Marie Brennan's Blog, page 228
July 16, 2011
The DWJ Project: Charmed Life
Since I got a request for Witch Week, I postponed the Dalemark books in favor of doing the Chrestomanci ones instead. But never fear, I'll get to them all. :-)
After Eric Chant (nicknamed Cat) and his older sister Gwendolen are orphaned in a steamboat accident, Gwendolen, who is a powerful witch, schemes to have them taken in by Chrestomanci as his wards. But Chrestomanci refuses to let Gwendolen go on learning magic -- Cat, for his own part, doesn't seem to have any -- and so she begins causing trouble, and plotting with some rather unsavory magical types to boot. When Gwendolen pulls off her most spectacular trick, Cat finds himself saddled with the resulting mess.
This is actually the first Chrestomanci book, though it's third chronologically, and decidedly not the first one I read. (That was Lives, and then maybe one or both of Witch Week and The Magicians of Caprona; I can't remember precisely.) I never quite read it with the right eye, though, since I came to it as a Christopher fangirl, and accordingly process Chrestomanci through a lens that didn't actually exist when the story was written. Also, many of the things going on in the story were from the start entirely obvious to me, since I already knew the setting.
Despite me having that odd perspective on it, this is a delightful book. It has all the hallmarks of DWJ's writing, from the whimsy to the interesting world to the deft handling of some really, really unpleasant elements. But saying more involves spoilers, so behind the cut we go.
It's remarkable to me, now that I'm paying attention, how passive Cat is for the first ninety pages of this book. Look at my summary up above: it's all about Gwendolen, until the last sentence, which I specifically put in there because otherwise the unwary reader might think Gwendolen was the (unlikeable) protagonist. Not until she jumps ship and Janet shows up does Cat start taking action in the plot; prior to that, he's pretty much just an observer for the Gwendolen show. Which is, of course, part of the story -- but it's a testament to DWJ's skill that the book works that way, rather than being frustrating.
I like the elements from Lives that show up here -- which is, yes, the way I think of it, even though a more accurate description would be "the elements here that get incorporated into Lives." The silver, of course. Cousins Frank and Caroline. Milly/Millie; she's the major reason why I wish I'd read the books in the other order, since "OMG Chrestomanci's wife came from another world and used to be the avatar of a Goddess!" is a lot more exciting than "so Millie and Christopher got married, as I expected."
A question for those playing along at home, since my copy of Lives is currently loaned out and I can't check: what's the deal with how many lives Chrisopher has left? Here he says it's two, but at the end of Lives it was three, those being the one he was "wearing," the one in Gabriel's safe, and the one Millie stuck in a wall back in Ten. My strong impression was that the Castle people were going to go retrieve that third life. It's possible that one got destroyed; Gwendolen certainly destroyed Cat's life when she bailed on 12-A. But I don't see Millie doing something that horrible; I always thought she "used" Christopher's life in more or less the same way he did when spirit traveling, leaving it there as a kind of anchor. Am I misremembering something here? Is that one just gone, and that's why he's down to two by Charmed Life?
(I ask mostly because he doesn't lose a life in Conrad's Fate, so the apparent discrepancy immediately led my brain in fanficcy directions: "Nine Ways Christopher Chant Might Have Lost His Seventh Life." Etc.)
Overall, this book is a fantastic example of the way she could work in really hard-edged ideas without making the story itself feel cruel or depressing. I mean, on page one we get a remarkably graphic description of the steamboat accident and everybody dying; the climax shows Gwendolen calmly advising the bad guys that they'll need to murder her brother repeatedly; and then there's the matchbook, which still makes me shiver every time, when Cat strikes one and lights himself on fire. There's real darkness in there, but it's presented with that delicate balance, not trivializing it, but also not forcing the reader to dwell on it any more than they want to. I'm really not sure how she does it, on a craft level, but I admire it a great deal.
Next up: Conrad's Fate.
After Eric Chant (nicknamed Cat) and his older sister Gwendolen are orphaned in a steamboat accident, Gwendolen, who is a powerful witch, schemes to have them taken in by Chrestomanci as his wards. But Chrestomanci refuses to let Gwendolen go on learning magic -- Cat, for his own part, doesn't seem to have any -- and so she begins causing trouble, and plotting with some rather unsavory magical types to boot. When Gwendolen pulls off her most spectacular trick, Cat finds himself saddled with the resulting mess.
This is actually the first Chrestomanci book, though it's third chronologically, and decidedly not the first one I read. (That was Lives, and then maybe one or both of Witch Week and The Magicians of Caprona; I can't remember precisely.) I never quite read it with the right eye, though, since I came to it as a Christopher fangirl, and accordingly process Chrestomanci through a lens that didn't actually exist when the story was written. Also, many of the things going on in the story were from the start entirely obvious to me, since I already knew the setting.
