Fic meme

[hedda62]

This is a very multi-tasky sort of day, so while I'm doing other stuff I'll throw this meme out there:

I currently have 48 works archived at the AO3 [oh my God how did that happen, no this is not part of the meme]. Pick a number from 1 to 48, and I’ll tell you three things I currently like about the fic corresponding to the number you have picked.

Comments

[philomytha]

How about 13? Deliberately not going to look myself to see which fic that is, since I suspect that's cheating ;-).

[hedda62]

Ah, that one's not a fic per se, it's the essay Runaway Roses and Defiant Skellytums, about plants in the Vorkosiverse. I meant to write it for a long while before I finally got around to doing so, and I'm pleased with how it turned out (and Lois read it and appreciated it, and it's been cited twice in "print").

Three things I like:

1) That I managed to pull off the Game well, treating the Vorkosiverse as real enough to concoct a few botanical and sociological theories, while also delving into literary analysis.

2) That what I wanted to show about Ekaterin's character worked. She makes beauty out of what nearly everyone else considers ugly and deserving of rejection: it's worth noting that at times those descriptors have been applied to Miles. And: She rearranges to suit her desires, selects what works for her, and sprays herbicide on the rest. Gardening isn't just defiant; it's aggressive.

3) Pulling things together from all over the books, e.g.: He's always defined natural beauty as Earth-like -- landscapes of imported trees and flowers; horses; elegant cool brunettes -- but there was Taura, decidedly not an Earth woman in appearance, and yet beautiful. It was just great fun to plan and write.

[eight_of_cups]

I'll take 21.

[hedda62]

This is Improbability, the first of my two Sherlock fics. It's been read less than the second one (which is the slashy one, so there you go) but I really like it. It was one of those stories I woke up with and wrote down right away, pretty much all at once, and it takes advantage of the dreamy lyrical aspects of present tense (it is, in fact, one of the first things I ever wrote in present tense). So:

1) I like that I managed to sustain the mood and the thematic elements all the way through. I write landscape metaphor like breathing, though more often about sex (see this fic's sequel) than about depression and mourning, but pretty much I think it works here, and the oddities that popped in, like the scorpions, get picked up and carried (ouch) all the way through as well.

2) it's got probably my best line of the year: When he looks up again he's outside Barts, watching a dark bird swoop down out of the sky into ruin. And a lot of other good lines too. And pretty good dialogue considering how introspective it is. I like when John tells Mycroft "So you can go away now."

3) I like the Jonathan Creek cameo even though I didn't have the guts to write a real crossover and so it sits there sort of weird in the middle acknowledging that I'm putting all my Sherlock eggs in what turned out to be two baskets.

[pendrecarc]

40?

[hedda62]

That would be Phoenix, which is the first of two John/Grace/Harold fics, the one where I picked up a flight of fancy about Cyrano de Bergerac and ran with it. Some things don't work about it for me, but of course torturing them was great fun, and here's more of what I like:

1) I've already said this elsewhere, but I'm proud to be part of the Coalition to Make Grace Hendricks a Real Person. She's slightly more awesome in the sequel, but here I had to give her conversation and motivations and stuff like that, and it felt good.

And then two random things:

2) Not faint canaries, but ambrosial. Because someone had to quote that in a PoI fic, and it might as well be me.

3) John wearing the tie Harold picked out for him.

[pendrecarc]

I haven't actually commented on any of your PoI fic, have I? (I've been trying to curb my reading in the fandom to avoid spoilers, which is going about as well as you might expect.) They are incredibly lovely; I enjoyed both "Phoenix" and "Halycon", and while I think the setup requires a suspension of disbelief beyond what PoI usually demands I also think they work beautifully in the framework you've erected.

Also, behind you 100% on 1).

[hedda62]

No, I don't think you have, but thank you! And yeah, good luck with the spoiler avoidance.