Crueltide
Not every story is pleasant. Not every story has a happy ending. And sometimes, those are the kinds of stories that we really, really want to read.
If you're one of the many people interested in either writing or receiving darkfic for Yuletide, then Crueltide is here to devour your soul for you!
Why Crueltide?
Because darkfic isn't to everyone's taste. By making it easier to identify darkfic prompts and people open to receiving darkfic in yuletide, we can indulge our darkfic desires without placing undue pressure on our assigned writers/gifting unwelcome fics to our recipients. (And also: the name was the least cutesy of those being thrown around.)
What is darkfic?
Depends on your definition. But here's a (non-exhaustive) list of darker tropes to get you started (behind a spoiler cut because some are more unpleasant/disturbing than others): [Spoiler (click to open)]Addiction - Amputation - Animal Abuse - Apocalypse - Betrayal - Body Horror - Brainwashing - Cannibalism - Character Death - Child Abuse - Claustrophobia - Conspiracy - Degradation - Disease - Dystopia - Gaslighting - Hauntings - Humiliation - Hypothermia - Insanity - Invasion of Privacy - Lovecraftian Cosmic Horrors - Medical Experimentation - Mind Control - Monsters - Murder - Mutilation - Non-Con - Paranoia - Poisoning - Prison - PTSD - Sadism - Slavery - Suicide - Torture - Unhappy Endings - Violence.
Does a darkfic story have to have an unhappy ending/some other specific trope?
No! Not at all. Just because a story is packed with darkfic tropes doesn't mean there's no light at the end of the tunnel.
Also, just because you like one trope, it doesn't mean you like all of them. Feel free to specify your do-not-wants alongside your wants.
Great, how does it work?
-- If you end up writing a darkfic story, just tag it with Crueltide when you upload it to the collection, and that'll help readers find more of what they like. It would also be good to tag any particular tropes you've used, to help readers find/avoid them. That's all you need to do!
-- If you want to receive a darkfic story, you can advertise that here, by adding a comment like this:
AO3: ao3username
Letter: dear yuletide writer (URL)
Fandoms: fandom details here
Wanted tropes: list any of your favorite dark tropes, themes, or prompts here.
Unwanted tropes: list your darkfic do-not-wants here.
A spreadsheet of darkfic letters/prompts may well appear in due course.
If you want to advertise your fandoms as being particularly dark and of potential interest to others, feel free to comment along those lines too.
Alternatively, if you only want your assigned writer to know what you're into, just make a mention of darkfic/crueltide in your optional details as part of your signup.
So there you go. Don't have nightmares. Do sleep well.
(With thanks to the nonnies on _coal who helped kick me into action, and the writers of the yuleporn posts from previous years who may recognise a lot of this template. Apologies to anyone who wanted to write this post themselves, but the collective impatience grew too strong to resist.)
ETA - the tropes list is now behind a spoiler cut rather than an lj cut so that the screening persists unless the reader chooses otherwise, and I've added a more obvious warning ahead of the list. Also added a suggestion to tag fics with tropes as well as with 'crueltide'. Apologies to the individuals who were discomfited by the earlier version of the post - hopefully this version is better.
If you're one of the many people interested in either writing or receiving darkfic for Yuletide, then Crueltide is here to devour your soul for you!
Why Crueltide?
Because darkfic isn't to everyone's taste. By making it easier to identify darkfic prompts and people open to receiving darkfic in yuletide, we can indulge our darkfic desires without placing undue pressure on our assigned writers/gifting unwelcome fics to our recipients. (And also: the name was the least cutesy of those being thrown around.)
What is darkfic?
Depends on your definition. But here's a (non-exhaustive) list of darker tropes to get you started (behind a spoiler cut because some are more unpleasant/disturbing than others): [Spoiler (click to open)]Addiction - Amputation - Animal Abuse - Apocalypse - Betrayal - Body Horror - Brainwashing - Cannibalism - Character Death - Child Abuse - Claustrophobia - Conspiracy - Degradation - Disease - Dystopia - Gaslighting - Hauntings - Humiliation - Hypothermia - Insanity - Invasion of Privacy - Lovecraftian Cosmic Horrors - Medical Experimentation - Mind Control - Monsters - Murder - Mutilation - Non-Con - Paranoia - Poisoning - Prison - PTSD - Sadism - Slavery - Suicide - Torture - Unhappy Endings - Violence.
Does a darkfic story have to have an unhappy ending/some other specific trope?
No! Not at all. Just because a story is packed with darkfic tropes doesn't mean there's no light at the end of the tunnel.
Also, just because you like one trope, it doesn't mean you like all of them. Feel free to specify your do-not-wants alongside your wants.
Great, how does it work?
-- If you end up writing a darkfic story, just tag it with Crueltide when you upload it to the collection, and that'll help readers find more of what they like. It would also be good to tag any particular tropes you've used, to help readers find/avoid them. That's all you need to do!
-- If you want to receive a darkfic story, you can advertise that here, by adding a comment like this:
AO3: ao3username
Letter: dear yuletide writer (URL)
Fandoms: fandom details here
Wanted tropes: list any of your favorite dark tropes, themes, or prompts here.
Unwanted tropes: list your darkfic do-not-wants here.
A spreadsheet of darkfic letters/prompts may well appear in due course.
If you want to advertise your fandoms as being particularly dark and of potential interest to others, feel free to comment along those lines too.
Alternatively, if you only want your assigned writer to know what you're into, just make a mention of darkfic/crueltide in your optional details as part of your signup.
So there you go. Don't have nightmares. Do sleep well.
(With thanks to the nonnies on _coal who helped kick me into action, and the writers of the yuleporn posts from previous years who may recognise a lot of this template. Apologies to anyone who wanted to write this post themselves, but the collective impatience grew too strong to resist.)
ETA - the tropes list is now behind a spoiler cut rather than an lj cut so that the screening persists unless the reader chooses otherwise, and I've added a more obvious warning ahead of the list. Also added a suggestion to tag fics with tropes as well as with 'crueltide'. Apologies to the individuals who were discomfited by the earlier version of the post - hopefully this version is better.