The Fandom Snowflake Challenge - Day 2
In your own space, post a rec for at least three fanworks that you did not create. Drop a link to your post in the comments. See if you can rec fanworks that are less likely to be praised: tiny fandoms, rare pairings, fanworks other than stories, lesser known kinks or tropes. Find fanworks that have few to no comments, or creators new to a particular fandom and maybe aren't well known or appreciated. Appreciate them.
Note: My regular friends know all about my love for slash, but those visiting from the challenge - the following links contain, at the very least, intimate homosexual relationships, and some of them may contain explicit sex. So... you have been warned. There's some het, too, though. XD
On to the recs! Let's separate by fandom, shall we? (There are too many amazing fics out there to choose from, so some of these are random links off my Pinboard. XDD)
Hikaru no Go:
The 'was decently active in its day but is now tiny and held together mostly by a tight-knit group of fans for who the love of Hikago will never die - especially as long at there is Blind Go' fandom. XD AKA my favorite fandom, and also the main fandom people go 'Hika-what now? Go? WTF is Go?' XDDD
Speaking of Blind Go...
Blind Go, THE Hikago fic challenge currently run by blue_cage and trixie_chick
Blind Go has become the main Hikago Challenge community - it happens twice a year (with occasional mini-rounds). A theme is announced, you sign up, write a fic, send it in, and all the fics are posted anonymously so that everyone can try to guess who wrote what! It's ridiculous amounts of fun - there's a lively AIM chat during rounds and a support (AKA DISTRACTIONS!) community, Kifu_Archive currently run by Verloren1983 that both participants and readers can play at. It's been around for YEARS, and it's no wonder why - it's addicting, fun, and it's turned out some of the best fics Hikago has. Come play with us!
ihikago, a podfic Hikago community ran by daisy_chan
This is such a cool community, and since I just poked Daisy to put up a new round (:DDDD), I want to announce it to the world! People volunteer fics they'll allow to be turned into a podfic, and people sign up to make podfics from those authors! It's so awesome, and I finally have a decent enough mic to try it out! (Something tells me I'll be recording the same fic 900 times before I'm satisfied...) Podfics are a rarity in the fandoms I frequent, so this comm is totally amazing to me. Come exercise your voice with us!
Intentional Ambiguity - coded references to same-sex attraction in Hikaru no Go by stirring_still
Okay, so, in the Hikago fandom, this meta post is probably pretty well-known, but it's so amazing that I really think everyone should read it. It is a wonderful breakdown of just how much thought was put behind the symbolism in Hikaru no Go, right down to the naming kanji, and how, when faced with the sheer amount of evidence, it is much more far-fetched to think that Hikaru no Go is NOT about two young boys who fall in love. There are some great observations on how homosexuality is viewed and why the author went through so much trouble to make things ambiguous. It is long and amazingly well thought out. It is very much an academic dissection of Hikaru no Go, and it is beautiful and wonderful and lovely. Seriously, read it. It's amazing.
The Lacquer Box by Penguin474
This is, without a doubt, my very favorite 'Shindou tells Touya about Sai' fic, and it still gives me chills and makes me misty-eyed. This fic can never get enough love. Read it. I don't care if you've read it before - read it again. I could read it a million times and still want to read it one more time.
Ten Things Touya Didn't Know Before Having Sex With Shindou by Vstar
This is an older fic, but I absolutely adore it. It's packed with emotion and lovely Touya revelations and seriously hot lime. She captures these two and how I imagine they'd be perfectly. It is always a delightful read.
A Proof By Contradiction (Eight Primary Sources) by Petronia
This is breath-taking. I usually don't like tragedies, but this is DEFINITELY one of my favorite Hikago fics of all time. It's such an unusual style, but she pulls it off with style, and even my non-slash friend who's not even a Hikago fan said it was ridiculously intriguing. Basic summary - it is the story of Shindou's death and how Touya sort of goes insane - building a super Go computer that can play like Shindou. It isn't told to you in a straight-forward fashion, though - the eight primary sources consist of things like home videos, interviews, letters and audio tapes, so that in each of the eight parts, you only get a small piece of the puzzle. It's a fic that leaves you thinking long after it's over. This fic was turned into a wonderful podfic read by aiwritingfic on ihikago.
