Dear Yuletide Writer
Dear Yuletide Writer,
First off, thank you very much for doing this. I appreciate this more than you can possibly guess. I will appreciate WHATEVER you decide to write, so long as you enjoy writing it. All of what follows is just...additional info, if you need it (or if anyone writing treats is curious).
Specifics about my requests:
1) Matthew Swift series - Kate Griffin
What is the canon? A series of four books (A Madness of Angels, The Midnight Mayor, The Neon Court, and The Minority Council) and a spin-off series of two (Stray Souls and The Glass God, collectively called the Magicals Anonymous series). They're all available as paperbacks or as ebooks.
Where can you get it? Amazon, B & N, your local library, etc.
Characters: Matthew Swift, Oda (Matthew Swift), Penny Ngwenya, Nabeela Hirj
Matthew is a formerly murdered urban sorcerer in London who is mentally fused with entities known as the blue electric angels. Basically, all of the emotion that people have poured into telephones since they were invented has mixed with mixed with the electricity flowing through the phones and phone lines, creating an intensely powerful group of beings that have no understanding of emotions, morals, life or death…and that are as curious as your average six-year-old. Matthew has a tendency to meander from "I" to "we" and back again when he narrates (though it's not just the pronoun that lets you know who's talking). He's a trouble magnet who draws his power directly from the city itself, and he has a bad habit of running into virtually omnipotent eldritch abominations.
Oda-also known as Oda Ajaja, birth name Oda Ajaja-Brown-is a relentlessly good, albeit humorless, biracial female paladin who belongs to an order dedicated to the eradication of all magic. She spends the first three books as Matthew's foe-she distrusts him for a long time, definitely doesn't like the blue electric angels, and hates his magic, but, ultimately, perhaps "frenemy" would be a better word.
Penny Ngwenya is a Nigerian-British woman who is a former traffic warden and a present kickass sorceress. Matthew admits to her that she has more power and more ability than he does and learns a lot more quickly than he ever did. She's nominally Matthew's apprentice but actually more like his co-worker. They're friends.
Nabeela Hirj is a hijabi social worker who shows up during the fourth book when she notices that some of her clients have become...well, soulless. She refuses to bow out afterwards, because her clients are her responsibility, damn it. She and Penny click instantly and become the best of friends.
I love Matthew and the blue electric angels--that is, the resurrected amalgamation calling himself/themselves Matthew that we see in the books--but I also dearly love Penny Ngwenya, Oda Ajaja, and Nabeela Hirj, as well as the eldritch abominations (like the Death of Cities). I would adore a story about anyone in this universe, but the ones that I mentioned are my favorites.
Prompts (and ALL THE SPOILERS!):
We know that Penny summoned the Death of Cities...but who or what created it in the first place?
I really, REALLY want to see an AU where Nabeela survives and she and Penny are best friends. Because how can you not want to see a friendship between an urban sorceress and a technogorgon?
Oda. Anything about Oda. The woman had a tragic, angry life and was convinced that she was damned when she died; I'd like to see the world--or some events from her life--from her point of view. I'm sure that she saw things very differently from Matthew. (I'd also love her to learn post-mortem that she wasn't eternally damned, but I'm not sure that she would ever forgive herself...or would accept a deity who forgave her. Oda Ajaja is complicated.)
Matthew, pre- or post-death and resurrection. I'd love to see him as a kid with his mother and grandmother, as Robert Bakker's student, or dealing with the more tedious and less apocalyptic side of being the Midnight Mayor (there has to be something between paperwork and battling potentially world-ending powers--rituals? ceremonies? interacting with dignitaries from other cities/realms?) Is he/Are they suffering from nightmares or PTSD after being disembodied and re-embodied? What does he/do they do to relax between disasters?
Oh, and what WAS Penny doing off in New York City? I know that she went, on Matthew's instructions, to get out of the way of the latest apocalypse...but things seem to happen around urban sorcerers and sorceresses. So what problem arose or made itself known while Penny was in New York, and what did Penny do about it, if such a problem existed?
