Dear Yuletide author!
Hello, dear Yuletider!
First of all, a reassurance: I love Yuletide for the writing, for the giving, and for getting a story that someone wrote with me in mind in a fandom I love. It's not because I want a specific story. Pretty much anything you write for me, I will love getting, I promise you!
If you're the sort of person who'd rather just write from the prompt alone, go for it! Stop here, don't click on the cut-tags, and go forth and write. Enjoy! If, however, you're the kind of person (like me) who would rather figure out the recipient's tastes as much as you can, here's my best (and highly rambly) attempt to help.
Things I like: uh. LOTS. I love friendship; I love gen-fic, but I have absolutely nothing against pairings either! I love characters who know each other, whether it's what the other would like for breakfast or how the other would move in a fight. Families, created and not. Characters being badass. Ordinary characters being unexpectedly badass in the right situation. Badass characters doing everyday things. Things unsaid, whether they're understood or not. Conversations that aren't about what they sound like they're about. Tiny gestures. Friendly bickering. Atmospheric creepiness that never quite crosses over into graphic horror. Conversations conducted in private code, or 'conversations' where words are unnecessary. Love. Scenery. Physicality -- movements grounded in muscles, in characterization, in the world of objects around someone. Ensemble fic. Character studies. Minor characters. Crossovers. Culture gaps and cultural misunderstandings and tiny gaps in translation. Third-party views of close and/or complicated relationships.
Characters, characters, and occasionally atmosphere. Plot is lovely, and I will salute you wholeheartedly if you're good at it, but characters (and sometimes meta) are what I come to a story for.
This is not an exhaustive list. I love many things I didn't happen to think of while writing this! You can find my letters from the last couple of years in my Yuletide tag, if you really want to go looking, and see what else I said then.
Things I like less: Unequal power dynamics in a romantic relationship, or a large (and uncanonical) age gap. (However, pairings which look unequal to an outsider and actually are nothing of the sort can be awesome.) Non-con or dub-con -- unless it's canonical, and even then I'd rather explore the dynamics than see the sex onscreen. In general, actually, I don't mind sex scenes (even NC-17), and I don't mind violence, but I'd rather they serve the story than that the story be built around them; I don't come to Yuletide for PWPs. Character-bashing, of anyone but especially ladies. (To clarify, it's totally fine if there's IC dislike or dismissal! But I don't want the narrative to support that dislike of a character we're not intended to hate, and I don't want that used to write off a character who's canonically liked just fine.)
Okay, on to the prompts! Which are pretty rambly and detailed themselves, so I don't know how much expansion on them is needed, but oh well.
The Tempest
What interests me most in The Tempest are the tensions between power and humanity, isolation and society, responsibility and tyranny -- and the fantastical elements, throughout all of it. What would be dearest to my heart would be an Ariel story that really explores Ariel, that airy sprite who isn't and will never be human, and what it means to be him(/her/it?) But you needn't write that if it doesn't suit your fancy -- how about Miranda, raised on that island, in her childhood or after the story ends and she comes to a normal human land? What is that brave new world like for her? How about Sycorax, about whom we know nearly nothing? Or Prospero, that old man, magician and autocrat and father, full of bombast and manipulation and contradictions? Be as metatextual as you like, whether it's entirely or not at all, and anything that explores the magic of this world (in any of its dimensions, and from any viewpoint, and at any time) will delight me.
That's a novel of a prompt, right there, and I can't think of much to say that I didn't say there. Except to reiterate that you should write what you like! But the more the fantastical is integral to it, even if it's on the periphery or half-noticed or misunderstood, the more I will hug the story forever.
The Little Mermaid
What I would really love in this fandom is anything that reworks it to make the world an adult-viewed one of true ocean, under the Disney-bright colors of the cartoon. When I say adult, I don't necessarily mean grim or R-rated -- though you're welcome to take that route if you like! -- but I mean nuanced and complicated. What is it to live under this sea, in that world? What is it like to come from there to land and air, or to know that your daughter or sister or princess has, or to know that your wife came from this world you'll never truly understand? Any character(s) you like, or even OCs, would be entirely fine by me! If this prompt doesn't suit you, though, feel free to toss it out and do what you want. This movie has a tremendous nostalgia factor for me, and I'll love the most lighthearted romp or darkest deconstruction.
