for statistical purposes
Apparently it's time for the "ten most popular fanworks by hitcount" thing again? I didn't do it last year, probably because I was in Texas at the time, so I have no data for comparison. Also limiting this to fic because I don't post other stuff to AO3 (yet) but AO3 is the easiest gauge I have, and because I'm fairly certain that none of my non-fic fanworks are even near as viewed as these ten.
Figured I'd bost the list as it stands now, though I'm pretty sure a couple of these will get bumped down by some of the things I'm working on now (that I should really hurry up and post before the movie comes out and Josses them even more than the spoilers already have). It's an interesting mix of ratings & stuff, I guess, though it's mostly pretty clear what gave these works a leg-up the sort-by-hits ladder. No archive-standard warnings apply on any of the ten.
1. Broken Wing (Need Something to Mend Me) (The Losers, explicit, January 2011)
Summary: "Under orders not to use his right hand until it heals, Jensen is quickly frustrated by the inconvenience of functioning with only one thumb. It's a good thing Cougar is there to help him out with little things, and big things too."
Last year's
ante_up_losers exchange fic, it's also one of my longest "published" stories, and it's pretty classic hurt/comfort get-together romance in the biggest-by-far m/m pairing (Cougar/Jensen) of a moderately sized fandom, that also actively explores and challenges a few tacit assumptions in lots of BDSM fanworks and, honestly, BDSM culture (in particular, the common view of service as inherently submissive), in a way that seems to resonate positively with readers. Started with a great, challenging, inspiring prompt (dear author letter requesting lots of physical intimacy and sub!Jensen with D/s but no painplay or ageplay or a few other things I'd otherwise have probably reached for sooner), and I think it's been recced relatively widely. Been meaning to podfic for a while, keep forgetting.
2. Where the Music Plays for Free (Avengers movieverse, explicit, February 2012)
Summary: "Banterfuck."
My first-ever on-time entry in Porn Battle? And my first Avengers fic. Don't actually know why this one is so popular--would have thought Clint/Darcy was a relatively rare pairing, for one thing--but I guess a combination of right place/right time (fandom, collection, content) and whatever luck/skill thing I managed there, striking bullseye on the sexy target, cuz it's apparently pretty hot stuff.
3. Five Times (of Many) Clint Made Phil Coulson Facepalm (Avengers movieverse, teen, March 2012)
Summary: "Scenes from one day in the life of Clint Barton, gentleman troublemaker, and his favourite straightman, Phil Coulson."
Not at all shocked by the popularity on this one: it's got comedy (and bad puns), it's got established tropes ("five times" format), it's got (at least obliquely) one of the most (and daily moreso) popular m/m pairings (Clint/Coulson) and (more directly) a not unpopular f/m one (Clint/Natasha) plus appearances from other characters to make it basically ensemble, in a HUGE fandom, right in the moment of its growing hugeness and drooling anticipation (but it's not just the fandom, because the none of the other three Avengers 'verse fic I've posted so far are even on the top page of the hit list, though one is creeping closer). Also features Mythbusters and Warren Ellis references and Thor spinning poi, which will never not delight me. Really, this is me pulling a trollface, and I'm lucky that no one's thrown any rotten tomatoes.
4. Sharing Is Caring (Inception, teen, January 2011)
Summary: "Inspired by the Text From Last Night "Just rolled over and found your boyfriend in bed with me. Is mine at your house?" "
Pretty much does what it says on the tin--a short, fluffy little poly fic that hints at various combinations of Ariadne, Arthur, Eames, and Yusuf, that people seem to like. Was firmly in second place behind "Broken Wing" whenever it was I started paying attention to my hitcounts and held that position for a long time until the Avengers fics started rocketing up the ranks. Looks like it's still getting recced around, too--like, it got about 200 hits and at least 15 kudoses in the space of a day while I was in Boston last week.
5. Something to Sing About (Avengers movieverse, teen, February 2012)
Summary: "In whose end-o?"
More trollfacing, but I'm kind of proud of it. It's short and to-the-point, anyway (tags contain spoiler).
6. Roll with It (The Losers, teen, September 2010)
Summary: "Four "strangers" walk into a bar and create a distraction"
Possibly the first fic I posted directly to AO3? I'm pretty sure everything marked as older than this was posted on LJ first and back-dated when I uploaded it.
kink_bingo fic that, like the remainder of this list because they're all from 2010, predates the kudos system, but was very well-received at the time and probably topped my hit list for a good long while before the five above it came along.
