2006 in fannish review
I hadn't realized I've been doing these since 2003. Glad I picked up on the meme early, because it's great to have a nice encapsulation of each year for comparative purposes.
Anyway, in 2006 I threw myself off a couple of fannish cliffs. The first was the Sam Carter Ficathon that nandamai, surrealphantast and I did over the summer. It was a resounding success, with over 40 gen Sam stories written by over 30 writers. Organizationally, the enthusiastic response made for some craziness, but it was well worth it for the outcome.
And then there's sg1_debrief which, unsurprisingly, became a much bigger venture than I'd expected. The newsletter sucked up most of my fannish time in 2006 by a large margin, and will probably continue to do so in 2007, but it's been well worth it, if only to show that SG-1 fandom is still very much alive and kicking. Props go to my co-mods surrealphantast and poohmusings, who are awesome, and many, many thanks go to the cast of volunteers who sort through the wealth of fandom product to tag links. The newsletter would be impossible to maintain without them, and really, they deserve the bulk of the credit for making it as complete and successful a resource as it is.
Writing-wise, 2006 ended up with:
FIC
If I Were King of Babylon. Gen. Daniel. S7. Backup for the sg1teamficathon.
One for the Money. Sam/Jack. Team. S6. PG. For the samjack4evah cliché challenge.
My Bloody Valentine.Sam/Jack. PG-13. S9.
Lost in Translation. Gen. Team. Humor. Zombies. S5. PG.
Measure of a Man. Jack/Daniel. Humor. Future. NC-17.
But It's a Good Refrain. Gen. Sam. Rodney. S8 SG-1/S1 SGA. PG. For the Sam Carter Ficathon.
Never Fully Dressed without a Smile. Gen. Sam. S8. PG. Backup for the Sam Carter Ficathon.
And You Peacemakers Go to the Same Place as Soldiers. Gen. Sam. S3. PG. Backup for the Sam Carter Ficathon
FICLETS
A mix of off-the-cuff pieces and responses to a call for prompts I put out in April.
31 Flavors. Jack/Teal'c. Humor. PG. For nandamai.
Victory Fries. Gen. Sam. Jack. Humor. For syxp.
Define Harmless. Gen. Humor. For lyssie.
The one where Jack vows to never watch porn again. NC-17. For surrealphantast.
Cover Me. Jack/Daniel. Humor. PG-13. For kellifer_fic.
Say Goodbye to Broadway. Gen. Sam. Humor. For elismor
And I Am Looking Up at the Stars. Gen. Teal'c. post-Threshold. For shaddyr.
Cam's first Thanksgiving with the team Gen. Team. S9.
The signs that the signmakers made. R. Sam/Jack/Daniel. S10. For _minxy_.
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. Team. S9.
FIVE THINGS
Responses to the Five Things meme.
"Five AUs that SG-1 agrees to never speak of again" for surrealphantast.
Five moods Jack hates seeing Sam in for deejay435.
"Five books Jack O'Neill cannot live without" for nandamai.
"Five reasons the SGC needs Siler's giant wrench" for syxp.
"Five baby names that Jack suggested and Sam refused to even consider" for vicki595.
"Five remedies Jack suggested to Sam when she had the hiccups off-world" for majorsamfan.
"Five other times Cam Mitchell lost his pants (or all his clothes)" for macgyvergal. R.
Five things from Earth that Jonas took with him back to Kelowna for katcorvi.
"Five movies Teal'c showed Vala when she joined the SGC" for iuliamentis.
"Five moments Teal'c lost faith" for annerbhp.
Five things John Sheppard envied Cam Mitchell for marbleslab.
Five days that make Sam wish she'd stayed in bed for karma_aster. Spoilers for Heroes.
My favorite story this year (of my own): Never Fully Dressed without a Smile. This story drove me nuts when I first started it, but when I picked up to finish as a backup, it took off, and by the time it was done, I was totally in love with it.
I'm also exceedingly fond of And I Am Looking Up at the Stars. I've written a lot of Teal'c this year, what with the ficlets and five things, and I'm really enjoying it.
My best story this year: Never Fully Dressed without a Smile. Once I stopped trying to tell three stories in one, I was able to use a humorous situation to make some good, subtle comments about Sam as a leader, the team dynamic, the command issues in S8, all without losing the funny. I'm pretty proud of that.
Story most under-appreciated by the universe, in my opinion: In some ways I want to say Never Fully Dressed without a Smile, just because outside of the ficathon there was nary a peep about it. But really, it was well-appreciated by its intended audience, and that's the important part.
Most fun story: The Five Things prompts, hands down. They were challenging and new and just utterly fun to play with.
Sexiest story: Well, none of the stories involving sex or sexual situations (My Bloody Valentine, 31 Flavors, The one where Jack vows to never watch porn again, Cover Me, Measure of a Man, ) were particularly sexy - most were just funny. Though The signs that the signmakers made was probably closest, though I think it was less "sexy" than comfortable and warm. OH, there was the one response in "Five other times Cam Mitchell lost his pants (or all his clothes)" that counts as pretty sexy.
Hardest story to write: But It's a Good Refrain. It was tough, balancing the request for a Sam and Rodney friendship story, while still making Sam the main focus of the story. Also, because I don't subscribe to them being really easily friendly because of their past antagonisms, it was difficult to find a good balance between the things they do have in common that would be the foundation for a potential friendship and the fact that they're very competitive and they do actively try to antagonize each other. I yelled at them both a lot while writing this.
Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted? I think even though I only wrote eight actual stories (five less than last year's 13), with the ficlet prompts and the five things I think my overall wordage was higher. And with all the smaller pieces, I was certainly thinking about writing in a much more dynamic way than last year.
Did you take any writing risks this year? What did you learn from them? No real risks, though many of the ficlet prompts and the five things prompts really gave me an opportunity to play around with characters I don't usually focus on, as well as a chance to play stylistically. I really enjoyed those challenges.
Do you have any goals for the New Year? Have you seen my WIP list? At the very least the last few five things and ficlet prompts I still have to finish up, the space pirates fic, the McKenzie fic, the Sam/Jack fluff fic that the porn ate, the OT4 Short Supply sequel and the Fic I Hate OMG SO MUCH. That'll keep me occupied for a while. I'd also like to play around with vidding again.
2005 fandom review
2004 fandom review
2003 fandom review