If you want to write something dark, eerie, and just plain strange, go for it! That's the series, after all. But please, no PWP, protagonist-centered morality, lack of consequences for actions, or abuse, stalking or rape treated as a joke. (And I like happy endings if they fit the story, friendship, especially improbable friendship, and women being awesome.)
You do not have to write a story featuring all four characters; a story about any one, any two or any three is fine.
2) Edward Gorey's PBS Mystery Intro
What is the canon? Exactly what it says on the tin-the intro for PBS' Mystery! series, which was drawn by Edward Gorey.
Where can you get it? There are a few variants of it on YouTube.
Characters: Any
Prompts: Go wild! Have fun making up identities and characterization for any, some or all of the characters: the Swooning Damsel on the Roof and her counterpart, the Swooning Woman on the Wall (who left them there and bound only their ankles?); the Partygoers; the Person Sliding Backward into a Pond (who are they, and who or what is dragging it into the water?); the Woman With the Changing Fan; the Dog With the Letter (what does the letter say? Who sent it? Why does the dog have it?); the Veiled Woman at the Grave, who seems to be sipping a glass of red wine (why is she drinking at the graveside? Is she miserable or celebrating?); and, of course, the Bald Inspector Taking Notes.
I'd love it if this story was a mystery, because what could be more fitting?
This can get dark, if you like--that would fit Gorey's work--but please, no PWP, protagonist-centered morality, lack of consequences for actions, or abuse, stalking or rape treated as a joke. I'd rather, too, that cannibalism form no part of the story; it's a huge, huge squick of mine.
3) Emelan - Tamora Pierce
What is the canon? Everyone probably knows this already, given Pierce's popularity, but it's a series of eleven books, ten of them focusing on four ambient young mages-mages whose power comes from ordinary things (thread, weather, metal and plants, in their cases) and one book focusing on the student of the plant mage. Wikipedia has an incredibly detailed article about this world, if you don't mind spoilers.
Pictured: Circle protagonists Daja Kisubo, Briar Moss, Trisana Chandler, and Sandrilene fa Toren, as drawn by Minuiko.
The Circle of Magic quartet (which takes place when they're around eleven):
Sandry's Book
Tris's Book
Daja's Book
Briar's Book
The Circle Opens quartet (in which three of the four are traveling around the world and each of the fourteen-year-old mages gets at least one student)
Magic Steps (Sandry)
Street Magic (Briar)
Cold Fire (Daja)
Shatterglass (Tris)
The three sequels to the quartets, in publication order:
The Will of the Empress (which takes place when they're eighteen)
Melting Stones (the one about Briar's student, Evvy)
Battle Magic (which takes place when Briar is about sixteen and Evvy is about twelve)
Where can you get it? Amazon, B & N, your local library, etc.
Characters: Any
Prompts (and SPOILERS):
I'd really like one of three things:
a) a story about any of the Circle kids from the missing years between Shatterglass and The Will of the Empress (or, in Briar's case, between Shatterglass and Battle Magic). There are so many stories that have just been referred to in passing. Why didn't Daja and Frostpine go right home to Winding Circle as they planned to at the end of Cold Fire? Who asked Tris to do war magic, and how did she elude the ruler or general who craved that? Was there one particular thing that Sandry did-aside from what we have seen-that convinced her uncle that she would make a better ruler than either of his sons? If so, what? Did Briar and Rosethorn ever wander into a country where they could simply relax and not have to use green magic as a weapon?
b) anything about the past of either Lark or Rosethorn would be fantastic--such as Lark as a yaskedasu in Tharios, Lark discovering that she had thread magic (which she apparently didn't learn until she was in her thirties), or young Rosethorn competing with young Crane at Winding Circle. I'd particularly like a story where the two of them either falling in love or living their lives as a couple over the years is a big part of the story.
c) post-The Will of the Empress fic. Or, in the case of Evvy, post-Melting Stones fic. I'd really like to know what the characters are doing after everything that they've gone through. You can write about one, some, many or all--the number doesn't matter.