Playing a Hand by Harukami
...Really, I'm only linking to this because OMFG HOT. This is so freaking hot and sexy and mind-blowingly smutty that I practically get shortness of breath just reading it. This is smut at its best.
Gundam Wing:
The 'just because it's one of your main fandoms doesn't mean you have to list it, even if it is thinning out after sixteen years' fandom. But of course, here I am, listing it anyways.
Moments of Rapture, a Gundam Wing fanfiction archive with awesome contests created and run by Sharona1x2
Sharon is fantastic, and she collects her favorite Heero/Duo fics from authors who agree to be archived for all to enjoy. It's not a blanket archive - she's not just archiving all the fics by an author she likes. She picks and chooses those that really speak to her, generally one-shots, all of her favorite pairing, Heero/Duo. So when she asks you if she can archive a story, you know she really likes it, not just because you happen to be her friend. It's a real honor - one that she has bestowed upon me eight times! She is currently running a contest, which she will commission lovely art for the winners. It's a wonderful place!
AJU_Scenes, the best Gundam Wing RP on the net, ran anonymously.
AJU_Scenes is an AU Gundam Wing RP that is just breathtaking. It's no longer active, but there is plenty to keep a new reader busy with. The main pairing is Heero/Duo, which develops slowly and is a real delight to watch play out, but there are plenty of other pairings to see, as well. It's really amazing how they manage to stay in character all the time - I have no idea who runs it.
Covetousness by wanderingassassin
An assassins AU where Heero is brought back from the dead. Amazing, and the inspiration for my Hikago fic, Project Zombie. Seriously, there are no words. Just read it.
Window of Opportunity by The Manwell
Hell, I'd recommend you read anything by The Manwell you can get your hands on, but this is a nice, semi-short piece that is THE perfect example of how to do snark RIGHT. It's truly a delightful read, as is anything she writes, and it seriously did not get the love it deserved, so give it some love!
Final Fantasy IV:
The 'this is practically non-existent' fandom, or the teeny tiny fandom.
Embers by masserect
A touch crack, as it was written for Springkink, this hilarious and surpisingly hot fanfic is about Edge being a horny voyeur that gets way more than he bargained for when Rydia summons Ifrit to satisfy her. She also wrote Frost, which is a pretty hot Shiva/Rydia, if you're so inclined.
Momentum by seventhe
This fic is mind-blowing. I saw a rec for it, and I wasn't sure if I could handle turning my OTP (Edge/Rydia) into an OT3 (Kain/Edge/Rydia), but not only was it so good, I now actively seek out Kain/Edge/Rydia (of which there is a woeful lack), but my entire perception of Edge was irrevocably changed. That's right, this one fic single-handedly altered my head-canon for Edge. Suddenly, he is what I'm calling 'omnisexual', meaning basically, if it's of decent intelligence and interested, he'll probably sleep with it. Man, woman, Eidolon, whatever. Not that he can't be faithful, but if he's a free agent? He's getting it from literally every possible source. This fic is totally responsible for this (and he doesn't even have any questionable sex in it - it's just Kain and Rydia!), which I think is AMAZING, because once I have a head-canon I like, I usually reject things that go against it. Not this. It's really quite the remarkable fic. Read it and be amazed! I'm also a big fan of Edge being in the middle when they finally have sex, because in a threesome like this, you usually see the female sandwiched inbetween the two males, and I found this a thousand times sexier having Edge be the middle man. :D
Tintinnabulum by ObsessiveCompulsiveValkyrie
Valk captures Edge and Rydia perfectly, delivering a romance without all the cliche cheese and OOC weak Rydia that's all too common in this tiny fandom. The Tintinnabulum flower she created for the story integrates seamlessly into the world as if it belongs there, and is used wonderfully as the theme of the story. It easily could have been horribly cheesy, but it's not - instead it's wonderful and so very them. Great stuff here.
Fairy Tail:
Because for being the seventh most popular anime on Anime Crazy and the fourth most popular manga on One Manga before they took their collection down, it has the most pathetically small fandom, which becomes positively microscopic when trying to find Gray/Natsu fics (my pairing of choice), and smaller still if you actually want those fics to be any good.
