, as is probably obvious from the prompts. (I can envision The Obnoxious Jerks and "Delilah" AUs more than the other two, I think.) And, as always, these are all vague guidelines rather than rules -- if a dramatic AU strikes you and it works with the character interactions, feel free to go with it! I just might love it.
Okay! Onto the specific requests:
Stephen Manes - The Obnoxious Jerks
Frank Wess aka Back/Joe Ippolito/Leslie Freeze
My absolute ideal here would be a post-book triad or threesome, but I would also be thrilled with gen friendship fic or a burgeoning het or slash relationship between any pair within these three characters, as long as the interactions between them all are central to the story and developed fairly clearly from the directions they were going in the book (not necessarily linear in the obvious way, but somehow convincingly related). Near-future, farther-future, whatever strikes your fancy. Relationship development is the key, and while some angst is welcome, a happy-ish ending is preferred.
One of my favorite books from when I was a teen. Full of smart, geeky guys revelling in their hilarious, geeky, anti-establishment brilliance, includes an equally smart and awesome female character, and is just fun. The characters are charming and endearing even when they're showing us their slightly jagged edges -- after all, it's high school. Jagged edges are pretty much a requirement. The essence of this book is humor, absolutely, but it's also about learning how to navigate relationships. And I love how these three characters interact. I love Frank and Joe's best friendness, I love Frank and Leslie's gradually building, possibly romantic relationship, I love Leslie and Joe's longstanding antagonism that just might be mellowing. I love the rest of the Obnoxious Jerks, too, so if you feel inspired to include them, please feel free! I just adore this book. (P.S. Here's the Amazon page. There are a ton of 1 cent used copies listed! Not a hard book to find.)
Athena (comic)
Any
Wow. This is the first time I've ever clicked "Any" for characters in a request, so you can be sure that I really mean it. I love the gritty yet futuristic worldbuilding of Pan Athens, and I would adore seeing any of the characters dealing with changes, before, during, or after the comics are set. (Note that this is only 13 comic book issues, also available as two graphic novels, easily acquired from Dean Hsieh's website.) Every single one of these characters is fascinating and deeper than they first appear, and I love them all. You can focus on one, you can pair them up (I am especially partial to the canon couple of Athena/Kallie, but I would be happy to read pretty much any pairing, girlslash or slash or het, or gen, too, for that matter, there are some wonderful friendships in this series), you can put them in multiples (monogamy and polyamory both make sense to me, and group friendship fic is always welcome), whatever you like. I just want more of this world and these characters to exist.
What can I say, I love everything about this series. I love the wacky-fun hijinks of the first volume, with Athena's punk band and Dionysus's strip club and all their friends. I love the epically epic god-and-goddess level battle and the threat of world destruction in the second volume, not to mention all the relatives who put their hands in. I love every single character in this -- they're all so human! Especially for former Greek gods (or, you know, wacky modern gods based on technology and bureaucracy). (P.S. Here's the creator's webpage for the series, and here's where you can buy the comic book at discounted prices from him directly, including a complete set for $20, which is less than what Amazon has been showing me lately. This series is so good, I'm actually tempted to buy yet another copy.)
Mysterious Skin (movie)
Brian Lackey/Eric/Neil McCormick/Wendy
I would love post-movie fic about how Neil and Eric and Wendy absorb Brian into their lives. Gen and slash and het and monogamy and polyamory are all entirely welcome, though I'd prefer that neither of the characters who seem to be canonically gay are written to be in a het romantic relationship without some clear acknowledgement within the fic of the issues involved with that. There is a lot of darkness inherent in the source, but there is also certain sense of healing and hope at the end of the movie despite all the brokenness, and it would be wonderful if both the darkness and the hope were represented. Just one or the other is also fine, of course. But make it powerful.
This movie blew me away when I watched it earlier this year. I actually think most of us are fundamentally flawed in some way or another, and a central question in life is how to deal with it and still make a life for yourself. It's part of what makes us human. Neil and Brian dealt with something that broke them in such completely different ways, but it can be very hard to heal from something if you can't even remember or fully acknowledge what hurt you. The movie chronicles that first step of realization for Brian, and I think to an extent for Neil, too, for though Neil clearly thought about what had happened, could remember it, I am not sure he really let himself understand the impact of it on himself or on others until he actually said it out loud as he told Brian. So what happens after that? I would like to believe that Brian doesn't have to be alone as he deals with this, that Neil and Wendy and Eric would befriend him, and eventually love him, because he needs it. And they do too. (P.S. There's a brief summary on the wikipedia page here; it's on Amazon here, and on Netflix here. Do note that the subject matter of this film is extremely distressing. Though its handling of these difficult issues is truly top-notch, complex and subtle and thoughtful, somehow both brutal and delicate all at once, not everyone is going to want to see this film. It is amazing, though, in a way that's hard to put into words... the Rotten Tomatoes synopsis makes a pretty good effort, though.)
Delilah - Dresden Dolls (song)
Amanda/Delilah
There's an incredible intensity to this song, something wistful and desperate and despairing and pained, and all of it overlaid with an obvious deep affection. Girlslash would be fantastic, but a gen friendship fic could also be amazing. I would really, really appreciate it if "Amanda" were quite distinct from Ms. Palmer, as while I have no issues at all with RPF, it weirds me out a little when it's too close to home. So please just base the fic on the details within the song itself (and possibly from other songs by them or on Amanda Palmer's solo album) rather than on the actual people who make up The Dresden Dolls. I would love a hopeful ending, but there are other kinds of endings I could see working just as well, so go with whatever feels right to you. As long as some essence of the song and their relationship manages to come through, I'll be happy.
I first heard this song at the SF Great American Music Hall in April of 2005, just about a year before Yes, Virginia came out. It was a fantastic show overall (hard for it not to be with Vau de Vire collaborating with them on some songs), but this is the song that struck me most out of the several new ones they played that set. The background vocals were strikingly haunting and pretty, and the entire song just gorgeous, and full of such palpable emotion. Who hasn't felt something like this? The way it can hurt to truly care about someone, but caring about them isn't the thing you would change. That bond of friendship or something more is the thing I want to see.
Note: I really mean it about preferring that "Amanda" does not actually = Amanda Palmer, even though she wrote the song and presumably it could be read as autobiographical in some way. But the narrator calls herself "Amanda" in many other songs by the Dresden Dolls and in her solo stuff, yet not necessarily to be literally autobiographical -- see "Mandy Goes to Med School" for an example. I basically lived in Boston for too long at the just right times and tangential to the right social circles that now reading actual Dresden Dolls RPF tends to make me want to go like this: /o\. So please just try to make sure she's a fictional character based specifically on the song, rather than one based on Amanda Palmer herself RPF-style.
(P.S. You can hear the song here on My Face In A Tube youtube, though the sound is a little tinny -- it's probably a live recording. It's better here on Lala, much richer and rounder, though you might only be able to listen to it once. Here are the lyrics off their official website. And If I can convince my computer to behave I'll be back with a dl link. I really, really, really hope my computer behaves!)
The bottom line is: I like a huge variety of stuff (and am all in favor of experiments, creativity, and unusual things), I'm harder than usual to squick, and I'm willing to try almost anything. Please just enjoy the writing, and I know I'll have fun reading it. :)
much love,
athenejen