I don't like PWP, incest (please, no Circlecest!), teacher/student romances or sex (please, none of that, either), protagonist-centered morality, lack of consequences for actions, or abuse, stalking or rape treated as a joke. I love happy endings, friendship and trust, and plots that spring from characters' personalities.
4) Macbeth - Shakespeare
What is the canon? One of the best-known plays by Shakespeare. You might have read it in English class in high school.
Where can you get it? Right here: http://shakespeare.mit.edu/macbeth/full.html
You can also buy or rent various movie versions of the play here.
Characters: Three Witches (Macbeth - Shakespeare), Lady Macbeth (Macbeth - Shakespeare)
Prompts: I'd really like something here about the witches' backstories. Who are they? What are their names? Why did they become witches? (I presume that there was more involved than "for the evulz.") Have they issued any other deadly prophecies over the centuries?
As for Lady Macbeth, she seems to have much more ambition than Macbeth does. Why? She mentions having had a child in the play; what happened to that child? Why does Duncan look so much like her father when he isn't? (I know the historical reasons for these things, but I want to hear your take on them.)
If that doesn't do it for you, I'd love to see AUs with the witches, Lady Macbeth or both-historical ones, ones set in outer space, solarpunk, AUs where the women aren't from Scotland but are from a different country/countries, races, or cultures. I'd really like to see how different times, places, cultures and/or genres would change the story. Feel free to mix and match this, too.
It's perfectly okay if you write this as a horror story; after all, it involves ambition, regicide, multiple murders, including those of children, framing the dead for crimes they didn't commit, black magic, ghosts of the murdered, and off-stage suicide. However, I'd prefer to avoid topics like cannibalism, vore, and rape. And please, no AUs that put the characters in a mundane setting like coffee shop AUs, high school AUs or college AUs.
You do not have to write a story featuring Lady Macbeth AND the Three Witches; a story about one or the other is fine.
5) Quantum Leap
What is the canon? A sci-fi show about time travel and changing history for the better that aired on NBC from March 1989 to May 1993. Wikipedia has an excellent description of the premise and the plotlines here.
Where can you get it? All five seasons are available with a Hulu subscription. NBC has seasons 1-3 online for free.
Characters: Sam Beckett (Quantum Leap), Al Calavicci
Prompts: Nothing complex here-just a request for a leap, preferably historically accurate. It can be pre-finale, post-finale, an AU where Sam leaps home, Al leaping (as happened several times in the series)…you get the idea.
One caveat-I'd prefer that Sam and Al weren't presented as a couple, past or present. (While Sam and Al could theoretically be bi, thus accounting for Beth Calavicci and Donna Elesee-Beckett, I don't like the "bisexuals are always unfaithful" trope, which is untrue and unfair. And I do like Al Calavicci/Beth Calavicci, even though I didn't ask for it. So I'd rather that the guys be very close friends.)
6) The Wicked + The Divine
What is the canon? An ongoing comic book series that Image Comics summarizes this way: Every ninety years, twelve gods incarnate as humans. They are loved. They are hated. In two years, they are dead.
Where can you get it? Comixology.com. As of this writing, there have been fifteen comics (all 1.99 except for the last issue, with Amaterasu's incarnation on the cover, which is 2.99) and two collected volumes-Volume 1, The Faust Act, for 7.99, and Volume 2, Fandemonium, for 11.99.
Characters: Laura Wilson/Persephone, Ananke (The Wicked + The Divine), Cassandra Igarashi/Urdr, Amaterasu (The Wicked + The Divine)
Prompts (and SPOILERS): Anything-well, anything within my preferred parameters!-about these characters! Why do the other gods (especially Cassandra/Urdr) sneer at Amaterasu and call her by her mortal name, Hazel? They seem to doubt that she's a god at all, though she has godlike powers.