I adored The Little Mermaid when it first came out, and watched it until my parents were undoubtedly ready to throttle Disney. (Relevantly, I was eight.) One of my first fanfics, if you can call it that, was rewriting it from Ursula's POV for a school assignment in third grade. I also spent a few years wanting to be a marine biologist, did assorted school papers on sharks and cetaceans, and still gravitate instantly to anything involving marine zoology or oceanography. (Probably not because of this movie, although who knows what connections lurk in the subconscious...es of children.)
All of this probably explains some things about me.
Anyway, I say this not because you should feel obligated to write to this -- I mean it, very much, when I say that you should write what you want to write, and that anything for this movie will make me happy! -- but because if you should happen to feel inclined to write a story that unites these childhood fascinations (especially with an adult perspective), I will be a DELIGHTED Yuletide recipient.
The Inda series - Sherwood Smith
It's terribly unspecific, dear author, to say that I would love absolutely anything set in this series, and yet it's true. I'll ramble at greater length in my Dear Yuletide Author letter soon, I promise! But the gist of it remains true -- this is a series in which I love every single character, and all the world, and I will love anything you want to write in it. (But Hadand and Tdor and Jeje and Inda are my particular favorites. I had to stop myself from making that list three times as long, though, so... yeah, anything and anyone.)
Oh dear. I promised greater length, didn't I? And yet I keep getting stuck on I LOVE EVERYTHING.
Okay. Things I love in this series: how there are nearly no villains; everyone is human, whether they like or dislike and support or oppose Inda, and everyone has their own motivations. The cultures. The languages -- linguistic dorkery and culturally significant language usage, I love thee! How people grow and change. The families. The friendships. The way in which cultural institutions work beautifully for some people and okay for others and terribly for others. How there aren't exactly any sidekicks, either; every person is the center of his or her own world, and has his or her own concerns and hopes and loves and loyalties. How you don't have to be badass in any one way; Wisthia gets her way to shine, just as much as Hadand, for example.
Things I like less in this series: ...Uh. I have to work to think of any. I'm not particularly a fan of Inda/Signi, though I like them both individually?
I don't know if that's any help at all, but it's about all I can manage before I start flapping my hands incoherently.
(12/21/10: A hasty edit, since this just went out to the pinch-hit list: I haven't yet read the fourth book, Treason's Shore. I didn't realize I ought to specify that until it was far too late to assume my author hadn't already started on a post-canon epic or something, and if you've already started something I will gleefully read it anyway! I'm good with spoilers as a rule, and any spoilers I get by this will be my own fault. But if you're a pinch-hitter looking for ideas, something set pre-canon or in the first three books would be awesome.)
Ursula Vernon - Works
This is another terribly unspecific one, given how prolific the lady is. But I adore her imagination, and I'm enormously curious what a Yuletide author might do with her art as a prompt. How about Gearworld, if you like atmosphere and dream-logic? What on earth is the world of the weird fruit like? How about that little robed donkey carrying goldfish -- what's his story? Or the lesser-known saints -- how about a hagiography? Basically, there's something here to suit any style, from comic to poetic to sparse, and I'd love to see any of it. (I haven't yet read Dragonbreath and I'm way behind on Digger, so this is more focused on her art than on her published writings. But if you want to do something with those instead, feel free, especially if it's accessible to someone who's not really familiar with the canon!)
About all I have to add to this is that if you don't like my other prompts due to a tragic mismatch of sensibilities or something, you might check out this one. It's basically a prompt to look at a bunch of awesomely quirky artwork and see if anything sparks any kind of story idea! Check out http://www.redwombatstudio.com/wpg2 and see what strikes your fancy. (And if you already know you want to write to one of the others, you should still click that link, because she's fantastic.)
Oh my god, this is the longest Yuletide letter to ever not say a whole lot. I hope this helps! And I want to reiterate, yet again, that you shouldn't stress too much about matching anything on this list you don't already want to match. Write what makes you excited to write, and it will be marvelous, and I will be ecstatic to get it!