GrayxNatsu, a Gray/Natsu LJ comm that I actually made because, let me tell you, it is IMPOSSIBLE to find more than a couple Gray/Natsu fics on LJ, but unfortunately, it barely gets used. (Read as: please join it and CONTRIBUTE GRAY/NATSU FANNISH STUFF. Which you probably won't, but it was totally worth a try.)
Ice Skating by Shiny Pichu-chan
Be prepared for an attack of the cute, as Ice Skating totally gave me that flailing squee feeling. Some Fairy Tail members go ice skating, and while Gray is completely in his element, poor Fire Dragon Slayer Natsu is adorably ill-prepared, and Gray gives him a hand. It's seriously a fluff explosion in my head. XD She also wrote Flowers, which is a much more serious fic, dealing with Gray's loss of his parents and showing that small glimmer of Natsu depth that you seldom see in fic or in canon, which was delightfully refreshing. I highly recommend them both.
Self-Discipline and Other Abandoned Moral Standards by runic_binary
This fic is crazy awesome. It's a Lucy/Natsu/Erza/Gray fic, which, holy crap, so much love for how well she makes this work. It's incredibly interesting and total smut. It surprised me in a most awesome way. It has a mini-sequel involving Loke that's pretty hilarious, too, called In Which A Breakup Of Sorts Is Attempted. I highly recommend them both. :D
Misc:
Because there's always something that doesn't fit anywhere else.
Making Up is Hard to Do by china_shop
Anthropomorphic! Always fun, but this is especially awesome because it is fandom/LJ. Amazingly hilarious, full of cracks at LJ's expense, and just all around epic.
Stay Down by lokifan
In the same vein as the previous fic, this is also anthropomorphic, this time DW/LJ. Awesome stuff. <3
Ides of March by Pax
Seriously, this is a Re: Your Brains fic. You know, the song by Jonathan Coulton? I saw someone wrote it for the Porn Battle, and I couldn't help but read it, and holy crap, it's FANTASTIC. So serious, read it and be amazed.
*Dies* That took FOREVER. It was a three rec minimum, but even with my massively going overboard, I feel like I left out SO MUCH. Ugh. Rec posts are SO HARD. I tried to leave out most of the fics I love that everyone and their brother already knows about, but I know I'm missing some small fics that deserve ALL THE LOVE. But I'm tired now. Hopefully all the links work right, because I'm too tired to check them all. >.>
Note: My regular friends know all about my love for slash, but those visiting from the challenge - the following links contain, at the very least, intimate homosexual relationships, and some of them may contain explicit sex. So... you have been warned. There's some het, too, though. XD
On to the recs! Let's separate by fandom, shall we? (There are too many amazing fics out there to choose from, so some of these are random links off my Pinboard. XDD)
Hikaru no Go:
The 'was decently active in its day but is now tiny and held together mostly by a tight-knit group of fans for who the love of Hikago will never die - especially as long at there is Blind Go' fandom. XD AKA my favorite fandom, and also the main fandom people go 'Hika-what now? Go? WTF is Go?' XDDD
Speaking of Blind Go...
Blind Go, THE Hikago fic challenge currently run by blue_cage and trixie_chick
Blind Go has become the main Hikago Challenge community - it happens twice a year (with occasional mini-rounds). A theme is announced, you sign up, write a fic, send it in, and all the fics are posted anonymously so that everyone can try to guess who wrote what! It's ridiculous amounts of fun - there's a lively AIM chat during rounds and a support (AKA DISTRACTIONS!) community, Kifu_Archive currently run by Verloren1983 that both participants and readers can play at. It's been around for YEARS, and it's no wonder why - it's addicting, fun, and it's turned out some of the best fics Hikago has. Come play with us!
ihikago, a podfic Hikago community ran by daisy_chan
This is such a cool community, and since I just poked Daisy to put up a new round (:DDDD), I want to announce it to the world! People volunteer fics they'll allow to be turned into a podfic, and people sign up to make podfics from those authors! It's so awesome, and I finally have a decent enough mic to try it out! (Something tells me I'll be recording the same fic 900 times before I'm satisfied...) Podfics are a rarity in the fandoms I frequent, so this comm is totally amazing to me. Come exercise your voice with us!