Laura Wilson, the ultimate fangirl, died mere minutes after transformation…but, in addition to her death stopping her from asking inconvenient questions, did she have to die to truly be Persephone? I have read articles where Persephone is referred to not as "the queen of the dead" but "the goddess who dies each year." Are Tara and Lucifer, after dying, part of Laura/Persephone's realm now? (Or Morrigan's? Or Baphomet's? Or is Luci now reigning/imprisoned in a hellish spiritual realm? We know that the gods keep coming back every ninety years, but do the mortals that they incarnate into stop being divine when they die? A number of religions say that death doesn't change a person's divinity.)
We know that Ananke is the one who's been killing the members of the Pantheon (and making them suspect each other as well)-but why? How does this benefit her? What is the purpose of this? And why don't the gods of wisdom (like Minerva), prophecy (like Urdr and her sister Norns) or death (like the Morrigan) know what Ananke is doing? How is she keeping her actions secret from the Pantheon itself?
If you feel like bringing in other characters that were nominated, feel free. (One caveat-I'm not crazy about Woden, as he's racist and emotionally abusive. He's usable, but I'd rather that the story not focus on him or his less appetizing attributes.) Please, no PWP, rape, abuse (physical, emotional and/or sexual), pedophilia (added because of Minerva, who incarnated as a twelve-year-old), torture, or kink. I'd much prefer a gen story focusing on who the characters are, what's happening to them, and what their plans and goals might be.
You do not have to write a story featuring all four characters; a story about any one, any two or any three is fine.
Things I Like:
*AUs. I am a huge, huge fan of AUs, retellings and updatings. If you want to set a story in a different era, genre or environment, knock yourself out.
Exceptions: no coffee shop, high school/college, or "all human/all normal" AUs, please. Coffee shops are nothing special to me, so I don't get the appeal. High school was awful, college was meh, and I'd rather not revisit either. And "all human" AUs simply don't interest me. If magic and/or the supernatural is part of a canon, that's usually a large part of the reason I'm invested in it.
* Awesome characters--especially female characters. You may have noticed that many of the characters I requested were women and girls. I love hearing stories about women and girls doing all sorts of things, taking center stage and telling their own stories.
Also, to quote : "I have a serious kink for competent characters who are good at what they do: let the characters be awesome in a realistic, natural way, and I will be in heaven."
* Characterization. I love finding out new details about characters that fit what we already know. Backstory, post-canon, missing scenes, friendship fic--it's all good, as long as I feel that the characterization still fits plausibly into canon. Imaginative AND believable would be incredible.
* Consent in sexual scenes, and affection in a relationship unrelated to sex-kindness, humor, friendship, enjoying each other's company, having fun with each other.
* Endings that fit. I love happy endings--who doesn't? But if the ending that flows naturally from the story is sad or creepy or whatever, you don't have to shoehorn in a happy ending to satisfy me.
* Friendship. I'm a sucker for improbable friendships that absolutely should not work but do.
* Gen stories. There are obviously exceptions to this, but even in pairing stories, I have a strong preference for plot.
Things I DON'T like:
* Idiot plots,where the plot doesn't work unless the characters behave like idiots.
* Lack of consequences. I hate it when a character makes a bad decision that SHOULD have a negative impact on his or her life...and nothing happens to him or her, because this character is one of the designated good guys. I hate it even more when an action that has been previously described as evil when the villains were doing it suddenly becomes virtuous when the heroes do it. This is the kind of thing that gets me ranting.
* Lack of research.
* Lack of continuity.
* PWP, porn and kink.. They don't interest me. Basically, if it fits into either the sex or the kink categories, you're probably better off avoiding it.
The next two shouldn't be concerns, given the fandoms I picked, but they may tell you something about the way I think, so I'll list them anyway.
* Abuse--physical, mental, emotional or sexual--being presented as a good thing--or worse, a loving thing--to do. Rape, non-con and dub-con fall under this category for me. So does stalking.
* Bigotry played for laughs or shown to be correct.
If you have any questions, just comment here anonymously and I'll do my best to answer.
And once again, thank you for writing for me! I'm sure that whatever you write will be awesome. I can't wait to see what you come up with!