First of all, a reassurance: I love Yuletide for the writing, for the giving, and for getting a story that someone wrote with me in mind in a fandom I love. It's not because I want a specific story. Pretty much anything you write for me, I will love getting, I promise you!
If you're the sort of person who'd rather just write from the prompt alone, go for it! Stop here, don't click on the cut-tags, and go forth and write. Enjoy! If, however, you're the kind of person (like me) who would rather figure out the recipient's tastes as much as you can, here's my best (and highly rambly) attempt to help.
Things I like: uh. LOTS. I love friendship; I love gen-fic, but I have absolutely nothing against pairings either! I love characters who know each other, whether it's what the other would like for breakfast or how the other would move in a fight. Families, created and not. Characters being badass. Ordinary characters being unexpectedly badass in the right situation. Badass characters doing everyday things. Things unsaid, whether they're understood or not. Conversations that aren't about what they sound like they're about. Tiny gestures. Friendly bickering. Atmospheric creepiness that never quite crosses over into graphic horror. Conversations conducted in private code, or 'conversations' where words are unnecessary. Love. Scenery. Physicality -- movements grounded in muscles, in characterization, in the world of objects around someone. Ensemble fic. Character studies. Minor characters. Crossovers. Culture gaps and cultural misunderstandings and tiny gaps in translation. Third-party views of close and/or complicated relationships.
Characters, characters, and occasionally atmosphere. Plot is lovely, and I will salute you wholeheartedly if you're good at it, but characters (and sometimes meta) are what I come to a story for.
This is not an exhaustive list. I love many things I didn't happen to think of while writing this! You can find my letters from the last couple of years in my Yuletide tag, if you really want to go looking, and see what else I said then.
Things I like less: Unequal power dynamics in a romantic relationship, or a large (and uncanonical) age gap. (However, pairings which look unequal to an outsider and actually are nothing of the sort can be awesome.) Non-con or dub-con -- unless it's canonical, and even then I'd rather explore the dynamics than see the sex onscreen. In general, actually, I don't mind sex scenes (even NC-17), and I don't mind violence, but I'd rather they serve the story than that the story be built around them; I don't come to Yuletide for PWPs. Character-bashing, of anyone but especially ladies. (To clarify, it's totally fine if there's IC dislike or dismissal! But I don't want the narrative to support that dislike of a character we're not intended to hate, and I don't want that used to write off a character who's canonically liked just fine.)
Okay, on to the prompts! Which are pretty rambly and detailed themselves, so I don't know how much expansion on them is needed, but oh well.
The Tempest
What interests me most in The Tempest are the tensions between power and humanity, isolation and society, responsibility and tyranny -- and the fantastical elements, throughout all of it. What would be dearest to my heart would be an Ariel story that really explores Ariel, that airy sprite who isn't and will never be human, and what it means to be him(/her/it?) But you needn't write that if it doesn't suit your fancy -- how about Miranda, raised on that island, in her childhood or after the story ends and she comes to a normal human land? What is that brave new world like for her? How about Sycorax, about whom we know nearly nothing? Or Prospero, that old man, magician and autocrat and father, full of bombast and manipulation and contradictions? Be as metatextual as you like, whether it's entirely or not at all, and anything that explores the magic of this world (in any of its dimensions, and from any viewpoint, and at any time) will delight me.
That's a novel of a prompt, right there, and I can't think of much to say that I didn't say there. Except to reiterate that you should write what you like! But the more the fantastical is integral to it, even if it's on the periphery or half-noticed or misunderstood, the more I will hug the story forever.
The Little Mermaid
What I would really love in this fandom is anything that reworks it to make the world an adult-viewed one of true ocean, under the Disney-bright colors of the cartoon. When I say adult, I don't necessarily mean grim or R-rated -- though you're welcome to take that route if you like! -- but I mean nuanced and complicated. What is it to live under this sea, in that world? What is it like to come from there to land and air, or to know that your daughter or sister or princess has, or to know that your wife came from this world you'll never truly understand? Any character(s) you like, or even OCs, would be entirely fine by me! If this prompt doesn't suit you, though, feel free to toss it out and do what you want. This movie has a tremendous nostalgia factor for me, and I'll love the most lighthearted romp or darkest deconstruction.