Intentional Ambiguity - coded references to same-sex attraction in Hikaru no Go by stirring_still
Okay, so, in the Hikago fandom, this meta post is probably pretty well-known, but it's so amazing that I really think everyone should read it. It is a wonderful breakdown of just how much thought was put behind the symbolism in Hikaru no Go, right down to the naming kanji, and how, when faced with the sheer amount of evidence, it is much more far-fetched to think that Hikaru no Go is NOT about two young boys who fall in love. There are some great observations on how homosexuality is viewed and why the author went through so much trouble to make things ambiguous. It is long and amazingly well thought out. It is very much an academic dissection of Hikaru no Go, and it is beautiful and wonderful and lovely. Seriously, read it. It's amazing.
The Lacquer Box by Penguin474
This is, without a doubt, my very favorite 'Shindou tells Touya about Sai' fic, and it still gives me chills and makes me misty-eyed. This fic can never get enough love. Read it. I don't care if you've read it before - read it again. I could read it a million times and still want to read it one more time.
Ten Things Touya Didn't Know Before Having Sex With Shindou by Vstar
This is an older fic, but I absolutely adore it. It's packed with emotion and lovely Touya revelations and seriously hot lime. She captures these two and how I imagine they'd be perfectly. It is always a delightful read.
A Proof By Contradiction (Eight Primary Sources) by Petronia
This is breath-taking. I usually don't like tragedies, but this is DEFINITELY one of my favorite Hikago fics of all time. It's such an unusual style, but she pulls it off with style, and even my non-slash friend who's not even a Hikago fan said it was ridiculously intriguing. Basic summary - it is the story of Shindou's death and how Touya sort of goes insane - building a super Go computer that can play like Shindou. It isn't told to you in a straight-forward fashion, though - the eight primary sources consist of things like home videos, interviews, letters and audio tapes, so that in each of the eight parts, you only get a small piece of the puzzle. It's a fic that leaves you thinking long after it's over. This fic was turned into a wonderful podfic read by aiwritingfic on ihikago.
Playing a Hand by Harukami
...Really, I'm only linking to this because OMFG HOT. This is so freaking hot and sexy and mind-blowingly smutty that I practically get shortness of breath just reading it. This is smut at its best.
Gundam Wing:
The 'just because it's one of your main fandoms doesn't mean you have to list it, even if it is thinning out after sixteen years' fandom. But of course, here I am, listing it anyways.
Moments of Rapture, a Gundam Wing fanfiction archive with awesome contests created and run by Sharona1x2
Sharon is fantastic, and she collects her favorite Heero/Duo fics from authors who agree to be archived for all to enjoy. It's not a blanket archive - she's not just archiving all the fics by an author she likes. She picks and chooses those that really speak to her, generally one-shots, all of her favorite pairing, Heero/Duo. So when she asks you if she can archive a story, you know she really likes it, not just because you happen to be her friend. It's a real honor - one that she has bestowed upon me eight times! She is currently running a contest, which she will commission lovely art for the winners. It's a wonderful place!
AJU_Scenes, the best Gundam Wing RP on the net, ran anonymously.
AJU_Scenes is an AU Gundam Wing RP that is just breathtaking. It's no longer active, but there is plenty to keep a new reader busy with. The main pairing is Heero/Duo, which develops slowly and is a real delight to watch play out, but there are plenty of other pairings to see, as well. It's really amazing how they manage to stay in character all the time - I have no idea who runs it.
Covetousness by wanderingassassin
An assassins AU where Heero is brought back from the dead. Amazing, and the inspiration for my Hikago fic, Project Zombie. Seriously, there are no words. Just read it.
Window of Opportunity by The Manwell
Hell, I'd recommend you read anything by The Manwell you can get your hands on, but this is a nice, semi-short piece that is THE perfect example of how to do snark RIGHT. It's truly a delightful read, as is anything she writes, and it seriously did not get the love it deserved, so give it some love!
Final Fantasy IV:
The 'this is practically non-existent' fandom, or the teeny tiny fandom.
Embers by masserect
A touch crack, as it was written for Springkink, this hilarious and surpisingly hot fanfic is about Edge being a horny voyeur that gets way more than he bargained for when Rydia summons Ifrit to satisfy her. She also wrote Frost, which is a pretty hot Shiva/Rydia, if you're so inclined.