First off, thank you very much for doing this. I appreciate this more than you can possibly guess. I will appreciate WHATEVER you decide to write, so long as you enjoy writing it. All of what follows is just...additional info, if you need it (or if anyone writing treats is curious).
Specifics about my requests:
1) Matthew Swift series - Kate Griffin
What is the canon? A series of four books (A Madness of Angels, The Midnight Mayor, The Neon Court, and The Minority Council) and a spin-off series of two (Stray Souls and The Glass God, collectively called the Magicals Anonymous series). They're all available as paperbacks or as ebooks.
Where can you get it? Amazon, B & N, your local library, etc.
Characters: Matthew Swift, Oda (Matthew Swift), Penny Ngwenya, Nabeela Hirj
Matthew is a formerly murdered urban sorcerer in London who is mentally fused with entities known as the blue electric angels. Basically, all of the emotion that people have poured into telephones since they were invented has mixed with mixed with the electricity flowing through the phones and phone lines, creating an intensely powerful group of beings that have no understanding of emotions, morals, life or death…and that are as curious as your average six-year-old. Matthew has a tendency to meander from "I" to "we" and back again when he narrates (though it's not just the pronoun that lets you know who's talking). He's a trouble magnet who draws his power directly from the city itself, and he has a bad habit of running into virtually omnipotent eldritch abominations.
Oda-also known as Oda Ajaja, birth name Oda Ajaja-Brown-is a relentlessly good, albeit humorless, biracial female paladin who belongs to an order dedicated to the eradication of all magic. She spends the first three books as Matthew's foe-she distrusts him for a long time, definitely doesn't like the blue electric angels, and hates his magic, but, ultimately, perhaps "frenemy" would be a better word.
Penny Ngwenya is a Nigerian-British woman who is a former traffic warden and a present kickass sorceress. Matthew admits to her that she has more power and more ability than he does and learns a lot more quickly than he ever did. She's nominally Matthew's apprentice but actually more like his co-worker. They're friends.
Nabeela Hirj is a hijabi social worker who shows up during the fourth book when she notices that some of her clients have become...well, soulless. She refuses to bow out afterwards, because her clients are her responsibility, damn it. She and Penny click instantly and become the best of friends.
I love Matthew and the blue electric angels--that is, the resurrected amalgamation calling himself/themselves Matthew that we see in the books--but I also dearly love Penny Ngwenya, Oda Ajaja, and Nabeela Hirj, as well as the eldritch abominations (like the Death of Cities). I would adore a story about anyone in this universe, but the ones that I mentioned are my favorites.
Prompts (and ALL THE SPOILERS!):
We know that Penny summoned the Death of Cities...but who or what created it in the first place?
I really, REALLY want to see an AU where Nabeela survives and she and Penny are best friends. Because how can you not want to see a friendship between an urban sorceress and a technogorgon?
Oda. Anything about Oda. The woman had a tragic, angry life and was convinced that she was damned when she died; I'd like to see the world--or some events from her life--from her point of view. I'm sure that she saw things very differently from Matthew. (I'd also love her to learn post-mortem that she wasn't eternally damned, but I'm not sure that she would ever forgive herself...or would accept a deity who forgave her. Oda Ajaja is complicated.)
Matthew, pre- or post-death and resurrection. I'd love to see him as a kid with his mother and grandmother, as Robert Bakker's student, or dealing with the more tedious and less apocalyptic side of being the Midnight Mayor (there has to be something between paperwork and battling potentially world-ending powers--rituals? ceremonies? interacting with dignitaries from other cities/realms?) Is he/Are they suffering from nightmares or PTSD after being disembodied and re-embodied? What does he/do they do to relax between disasters?
Oh, and what WAS Penny doing off in New York City? I know that she went, on Matthew's instructions, to get out of the way of the latest apocalypse...but things seem to happen around urban sorcerers and sorceresses. So what problem arose or made itself known while Penny was in New York, and what did Penny do about it, if such a problem existed?
