Yuletide letter
I have signed up for Yuletide! Despite not completing a single fic since last year's Yuletide - but hey, I managed that, so I daresay I will manage it again. It feels like a promise to myself: at some point I will be writing more frequently again, and in the meantime at least I can do Yuletide. Anyhow, here is my letter, which seems to be all police/detective stories this year.
Dear Yuletide Writer,
Thank you for offering one of my small fandoms! I'm pretty much fic-omnivorous, especially in small fandoms, and I'm sure I will like whatever you come up with. I've listed some likes and dislikes to give you some ideas, but they're not hard boundaries or a list of requirements, and if you want to ignore them and do something different then that's absolutely fine. All of this is optional, and I love being surprised!
Things I like:
- loyalty and protectiveness and trust, and problems that arise from it, conflicting loyalties
- hurt/comfort and characters caring about each other especially in small gestures
- tropefic (things like huddling together for warmth, bodyswap, soulbonding, in vino veritas, sharing a bed... that sort of thing)
- casefic and adventures and characters being competent and brave
- stoical/repressed characters communicating their emotions obliquely and in small gestures
- role reversals
- Christmassy stories
- important platonic relationships
- moral dilemmas and difficult decisions
Dislike: Most AUs except fork-in-the-road AUs and IN SPACE because everything is better in space.
Please avoid: young children in harm's way, bleak unhappy endings (ambiguous or bittersweet endings are fine)
Note on crossovers: if you want write a crossover between any of these fandoms or adding any other Yuletide-sized fandoms you think I know, go for it. I love crossovers.
Cuffs - Ryan Draper, Jake Vickers, Donna Prager, Lino Moretti
I loved this show to bits when I saw it, and it is such a crime that it's been cancelled. If you want to write anything continuing any of the storylines left at the end of the season, please do so. I love the cases and how the characters deal with the more trivial policing stuff as well as the big stuff, I love how well the show used the Brighton setting, I loved the diversity and how well it was handled on the show, I loved how Ryan mentors Jake, I love Donna and Ryan helping Lino with his fitness, I love how the team works together, I love how even when they're screwing up their private lives six ways to Sunday, they still manage to be competent in their work. Feel free to treat this as an 'or' request - if you can't fit all four of them into the story, a fic about any one of them or any combination will be fantastic too. About the only thing I'm not hugely interested in is Jake/Simon, otherwise, absolutely anything.
This seems to be the most obscure of my Yuletide fandoms, so I'll mention a bit about it here. It's a BBC police procedural that was cancelled after the first season, so there's only eight episodes of it. But they are brilliant. Really vivid, interesting, likeable characters, good plots, both funny and dark where required, accurate police work, lovely scenery, plus how many police shows do you get with both a gay man and a lesbian as lead characters? I loved the way the show had the regular police officers on the street and the detectives and the senior management and showed how they all work together, it wasn't the kind of detective drama where police officers don't do anything important, and I loved how we saw the characters going from dealing with pickpocketing to murder and back again all in one story. I loved how Jake settles into the team, how they're wary of him as the boss's son and how he is basically brave and decent but also so very green, I like how we see him learning and how Ryan gradually develops some respect for him and vice versa.
Happy Valley - Catherine Cawood
Words cannot express how much I love Sgt Cawood. I know so many women like her IRL, but I almost never see them shown as heroines in stories. I love her in action, but I would happily read a thousand words of her doing laundry, if that's how your imagination takes you, or anything else you can think of. I love her relationship with Clare and how they look after each other, I love how she mentors younger women in the job, I love her and Ann working together, I love how compassionate she is in her work and also how tough. Really, anything you want to write about her, I want to read it.
I'm not sure I have much more to add to this. I've got reviews of the two tv series in the tag here, if that sparks anything for you. But I just want more of Catherine, caring about people and taking no shit from anyone and coping and not-coping with her life. Dealing with a case, spending time with Clare, with Ryan, getting a dog if that takes your fancy, working with Ann... anything you can think of.
Lord Peter Wimsey - Dorothy L Sayers - Lord Peter Wimsey, Mervyn Bunter
I recently re-read the books and I am still fascinated by how Peter and Bunter work together. It was particularly interesting in Busman's Honeymoon, which kept circling round and round the question of whether Bunter would allow Harriet to supplant him in Peter's life and how much better Bunter knows him than she does, but it comes up all over the series. I love stories about loyalty, and if you're taken that way then a thousand words of Bunter being tactful and devoted and bracing Peter with silent criticism and Peter being Peter would make me very happy. If you want to include Harriet and write something set either before or after their marriage, that would be lovely too. Or Peter and Bunter on a case together, any time. Really, anything with the two of them will be fantastic. Or I can see Peter/Bunter, if you want to go that way and can think of a way to make it work without hurting Harriet.
