Yuletide 2013: Who knew?
For a variety of reasons, I didn't sign up for Yuletide at AO3 this year, which was partly a little sad and partly a relief to not have the ZOMG ANGST PRESSURE, especially since I've been in a writing funk for the past few months and really lost all the feels (and if you know me, you know feels are EVERYTHING), and I was desperately worried that I would not be able to muster up enough enthusiasm to turn out a product I was happy with and that would delight my recipient. Then Three Sentence Ficathon happened and feels were back, and a chapter of Sleeping beauty happened and I worked through some hard feels, which are at least feels of some kind, and I thought, hmmm, writing is happening. YAY.
I was on the pinch hit list for YT but if you are on that list you know how it goes - it's all obscure anime and graphic novels and randomness - so it wasn't like I was holding my breath for anything to happen. And then it shows up, Dec 10th-ish. The Prompt. It had Phantom of the Opera AND Persuasion in it, two fandoms I know and love well. I figure, between those two I can come up with SOMETHING, right? So I send out the emails to claim it. (Yes, plural, I emailed like three different addresses hoping I connected with the right person.) And I got it!!
Then the panic sets in. Now I must write! Thankfully school was just wrapping up and on the last day of classes, I packed my bags and headed out to a little mini-vacation in Palm Beach, where I swam in the tropical pool and lounged around in bed all day and reread Persuasion. I very much enjoy emulating an author's writing style, but Jane Austen was a brand new wheelhouse for me, fanfiction-wise, and I was a bit nervous about the tone. I kicked around ideas with rthstewart, and she convinced me to go with what I love to do: sweet 'n' sexy romance, which was just what my prompt wanted. A love story that pushed the limits. Yes, I thought, I can do that.
And thus A Persuadable Temper was written in about two days, in time to send it out to a couple betas (hi silksieve and joutgetsu!) and finish the final edits before the Dec 22 submission deadline. I'm really happy with how it came out; I think it shows a side of Anne and Frederick that we don't see much but one that they are most certainly capable of, a playful teasing back-and-forth of wits and seduction. I really hope my recipient likes it and will someday leave a comment on it, because I so enjoyed writing it and getting to participate in Yuletide after all, when I did not expect to. It was a great prompt and I was lucky to get it!
High on my success at conjuring feels for that one, I decided to take on yet another prompt as a treat - Crantz's Genderbent Ripushko Disney Princesses. (Again, rthstewart is mostly to blame for this one.) I settled on Sleeping Beauty (surprise surprise) and wanted to reference some of the origins of the gruesome original while turning those tropes of non-consensual intimacy and instantaneous falling-in-love on their heads. Sleeping Charming got a lot of my RAWWWR princesses don't have to be weak! feels out (ahem, my mom's pushing the princess propaganda hard these days) and was a blast at the same time, taking scenes from the movie and imagining how Philippa would have reacted to them. This one I finished writing around Christmas Eve, and was unbeta'd, but still pretty happy with it and glad to hear Crantz liked it too!
So that was Yuletide 2013. Last year I wrote one fic; this year I wrote two. Next year - three? I'm already planning which fandoms to nominate (Vesper Holly, RPF [eeek], and perhaps Wrinkle in Time, plus I'm sure more will occur to me over the year), and I will most certainly sign up at the start for 2014!
I was on the pinch hit list for YT but if you are on that list you know how it goes - it's all obscure anime and graphic novels and randomness - so it wasn't like I was holding my breath for anything to happen. And then it shows up, Dec 10th-ish. The Prompt. It had Phantom of the Opera AND Persuasion in it, two fandoms I know and love well. I figure, between those two I can come up with SOMETHING, right? So I send out the emails to claim it. (Yes, plural, I emailed like three different addresses hoping I connected with the right person.) And I got it!!
Then the panic sets in. Now I must write! Thankfully school was just wrapping up and on the last day of classes, I packed my bags and headed out to a little mini-vacation in Palm Beach, where I swam in the tropical pool and lounged around in bed all day and reread Persuasion. I very much enjoy emulating an author's writing style, but Jane Austen was a brand new wheelhouse for me, fanfiction-wise, and I was a bit nervous about the tone. I kicked around ideas with rthstewart, and she convinced me to go with what I love to do: sweet 'n' sexy romance, which was just what my prompt wanted. A love story that pushed the limits. Yes, I thought, I can do that.
And thus A Persuadable Temper was written in about two days, in time to send it out to a couple betas (hi silksieve and joutgetsu!) and finish the final edits before the Dec 22 submission deadline. I'm really happy with how it came out; I think it shows a side of Anne and Frederick that we don't see much but one that they are most certainly capable of, a playful teasing back-and-forth of wits and seduction. I really hope my recipient likes it and will someday leave a comment on it, because I so enjoyed writing it and getting to participate in Yuletide after all, when I did not expect to. It was a great prompt and I was lucky to get it!
High on my success at conjuring feels for that one, I decided to take on yet another prompt as a treat - Crantz's Genderbent Ripushko Disney Princesses. (Again, rthstewart is mostly to blame for this one.) I settled on Sleeping Beauty (surprise surprise) and wanted to reference some of the origins of the gruesome original while turning those tropes of non-consensual intimacy and instantaneous falling-in-love on their heads. Sleeping Charming got a lot of my RAWWWR princesses don't have to be weak! feels out (ahem, my mom's pushing the princess propaganda hard these days) and was a blast at the same time, taking scenes from the movie and imagining how Philippa would have reacted to them. This one I finished writing around Christmas Eve, and was unbeta'd, but still pretty happy with it and glad to hear Crantz liked it too!
So that was Yuletide 2013. Last year I wrote one fic; this year I wrote two. Next year - three? I'm already planning which fandoms to nominate (Vesper Holly, RPF [eeek], and perhaps Wrinkle in Time, plus I'm sure more will occur to me over the year), and I will most certainly sign up at the start for 2014!