If you want to write something dark, eerie, and just plain strange, go for it! That's the series, after all. But please, no PWP, protagonist-centered morality, lack of consequences for actions, or abuse, stalking or rape treated as a joke. (And I like happy endings if they fit the story, friendship, especially improbable friendship, and women being awesome.)
You do not have to write a story featuring all four characters; a story about any one, any two or any three is fine.
2) Edward Gorey's PBS Mystery Intro
What is the canon? Exactly what it says on the tin-the intro for PBS' Mystery! series, which was drawn by Edward Gorey.
Where can you get it? There are a few variants of it on YouTube.
Characters: Any
Prompts: Go wild! Have fun making up identities and characterization for any, some or all of the characters: the Swooning Damsel on the Roof and her counterpart, the Swooning Woman on the Wall (who left them there and bound only their ankles?); the Partygoers; the Person Sliding Backward into a Pond (who are they, and who or what is dragging it into the water?); the Woman With the Changing Fan; the Dog With the Letter (what does the letter say? Who sent it? Why does the dog have it?); the Veiled Woman at the Grave, who seems to be sipping a glass of red wine (why is she drinking at the graveside? Is she miserable or celebrating?); and, of course, the Bald Inspector Taking Notes.
I'd love it if this story was a mystery, because what could be more fitting?
This can get dark, if you like--that would fit Gorey's work--but please, no PWP, protagonist-centered morality, lack of consequences for actions, or abuse, stalking or rape treated as a joke. I'd rather, too, that cannibalism form no part of the story; it's a huge, huge squick of mine.
3) Emelan - Tamora Pierce
What is the canon? Everyone probably knows this already, given Pierce's popularity, but it's a series of eleven books, ten of them focusing on four ambient young mages-mages whose power comes from ordinary things (thread, weather, metal and plants, in their cases) and one book focusing on the student of the plant mage. Wikipedia has an incredibly detailed article about this world, if you don't mind spoilers.
Pictured: Circle protagonists Daja Kisubo, Briar Moss, Trisana Chandler, and Sandrilene fa Toren, as drawn by Minuiko.
The Circle of Magic quartet (which takes place when they're around eleven):
Sandry's Book
Tris's Book
Daja's Book
Briar's Book
The Circle Opens quartet (in which three of the four are traveling around the world and each of the fourteen-year-old mages gets at least one student)
Magic Steps (Sandry)
Street Magic (Briar)
Cold Fire (Daja)
Shatterglass (Tris)
The three sequels to the quartets, in publication order:
The Will of the Empress (which takes place when they're eighteen)
Melting Stones (the one about Briar's student, Evvy)
Battle Magic (which takes place when Briar is about sixteen and Evvy is about twelve)
Where can you get it? Amazon, B & N, your local library, etc.
Characters: Any
Prompts (and SPOILERS):
I'd really like one of three things:
a) a story about any of the Circle kids from the missing years between Shatterglass and The Will of the Empress (or, in Briar's case, between Shatterglass and Battle Magic). There are so many stories that have just been referred to in passing. Why didn't Daja and Frostpine go right home to Winding Circle as they planned to at the end of Cold Fire? Who asked Tris to do war magic, and how did she elude the ruler or general who craved that? Was there one particular thing that Sandry did-aside from what we have seen-that convinced her uncle that she would make a better ruler than either of his sons? If so, what? Did Briar and Rosethorn ever wander into a country where they could simply relax and not have to use green magic as a weapon?
b) anything about the past of either Lark or Rosethorn would be fantastic--such as Lark as a yaskedasu in Tharios, Lark discovering that she had thread magic (which she apparently didn't learn until she was in her thirties), or young Rosethorn competing with young Crane at Winding Circle. I'd particularly like a story where the two of them either falling in love or living their lives as a couple over the years is a big part of the story.
c) post-The Will of the Empress fic. Or, in the case of Evvy, post-Melting Stones fic. I'd really like to know what the characters are doing after everything that they've gone through. You can write about one, some, many or all--the number doesn't matter.
