Moar Yuletide!
Fandoms I am glad to see:
Being Human: A cute BBC thing about a werewolf and vampire who room together with a ghost. Kind of like a wacky Remus/Sirus AU. Er, except a lot not.
Havemercy I haven't actually read the book yet, but it's good to know it's pre-ficced for my convenience.
Fandoms I am somewhat surprised to see:
Chuck Apparently a small fandom! Who knew?
Merlin? Yuletide, you have been had. I suppose in, what, October? When there was yuletide brainstorming this may actually have been small.
On Yuletide as a fandom: One Night Fandoms, a vid by thingswithwings and eruthros, which perfectly captures the love affair with the passionate, brief love affair that is at the heart of yuletide. Widely recced, and deservedly so.
Recs, in random order! Fandoms: From Eroica With Love
An Almost Perfect Alibi: I do like a fandom with staying power, and this one is still going. Captures the tension within Klaus and between him and Eroica, gives a decent story before yielding to the inevitable.
Hot Fuzz
And This Time I'll RememberCute little story on the same topic as most Hot Fuzz stories: making the subtext text.
Life
I'll be honest, the fandom's yuletide showing is slightly better than average, and I could have listed more, but these are the stand-outs for me.
Angulimala: Charlie's life in prison could be done so badly in fic, and yet so far, everything I read is done really well. (Don't feel the need to take that as a challenge, fandom.)
A Basket of Cellophane: Yeah, okay, so after declaring myself impervious to Charlie/Ted, I totally believe this one too. Shut up, fandom.
Vorkosiganverse
Tides of Stars: This fiendish author has uploaded part one with the promise of part two for New Years. The story could twist significantly in the last half, but the first half has put it in the running for best Vorkosiganverse made by fandom, in my opinion.
Comitatus: Not quite sure what in this one made me wiggle my toes with happiness. I think I just have a kink for decent, competent people, working together to make things better.
The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
A Night in Brussels: This one follows the forms of the old fashioned muncle-fic with a slightly more modern attitude. Gen in that way where gen is a fairly meaningless descriptor. Or possibly slash in the same way? *squints* In any case, obviously up my alley.
Mary Poppins
Wind in the East: When you think about it, of course he was in love with Mary.
Merlin
That Shall Achieve The Sword: I hadn't realized until readint this story how much Yuletide stories have a specific character, in that "Yuletide is my fandom" sort of way. A Yuletide story is a sort of synecdoche, standing in for all the fandom that isn't there, trying to suggest, by glimpsed corners of things beyond sight all the stories that can't be told in this fandom for lack of, you know fandom. In contrast, fic in long-running fandoms exists as part of an ongoing conversation no matter how self-contained the story is.
Which isn't the point, really, the point is, this is a decent story in the "Arthur finds out" genre, with certain unique features that I think may be a result of it occuring in the context of Yuletide.
"Right, no more prophecies," Arthur said. "That's just creepy."
Camlann Anonymous and I appear to have had almost the same fic idea, although they have put more in it, and stayed closer to the legend. I mean, right down to the injured squire. I ask you, fandom, psychic Yuletide idea-stealers, is this fair? I think it's quite good, but obviously I'm biased toward the plot.
Merlin, Arthur, and Sir Damas: Nice fic that but for one mention of Arthur's bum could pass for being an episode.
Damas looked at him with confusion. "Actually, we just meant to kidnap Prince Arthur. I've got no idea what you're doing here."