Momentum by seventhe
This fic is mind-blowing. I saw a rec for it, and I wasn't sure if I could handle turning my OTP (Edge/Rydia) into an OT3 (Kain/Edge/Rydia), but not only was it so good, I now actively seek out Kain/Edge/Rydia (of which there is a woeful lack), but my entire perception of Edge was irrevocably changed. That's right, this one fic single-handedly altered my head-canon for Edge. Suddenly, he is what I'm calling 'omnisexual', meaning basically, if it's of decent intelligence and interested, he'll probably sleep with it. Man, woman, Eidolon, whatever. Not that he can't be faithful, but if he's a free agent? He's getting it from literally every possible source. This fic is totally responsible for this (and he doesn't even have any questionable sex in it - it's just Kain and Rydia!), which I think is AMAZING, because once I have a head-canon I like, I usually reject things that go against it. Not this. It's really quite the remarkable fic. Read it and be amazed! I'm also a big fan of Edge being in the middle when they finally have sex, because in a threesome like this, you usually see the female sandwiched inbetween the two males, and I found this a thousand times sexier having Edge be the middle man. :D
Tintinnabulum by ObsessiveCompulsiveValkyrie
Valk captures Edge and Rydia perfectly, delivering a romance without all the cliche cheese and OOC weak Rydia that's all too common in this tiny fandom. The Tintinnabulum flower she created for the story integrates seamlessly into the world as if it belongs there, and is used wonderfully as the theme of the story. It easily could have been horribly cheesy, but it's not - instead it's wonderful and so very them. Great stuff here.
Fairy Tail:
Because for being the seventh most popular anime on Anime Crazy and the fourth most popular manga on One Manga before they took their collection down, it has the most pathetically small fandom, which becomes positively microscopic when trying to find Gray/Natsu fics (my pairing of choice), and smaller still if you actually want those fics to be any good.
GrayxNatsu, a Gray/Natsu LJ comm that I actually made because, let me tell you, it is IMPOSSIBLE to find more than a couple Gray/Natsu fics on LJ, but unfortunately, it barely gets used. (Read as: please join it and CONTRIBUTE GRAY/NATSU FANNISH STUFF. Which you probably won't, but it was totally worth a try.)
Ice Skating by Shiny Pichu-chan
Be prepared for an attack of the cute, as Ice Skating totally gave me that flailing squee feeling. Some Fairy Tail members go ice skating, and while Gray is completely in his element, poor Fire Dragon Slayer Natsu is adorably ill-prepared, and Gray gives him a hand. It's seriously a fluff explosion in my head. XD She also wrote Flowers, which is a much more serious fic, dealing with Gray's loss of his parents and showing that small glimmer of Natsu depth that you seldom see in fic or in canon, which was delightfully refreshing. I highly recommend them both.
Self-Discipline and Other Abandoned Moral Standards by runic_binary
This fic is crazy awesome. It's a Lucy/Natsu/Erza/Gray fic, which, holy crap, so much love for how well she makes this work. It's incredibly interesting and total smut. It surprised me in a most awesome way. It has a mini-sequel involving Loke that's pretty hilarious, too, called In Which A Breakup Of Sorts Is Attempted. I highly recommend them both. :D
Misc:
Because there's always something that doesn't fit anywhere else.
Making Up is Hard to Do by china_shop
Anthropomorphic! Always fun, but this is especially awesome because it is fandom/LJ. Amazingly hilarious, full of cracks at LJ's expense, and just all around epic.
Stay Down by lokifan
In the same vein as the previous fic, this is also anthropomorphic, this time DW/LJ. Awesome stuff. <3
Ides of March by Pax
Seriously, this is a Re: Your Brains fic. You know, the song by Jonathan Coulton? I saw someone wrote it for the Porn Battle, and I couldn't help but read it, and holy crap, it's FANTASTIC. So serious, read it and be amazed.
*Dies* That took FOREVER. It was a three rec minimum, but even with my massively going overboard, I feel like I left out SO MUCH. Ugh. Rec posts are SO HARD. I tried to leave out most of the fics I love that everyone and their brother already knows about, but I know I'm missing some small fics that deserve ALL THE LOVE. But I'm tired now. Hopefully all the links work right, because I'm too tired to check them all. >.>