I don't like PWP, incest (please, no Circlecest!), teacher/student romances or sex (please, none of that, either), protagonist-centered morality, lack of consequences for actions, or abuse, stalking or rape treated as a joke. I love happy endings, friendship and trust, and plots that spring from characters' personalities.
4) Macbeth - Shakespeare
What is the canon? One of the best-known plays by Shakespeare. You might have read it in English class in high school.
Where can you get it? Right here: http://shakespeare.mit.edu/macbeth/full.html
You can also buy or rent various movie versions of the play here.
Characters: Three Witches (Macbeth - Shakespeare), Lady Macbeth (Macbeth - Shakespeare)
Prompts: I'd really like something here about the witches' backstories. Who are they? What are their names? Why did they become witches? (I presume that there was more involved than "for the evulz.") Have they issued any other deadly prophecies over the centuries?
As for Lady Macbeth, she seems to have much more ambition than Macbeth does. Why? She mentions having had a child in the play; what happened to that child? Why does Duncan look so much like her father when he isn't? (I know the historical reasons for these things, but I want to hear your take on them.)
If that doesn't do it for you, I'd love to see AUs with the witches, Lady Macbeth or both-historical ones, ones set in outer space, solarpunk, AUs where the women aren't from Scotland but are from a different country/countries, races, or cultures. I'd really like to see how different times, places, cultures and/or genres would change the story. Feel free to mix and match this, too.
It's perfectly okay if you write this as a horror story; after all, it involves ambition, regicide, multiple murders, including those of children, framing the dead for crimes they didn't commit, black magic, ghosts of the murdered, and off-stage suicide. However, I'd prefer to avoid topics like cannibalism, vore, and rape. And please, no AUs that put the characters in a mundane setting like coffee shop AUs, high school AUs or college AUs.
You do not have to write a story featuring Lady Macbeth AND the Three Witches; a story about one or the other is fine.
5) Quantum Leap
What is the canon? A sci-fi show about time travel and changing history for the better that aired on NBC from March 1989 to May 1993. Wikipedia has an excellent description of the premise and the plotlines here.
Where can you get it? All five seasons are available with a Hulu subscription. NBC has seasons 1-3 online for free.
Characters: Sam Beckett (Quantum Leap), Al Calavicci
Prompts: Nothing complex here-just a request for a leap, preferably historically accurate. It can be pre-finale, post-finale, an AU where Sam leaps home, Al leaping (as happened several times in the series)…you get the idea.
One caveat-I'd prefer that Sam and Al weren't presented as a couple, past or present. (While Sam and Al could theoretically be bi, thus accounting for Beth Calavicci and Donna Elesee-Beckett, I don't like the "bisexuals are always unfaithful" trope, which is untrue and unfair. And I do like Al Calavicci/Beth Calavicci, even though I didn't ask for it. So I'd rather that the guys be very close friends.)
6) The Wicked + The Divine
What is the canon? An ongoing comic book series that Image Comics summarizes this way: Every ninety years, twelve gods incarnate as humans. They are loved. They are hated. In two years, they are dead.
Where can you get it? Comixology.com. As of this writing, there have been fifteen comics (all 1.99 except for the last issue, with Amaterasu's incarnation on the cover, which is 2.99) and two collected volumes-Volume 1, The Faust Act, for 7.99, and Volume 2, Fandemonium, for 11.99.
Characters: Laura Wilson/Persephone, Ananke (The Wicked + The Divine), Cassandra Igarashi/Urdr, Amaterasu (The Wicked + The Divine)
Prompts (and SPOILERS): Anything-well, anything within my preferred parameters!-about these characters! Why do the other gods (especially Cassandra/Urdr) sneer at Amaterasu and call her by her mortal name, Hazel? They seem to doubt that she's a god at all, though she has godlike powers.