7. Make Light Work (Multiplicity) (Inception, explicit, September 2010)
Summary: "Anyone would have their hands full pleasing Arthur and Ariadne. Fortunately Eames has a lot of hands."
One third of my
kink_bingo Arbitrary Mod Prize-winning multifandom tentacle triptych, along with #8 and #11 on the sort-by-hit list (podficced by
eruthros here--except that it looks like the download links are to megaupload, so might not work anymore. Still, the first time, to my knowledge, that someone else has podficced my work, and that makes me as happy again as winning the AMP in the first place did). I credit the distribution of the three on this list to the activity of their respective fandoms (Inception, Losers, Star Trek AOS) at the time of posting.
8. Gripped with Terror (Sensation and Iconography) (The Losers, teen, September 2010)
Summary: "Jensen has a Lovecraft kink. With tips for playing in high humidity."
See above.
9. Still Pink (Shout It from the Rooftops) (The Losers, general audiences, December 2010)
Summary: "Jensen celebrates the repeal of DADT."
Follow-up to #10, written for a challenge at
queerlygen (I should crosspost more stuff there, apropos of little) following the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Silly little stories, these two, but sweet.
10. Pink (The Losers, general audiences, September 2010)
Summary: "Jensen's wearing the shirt again."
Brief dialogue-only scene between Pooch and Jensen, written for a prompt at
fic_promptly (should also participate more there), examining the imbrication of colours in the cultural construction of gender and sexual identity. I like it when stories have more hits than words. Also interesting to watch these two relatively old stories creeping up the front page, and just to watch the older pieces shuffle around as people stumble across them for one reason or another (Losers stories probably get an annual boost from Ante Up traffic).
And while I'm linking to stuff on the AO3, here is an unbelievably precious and delightful, not to mention laugh-out-loud hilarious, story (by someone other than me) about living with people, domesticity, found family, disobedient brain-mouth circuits, and robots: Some Things Shouldn't Be a Chore. And while you're there, check out sabinelagrande because sabinelagrande is a synonym for awesome.
Cross-posted from Dreamwidth, where there are currently
comments. Please comment there using OpenID.
Figured I'd bost the list as it stands now, though I'm pretty sure a couple of these will get bumped down by some of the things I'm working on now (that I should really hurry up and post before the movie comes out and Josses them even more than the spoilers already have). It's an interesting mix of ratings & stuff, I guess, though it's mostly pretty clear what gave these works a leg-up the sort-by-hits ladder. No archive-standard warnings apply on any of the ten.
1. Broken Wing (Need Something to Mend Me) (The Losers, explicit, January 2011)
Summary: "Under orders not to use his right hand until it heals, Jensen is quickly frustrated by the inconvenience of functioning with only one thumb. It's a good thing Cougar is there to help him out with little things, and big things too."
Last year's
ante_up_losers exchange fic, it's also one of my longest "published" stories, and it's pretty classic hurt/comfort get-together romance in the biggest-by-far m/m pairing (Cougar/Jensen) of a moderately sized fandom, that also actively explores and challenges a few tacit assumptions in lots of BDSM fanworks and, honestly, BDSM culture (in particular, the common view of service as inherently submissive), in a way that seems to resonate positively with readers. Started with a great, challenging, inspiring prompt (dear author letter requesting lots of physical intimacy and sub!Jensen with D/s but no painplay or ageplay or a few other things I'd otherwise have probably reached for sooner), and I think it's been recced relatively widely. Been meaning to podfic for a while, keep forgetting.
2. Where the Music Plays for Free (Avengers movieverse, explicit, February 2012)
Summary: "Banterfuck."
My first-ever on-time entry in Porn Battle? And my first Avengers fic. Don't actually know why this one is so popular--would have thought Clint/Darcy was a relatively rare pairing, for one thing--but I guess a combination of right place/right time (fandom, collection, content) and whatever luck/skill thing I managed there, striking bullseye on the sexy target, cuz it's apparently pretty hot stuff.