Despite me having that odd perspective on it, this is a delightful book. It has all the hallmarks of DWJ's writing, from the whimsy to the interesting world to the deft handling of some really, really unpleasant elements. But saying more involves spoilers, so behind the cut we go.
It's remarkable to me, now that I'm paying attention, how passive Cat is for the first ninety pages of this book. Look at my summary up above: it's all about Gwendolen, until the last sentence, which I specifically put in there because otherwise the unwary reader might think Gwendolen was the (unlikeable) protagonist. Not until she jumps ship and Janet shows up does Cat start taking action in the plot; prior to that, he's pretty much just an observer for the Gwendolen show. Which is, of course, part of the story -- but it's a testament to DWJ's skill that the book works that way, rather than being frustrating.
I like the elements from Lives that show up here -- which is, yes, the way I think of it, even though a more accurate description would be "the elements here that get incorporated into Lives." The silver, of course. Cousins Frank and Caroline. Milly/Millie; she's the major reason why I wish I'd read the books in the other order, since "OMG Chrestomanci's wife came from another world and used to be the avatar of a Goddess!" is a lot more exciting than "so Millie and Christopher got married, as I expected."
A question for those playing along at home, since my copy of Lives is currently loaned out and I can't check: what's the deal with how many lives Chrisopher has left? Here he says it's two, but at the end of Lives it was three, those being the one he was "wearing," the one in Gabriel's safe, and the one Millie stuck in a wall back in Ten. My strong impression was that the Castle people were going to go retrieve that third life. It's possible that one got destroyed; Gwendolen certainly destroyed Cat's life when she bailed on 12-A. But I don't see Millie doing something that horrible; I always thought she "used" Christopher's life in more or less the same way he did when spirit traveling, leaving it there as a kind of anchor. Am I misremembering something here? Is that one just gone, and that's why he's down to two by Charmed Life?
(I ask mostly because he doesn't lose a life in Conrad's Fate, so the apparent discrepancy immediately led my brain in fanficcy directions: "Nine Ways Christopher Chant Might Have Lost His Seventh Life." Etc.)
Overall, this book is a fantastic example of the way she could work in really hard-edged ideas without making the story itself feel cruel or depressing. I mean, on page one we get a remarkably graphic description of the steamboat accident and everybody dying; the climax shows Gwendolen calmly advising the bad guys that they'll need to murder her brother repeatedly; and then there's the matchbook, which still makes me shiver every time, when Cat strikes one and lights himself on fire. There's real darkness in there, but it's presented with that delicate balance, not trivializing it, but also not forcing the reader to dwell on it any more than they want to. I'm really not sure how she does it, on a craft level, but I admire it a great deal.
Next up: Conrad's Fate.
July 14, 2011
tonight's random internet question
Abseiling/rappelling without mechanical aid (i.e. by wrapping the rope around your body): I'm guessing there is a high likelihood of bruises around your ribs or waist? Especially if you aren't experienced?
Any other tidbits of information on that sort of thing are equally appreciated. Rope burns on the hands? Etc.
(Yes, I just sent Isabella over a cliff. It's not the meanest thing I've done to her -- but that will surprise no one.)
Any other tidbits of information on that sort of thing are equally appreciated. Rope burns on the hands? Etc.
(Yes, I just sent Isabella over a cliff. It's not the meanest thing I've done to her -- but that will surprise no one.)
July 11, 2011
Fifty days!
The countdown continues. Today, I share with you my research photos from last year.
It is, as usual, only a tiny selection from the whole: 39 pictures, when I took somewhere between five hundred and a thousand. But a lot of those are blurry, terrible reference shots from inside dimly-lit museums, or placards reminding me what the next photo in the sequence is, or things that wouldn't mean much to anybody but me. I chose these to give you a sense of some of the things, places, and people that are important in the novel, with a few tossed in for sheer aesthetic pleasure, and a couple more for nostalgia.
Plus a whole wodge of shots from the Natural History Museum, because the decoration in there really has to be seen to be believed.
The rest of my photos, including those from previous Onyx Court research trips, are here.
It is, as usual, only a tiny selection from the whole: 39 pictures, when I took somewhere between five hundred and a thousand. But a lot of those are blurry, terrible reference shots from inside dimly-lit museums, or placards reminding me what the next photo in the sequence is, or things that wouldn't mean much to anybody but me. I chose these to give you a sense of some of the things, places, and people that are important in the novel, with a few tossed in for sheer aesthetic pleasure, and a couple more for nostalgia.