Loyalty is so much my thing, and Peter and Bunter were up there with Frodo and Sam for me as characters whose dynamic completely fascinated me from the first time I met them. And I like that the series goes into what it means a bit more, for Peter and for Bunter. If writing about that dynamic doesn't appeal, then perhaps casefic? Pre-series during the war or afterwards? Bunter in a scrape and Peter getting him out of it, for a change?
I don't really consider the Jill Paton Walsh books as proper canon; Thrones, Dominations has some good bits, but I haven't read the other ones at all. Feel free to ignore them all or pick'n'mix from them or anything you like.
Scott & Bailey - Gill Murray, Rachel Bailey
Anything with these two together! There is nothing I love more than a mentor-student relationship, and it's rare to find a canon where they're both women. I adore Rachel and Gill, I love their interactions, I love how Rachel hates and respects and admires and fears Gill, I love how Gill is alternatingly impressed and exasperated with Rachel. I love how Gill will go to the wall for Rachel, and how desperate Rachel is to impress and please her, I love the offhand, sidelong ways they communicate, I love everything about their interactions. I can happily ship them, but I am every bit as fond of their relationship as platonic. Working a case together, drinking in the pub together, stuck in a traffic jam together - anything you can think of.
Still hanging out for a fic for this prompt. I loved this show so much, and I'm very sad it's over, though the last season was a bit of a disappointment. I'd love to read some of the adventures and mishaps the characters got up to that we didn't see on screen, or what happens next for them. Casefic would be amazing, and I would also happily read a fic that was nothing but the team interviewing suspects (and if you would prefer to sideline Rachel and Gill and write a fic that's nothing but Janet interviewing a suspect for 1000 words, I would be very happy too; I've chosen Rachel and Gill because I love their relationship dearly, but there should be a special fandom just for Janet's interview technique).
I love how seriously the show takes the police procedural side of things, and how cases don't usually turn on the lone genius having a flash of inspiration (though when it does, it's Rachel) but on the whole team working together, on crossing all the Ts and dotting the Is, on following up every lead and running it down, on going through everything as many times as it takes before answers start appearing. And like I said, I love the interviews and the way half of the police work involves sitting down opposite a witness or suspect and sorting out the truth from the lies.
I'm not particularly interested in the characters' family and relationship drama, for the most part, and I'd rather have a story that doesn't focus too strongly on that. Especially Rachel's series of ridiculously disastrous boyfriends and relationships. I love that she's a screw-up, but I'm far more interested in her screw-ups relating to work and Gill and Janet than her boyfriends. I do like Sammy, though.
And thank you again for writing for me, and I hope you have a good Yuletide!
Crossposted at http://philomytha.dreamwidth.org/143339.html. There are
comments there.
Dear Yuletide Writer,
Thank you for offering one of my small fandoms! I'm pretty much fic-omnivorous, especially in small fandoms, and I'm sure I will like whatever you come up with. I've listed some likes and dislikes to give you some ideas, but they're not hard boundaries or a list of requirements, and if you want to ignore them and do something different then that's absolutely fine. All of this is optional, and I love being surprised!
Things I like:
- loyalty and protectiveness and trust, and problems that arise from it, conflicting loyalties
- hurt/comfort and characters caring about each other especially in small gestures
- tropefic (things like huddling together for warmth, bodyswap, soulbonding, in vino veritas, sharing a bed... that sort of thing)
- casefic and adventures and characters being competent and brave
- stoical/repressed characters communicating their emotions obliquely and in small gestures
- role reversals
- Christmassy stories
- important platonic relationships
- moral dilemmas and difficult decisions
Dislike: Most AUs except fork-in-the-road AUs and IN SPACE because everything is better in space.
Please avoid: young children in harm's way, bleak unhappy endings (ambiguous or bittersweet endings are fine)
Note on crossovers: if you want write a crossover between any of these fandoms or adding any other Yuletide-sized fandoms you think I know, go for it. I love crossovers.
Cuffs - Ryan Draper, Jake Vickers, Donna Prager, Lino Moretti
I loved this show to bits when I saw it, and it is such a crime that it's been cancelled. If you want to write anything continuing any of the storylines left at the end of the season, please do so. I love the cases and how the characters deal with the more trivial policing stuff as well as the big stuff, I love how well the show used the Brighton setting, I loved the diversity and how well it was handled on the show, I loved how Ryan mentors Jake, I love Donna and Ryan helping Lino with his fitness, I love how the team works together, I love how even when they're screwing up their private lives six ways to Sunday, they still manage to be competent in their work. Feel free to treat this as an 'or' request - if you can't fit all four of them into the story, a fic about any one of them or any combination will be fantastic too. About the only thing I'm not hugely interested in is Jake/Simon, otherwise, absolutely anything.