Laura Wilson, the ultimate fangirl, died mere minutes after transformation…but, in addition to her death stopping her from asking inconvenient questions, did she have to die to truly be Persephone? I have read articles where Persephone is referred to not as "the queen of the dead" but "the goddess who dies each year." Are Tara and Lucifer, after dying, part of Laura/Persephone's realm now? (Or Morrigan's? Or Baphomet's? Or is Luci now reigning/imprisoned in a hellish spiritual realm? We know that the gods keep coming back every ninety years, but do the mortals that they incarnate into stop being divine when they die? A number of religions say that death doesn't change a person's divinity.)
We know that Ananke is the one who's been killing the members of the Pantheon (and making them suspect each other as well)-but why? How does this benefit her? What is the purpose of this? And why don't the gods of wisdom (like Minerva), prophecy (like Urdr and her sister Norns) or death (like the Morrigan) know what Ananke is doing? How is she keeping her actions secret from the Pantheon itself?
If you feel like bringing in other characters that were nominated, feel free. (One caveat-I'm not crazy about Woden, as he's racist and emotionally abusive. He's usable, but I'd rather that the story not focus on him or his less appetizing attributes.) Please, no PWP, rape, abuse (physical, emotional and/or sexual), pedophilia (added because of Minerva, who incarnated as a twelve-year-old), torture, or kink. I'd much prefer a gen story focusing on who the characters are, what's happening to them, and what their plans and goals might be.
You do not have to write a story featuring all four characters; a story about any one, any two or any three is fine.
Things I Like:
*AUs. I am a huge, huge fan of AUs, retellings and updatings. If you want to set a story in a different era, genre or environment, knock yourself out.
Exceptions: no coffee shop, high school/college, or "all human/all normal" AUs, please. Coffee shops are nothing special to me, so I don't get the appeal. High school was awful, college was meh, and I'd rather not revisit either. And "all human" AUs simply don't interest me. If magic and/or the supernatural is part of a canon, that's usually a large part of the reason I'm invested in it.
* Awesome characters--especially female characters. You may have noticed that many of the characters I requested were women and girls. I love hearing stories about women and girls doing all sorts of things, taking center stage and telling their own stories.
Also, to quote : "I have a serious kink for competent characters who are good at what they do: let the characters be awesome in a realistic, natural way, and I will be in heaven."
* Characterization. I love finding out new details about characters that fit what we already know. Backstory, post-canon, missing scenes, friendship fic--it's all good, as long as I feel that the characterization still fits plausibly into canon. Imaginative AND believable would be incredible.
* Consent in sexual scenes, and affection in a relationship unrelated to sex-kindness, humor, friendship, enjoying each other's company, having fun with each other.
* Endings that fit. I love happy endings--who doesn't? But if the ending that flows naturally from the story is sad or creepy or whatever, you don't have to shoehorn in a happy ending to satisfy me.
* Friendship. I'm a sucker for improbable friendships that absolutely should not work but do.
* Gen stories. There are obviously exceptions to this, but even in pairing stories, I have a strong preference for plot.
Things I DON'T like:
* Idiot plots,where the plot doesn't work unless the characters behave like idiots.
* Lack of consequences. I hate it when a character makes a bad decision that SHOULD have a negative impact on his or her life...and nothing happens to him or her, because this character is one of the designated good guys. I hate it even more when an action that has been previously described as evil when the villains were doing it suddenly becomes virtuous when the heroes do it. This is the kind of thing that gets me ranting.
* Lack of research.
* Lack of continuity.
* PWP, porn and kink.. They don't interest me. Basically, if it fits into either the sex or the kink categories, you're probably better off avoiding it.
The next two shouldn't be concerns, given the fandoms I picked, but they may tell you something about the way I think, so I'll list them anyway.
* Abuse--physical, mental, emotional or sexual--being presented as a good thing--or worse, a loving thing--to do. Rape, non-con and dub-con fall under this category for me. So does stalking.
* Bigotry played for laughs or shown to be correct.
If you have any questions, just comment here anonymously and I'll do my best to answer.
And once again, thank you for writing for me! I'm sure that whatever you write will be awesome. I can't wait to see what you come up with!