I adored The Little Mermaid when it first came out, and watched it until my parents were undoubtedly ready to throttle Disney. (Relevantly, I was eight.) One of my first fanfics, if you can call it that, was rewriting it from Ursula's POV for a school assignment in third grade. I also spent a few years wanting to be a marine biologist, did assorted school papers on sharks and cetaceans, and still gravitate instantly to anything involving marine zoology or oceanography. (Probably not because of this movie, although who knows what connections lurk in the subconscious...es of children.)
All of this probably explains some things about me.
Anyway, I say this not because you should feel obligated to write to this -- I mean it, very much, when I say that you should write what you want to write, and that anything for this movie will make me happy! -- but because if you should happen to feel inclined to write a story that unites these childhood fascinations (especially with an adult perspective), I will be a DELIGHTED Yuletide recipient.
The Inda series - Sherwood Smith
It's terribly unspecific, dear author, to say that I would love absolutely anything set in this series, and yet it's true. I'll ramble at greater length in my Dear Yuletide Author letter soon, I promise! But the gist of it remains true -- this is a series in which I love every single character, and all the world, and I will love anything you want to write in it. (But Hadand and Tdor and Jeje and Inda are my particular favorites. I had to stop myself from making that list three times as long, though, so... yeah, anything and anyone.)
Oh dear. I promised greater length, didn't I? And yet I keep getting stuck on I LOVE EVERYTHING.
Okay. Things I love in this series: how there are nearly no villains; everyone is human, whether they like or dislike and support or oppose Inda, and everyone has their own motivations. The cultures. The languages -- linguistic dorkery and culturally significant language usage, I love thee! How people grow and change. The families. The friendships. The way in which cultural institutions work beautifully for some people and okay for others and terribly for others. How there aren't exactly any sidekicks, either; every person is the center of his or her own world, and has his or her own concerns and hopes and loves and loyalties. How you don't have to be badass in any one way; Wisthia gets her way to shine, just as much as Hadand, for example.
Things I like less in this series: ...Uh. I have to work to think of any. I'm not particularly a fan of Inda/Signi, though I like them both individually?
I don't know if that's any help at all, but it's about all I can manage before I start flapping my hands incoherently.
(12/21/10: A hasty edit, since this just went out to the pinch-hit list: I haven't yet read the fourth book, Treason's Shore. I didn't realize I ought to specify that until it was far too late to assume my author hadn't already started on a post-canon epic or something, and if you've already started something I will gleefully read it anyway! I'm good with spoilers as a rule, and any spoilers I get by this will be my own fault. But if you're a pinch-hitter looking for ideas, something set pre-canon or in the first three books would be awesome.)
Ursula Vernon - Works
This is another terribly unspecific one, given how prolific the lady is. But I adore her imagination, and I'm enormously curious what a Yuletide author might do with her art as a prompt. How about Gearworld, if you like atmosphere and dream-logic? What on earth is the world of the weird fruit like? How about that little robed donkey carrying goldfish -- what's his story? Or the lesser-known saints -- how about a hagiography? Basically, there's something here to suit any style, from comic to poetic to sparse, and I'd love to see any of it. (I haven't yet read Dragonbreath and I'm way behind on Digger, so this is more focused on her art than on her published writings. But if you want to do something with those instead, feel free, especially if it's accessible to someone who's not really familiar with the canon!)
About all I have to add to this is that if you don't like my other prompts due to a tragic mismatch of sensibilities or something, you might check out this one. It's basically a prompt to look at a bunch of awesomely quirky artwork and see if anything sparks any kind of story idea! Check out http://www.redwombatstudio.com/wpg2 and see what strikes your fancy. (And if you already know you want to write to one of the others, you should still click that link, because she's fantastic.)
Oh my god, this is the longest Yuletide letter to ever not say a whole lot. I hope this helps! And I want to reiterate, yet again, that you shouldn't stress too much about matching anything on this list you don't already want to match. Write what makes you excited to write, and it will be marvelous, and I will be ecstatic to get it!