This seems to be the most obscure of my Yuletide fandoms, so I'll mention a bit about it here. It's a BBC police procedural that was cancelled after the first season, so there's only eight episodes of it. But they are brilliant. Really vivid, interesting, likeable characters, good plots, both funny and dark where required, accurate police work, lovely scenery, plus how many police shows do you get with both a gay man and a lesbian as lead characters? I loved the way the show had the regular police officers on the street and the detectives and the senior management and showed how they all work together, it wasn't the kind of detective drama where police officers don't do anything important, and I loved how we saw the characters going from dealing with pickpocketing to murder and back again all in one story. I loved how Jake settles into the team, how they're wary of him as the boss's son and how he is basically brave and decent but also so very green, I like how we see him learning and how Ryan gradually develops some respect for him and vice versa.
Happy Valley - Catherine Cawood
Words cannot express how much I love Sgt Cawood. I know so many women like her IRL, but I almost never see them shown as heroines in stories. I love her in action, but I would happily read a thousand words of her doing laundry, if that's how your imagination takes you, or anything else you can think of. I love her relationship with Clare and how they look after each other, I love how she mentors younger women in the job, I love her and Ann working together, I love how compassionate she is in her work and also how tough. Really, anything you want to write about her, I want to read it.
I'm not sure I have much more to add to this. I've got reviews of the two tv series in the tag here, if that sparks anything for you. But I just want more of Catherine, caring about people and taking no shit from anyone and coping and not-coping with her life. Dealing with a case, spending time with Clare, with Ryan, getting a dog if that takes your fancy, working with Ann... anything you can think of.
Lord Peter Wimsey - Dorothy L Sayers - Lord Peter Wimsey, Mervyn Bunter
I recently re-read the books and I am still fascinated by how Peter and Bunter work together. It was particularly interesting in Busman's Honeymoon, which kept circling round and round the question of whether Bunter would allow Harriet to supplant him in Peter's life and how much better Bunter knows him than she does, but it comes up all over the series. I love stories about loyalty, and if you're taken that way then a thousand words of Bunter being tactful and devoted and bracing Peter with silent criticism and Peter being Peter would make me very happy. If you want to include Harriet and write something set either before or after their marriage, that would be lovely too. Or Peter and Bunter on a case together, any time. Really, anything with the two of them will be fantastic. Or I can see Peter/Bunter, if you want to go that way and can think of a way to make it work without hurting Harriet.
Loyalty is so much my thing, and Peter and Bunter were up there with Frodo and Sam for me as characters whose dynamic completely fascinated me from the first time I met them. And I like that the series goes into what it means a bit more, for Peter and for Bunter. If writing about that dynamic doesn't appeal, then perhaps casefic? Pre-series during the war or afterwards? Bunter in a scrape and Peter getting him out of it, for a change?
I don't really consider the Jill Paton Walsh books as proper canon; Thrones, Dominations has some good bits, but I haven't read the other ones at all. Feel free to ignore them all or pick'n'mix from them or anything you like.
Scott & Bailey - Gill Murray, Rachel Bailey
Anything with these two together! There is nothing I love more than a mentor-student relationship, and it's rare to find a canon where they're both women. I adore Rachel and Gill, I love their interactions, I love how Rachel hates and respects and admires and fears Gill, I love how Gill is alternatingly impressed and exasperated with Rachel. I love how Gill will go to the wall for Rachel, and how desperate Rachel is to impress and please her, I love the offhand, sidelong ways they communicate, I love everything about their interactions. I can happily ship them, but I am every bit as fond of their relationship as platonic. Working a case together, drinking in the pub together, stuck in a traffic jam together - anything you can think of.
Still hanging out for a fic for this prompt. I loved this show so much, and I'm very sad it's over, though the last season was a bit of a disappointment. I'd love to read some of the adventures and mishaps the characters got up to that we didn't see on screen, or what happens next for them. Casefic would be amazing, and I would also happily read a fic that was nothing but the team interviewing suspects (and if you would prefer to sideline Rachel and Gill and write a fic that's nothing but Janet interviewing a suspect for 1000 words, I would be very happy too; I've chosen Rachel and Gill because I love their relationship dearly, but there should be a special fandom just for Janet's interview technique).
I love how seriously the show takes the police procedural side of things, and how cases don't usually turn on the lone genius having a flash of inspiration (though when it does, it's Rachel) but on the whole team working together, on crossing all the Ts and dotting the Is, on following up every lead and running it down, on going through everything as many times as it takes before answers start appearing. And like I said, I love the interviews and the way half of the police work involves sitting down opposite a witness or suspect and sorting out the truth from the lies.
I'm not particularly interested in the characters' family and relationship drama, for the most part, and I'd rather have a story that doesn't focus too strongly on that. Especially Rachel's series of ridiculously disastrous boyfriends and relationships. I love that she's a screw-up, but I'm far more interested in her screw-ups relating to work and Gill and Janet than her boyfriends. I do like Sammy, though.
And thank you again for writing for me, and I hope you have a good Yuletide!
Crossposted at http://philomytha.dreamwidth.org/143339.html. There are
comments there.