3. Five Times (of Many) Clint Made Phil Coulson Facepalm (Avengers movieverse, teen, March 2012)
Summary: "Scenes from one day in the life of Clint Barton, gentleman troublemaker, and his favourite straightman, Phil Coulson."
Not at all shocked by the popularity on this one: it's got comedy (and bad puns), it's got established tropes ("five times" format), it's got (at least obliquely) one of the most (and daily moreso) popular m/m pairings (Clint/Coulson) and (more directly) a not unpopular f/m one (Clint/Natasha) plus appearances from other characters to make it basically ensemble, in a HUGE fandom, right in the moment of its growing hugeness and drooling anticipation (but it's not just the fandom, because the none of the other three Avengers 'verse fic I've posted so far are even on the top page of the hit list, though one is creeping closer). Also features Mythbusters and Warren Ellis references and Thor spinning poi, which will never not delight me. Really, this is me pulling a trollface, and I'm lucky that no one's thrown any rotten tomatoes.
4. Sharing Is Caring (Inception, teen, January 2011)
Summary: "Inspired by the Text From Last Night "Just rolled over and found your boyfriend in bed with me. Is mine at your house?" "
Pretty much does what it says on the tin--a short, fluffy little poly fic that hints at various combinations of Ariadne, Arthur, Eames, and Yusuf, that people seem to like. Was firmly in second place behind "Broken Wing" whenever it was I started paying attention to my hitcounts and held that position for a long time until the Avengers fics started rocketing up the ranks. Looks like it's still getting recced around, too--like, it got about 200 hits and at least 15 kudoses in the space of a day while I was in Boston last week.
5. Something to Sing About (Avengers movieverse, teen, February 2012)
Summary: "In whose end-o?"
More trollfacing, but I'm kind of proud of it. It's short and to-the-point, anyway (tags contain spoiler).
6. Roll with It (The Losers, teen, September 2010)
Summary: "Four "strangers" walk into a bar and create a distraction"
Possibly the first fic I posted directly to AO3? I'm pretty sure everything marked as older than this was posted on LJ first and back-dated when I uploaded it.
kink_bingo fic that, like the remainder of this list because they're all from 2010, predates the kudos system, but was very well-received at the time and probably topped my hit list for a good long while before the five above it came along.
7. Make Light Work (Multiplicity) (Inception, explicit, September 2010)
Summary: "Anyone would have their hands full pleasing Arthur and Ariadne. Fortunately Eames has a lot of hands."
One third of my
kink_bingo Arbitrary Mod Prize-winning multifandom tentacle triptych, along with #8 and #11 on the sort-by-hit list (podficced by
eruthros here--except that it looks like the download links are to megaupload, so might not work anymore. Still, the first time, to my knowledge, that someone else has podficced my work, and that makes me as happy again as winning the AMP in the first place did). I credit the distribution of the three on this list to the activity of their respective fandoms (Inception, Losers, Star Trek AOS) at the time of posting.
8. Gripped with Terror (Sensation and Iconography) (The Losers, teen, September 2010)
Summary: "Jensen has a Lovecraft kink. With tips for playing in high humidity."
See above.
9. Still Pink (Shout It from the Rooftops) (The Losers, general audiences, December 2010)
Summary: "Jensen celebrates the repeal of DADT."
Follow-up to #10, written for a challenge at
queerlygen (I should crosspost more stuff there, apropos of little) following the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Silly little stories, these two, but sweet.
10. Pink (The Losers, general audiences, September 2010)
Summary: "Jensen's wearing the shirt again."
Brief dialogue-only scene between Pooch and Jensen, written for a prompt at
fic_promptly (should also participate more there), examining the imbrication of colours in the cultural construction of gender and sexual identity. I like it when stories have more hits than words. Also interesting to watch these two relatively old stories creeping up the front page, and just to watch the older pieces shuffle around as people stumble across them for one reason or another (Losers stories probably get an annual boost from Ante Up traffic).
And while I'm linking to stuff on the AO3, here is an unbelievably precious and delightful, not to mention laugh-out-loud hilarious, story (by someone other than me) about living with people, domesticity, found family, disobedient brain-mouth circuits, and robots: Some Things Shouldn't Be a Chore. And while you're there, check out sabinelagrande because sabinelagrande is a synonym for awesome.
Cross-posted from Dreamwidth, where there are currently
comments. Please comment there using OpenID.