Plus a whole wodge of shots from the Natural History Museum, because the decoration in there really has to be seen to be believed.
The rest of my photos, including those from previous Onyx Court research trips, are here.
July 9, 2011
Books read, June 2011
In which it will be obvious that I am now working on a novel.
Dreaming of Wolves: Adventures in the Carpathian Mountains of Transylvania, Alan E. Sparks. I don't actually remember how much of this book I got through -- not all of it, certainly -- but whatever, we'll count it as read. I picked it up for environmental detail on the aforementioned Carpathian Mountains, as it is the account of a man who went there as part of some wolf-studying project. It's not very well executed, but I got what I needed from it, more or less.
The Land Beyond the Forest: facts, figures, and fancies from Transylvania, E. Gerard. More research, and again I didn't read the whole thing; just the section on Romanians. This was written in the late nineteenth century, and wow, the racism. I have to quote:
Yeeeeeeeah. But, well, I'm writing a nineteenth-century-ish novel set in a Romania-like region, so I don't regret picking this up from the library. On the other hand, I don't think I'll be copying from it all that closely: there is merit to Isabella being obsessed with dragons and really quite careless of human notions like racial superiority.
Eight Days of Luke, Diana Wynne Jones. Discussed elsewhere.
The Snow Queen's Shadow, Jim C. Hines. If I'd gotten around to posting this sooner, I could have said, ha-ha, I have this book and you don't, nyah nyah. But the book is out now, so I'll skip that part and go straight to the bit where I say that Hines has done a remarkable job wrapping up this series. He's said elsewhere that it took him a while to figure out that the fairy tale books have been about questioning and complicating the notion of "happily ever after," and this delivers on that theme, in very excellent ways. (Also, to echo Mris: this series is now done. So if you're one of those people who prefers to wait until you can get all the books, you're now cleared for take-off.)
Deep Secret, Diana Wynne Jones. Discussed elsewhere.
So far, July is shaping up to be the Month of Much Manga. (And comics, but that doesn't alliterate, so.) But we'll see how it goes.
Dreaming of Wolves: Adventures in the Carpathian Mountains of Transylvania, Alan E. Sparks. I don't actually remember how much of this book I got through -- not all of it, certainly -- but whatever, we'll count it as read. I picked it up for environmental detail on the aforementioned Carpathian Mountains, as it is the account of a man who went there as part of some wolf-studying project. It's not very well executed, but I got what I needed from it, more or less.
The Land Beyond the Forest: facts, figures, and fancies from Transylvania, E. Gerard. More research, and again I didn't read the whole thing; just the section on Romanians. This was written in the late nineteenth century, and wow, the racism. I have to quote:
Briefly to sum up the respective merits of these three races, it may be allowable to define them as representing manhood in the past, present, and future tenses. The Saxons [of that region; not of England] have been men, and right good men too, in their day; but that day has gone by, and they are now rapidly degenerating into mere fossil antiquities [...] The Hungarians are men in the full sense of the word, perhaps all the more so that they are a nation of soldiers rather than men of science and letters. The Roumanians will be men a few generations hence, when they have had time to shake off the habits of slavery and have learned to recognize their own value.
Yeeeeeeeah. But, well, I'm writing a nineteenth-century-ish novel set in a Romania-like region, so I don't regret picking this up from the library. On the other hand, I don't think I'll be copying from it all that closely: there is merit to Isabella being obsessed with dragons and really quite careless of human notions like racial superiority.
Eight Days of Luke, Diana Wynne Jones. Discussed elsewhere.
The Snow Queen's Shadow, Jim C. Hines. If I'd gotten around to posting this sooner, I could have said, ha-ha, I have this book and you don't, nyah nyah. But the book is out now, so I'll skip that part and go straight to the bit where I say that Hines has done a remarkable job wrapping up this series. He's said elsewhere that it took him a while to figure out that the fairy tale books have been about questioning and complicating the notion of "happily ever after," and this delivers on that theme, in very excellent ways. (Also, to echo Mris: this series is now done. So if you're one of those people who prefers to wait until you can get all the books, you're now cleared for take-off.)
Deep Secret, Diana Wynne Jones. Discussed elsewhere.
So far, July is shaping up to be the Month of Much Manga. (And comics, but that doesn't alliterate, so.) But we'll see how it goes.
July 8, 2011
The DWJ Project: Warlock at the Wheel
Another short-story collection, and more successful than
Stopping for a Spell
-- but that's largely because it includes a few stories I think are better than anything in that collection; some of the others here are just as forgettable. In other words, the quality is very uneven.
"A Plague of Peacocks," "The Fluffy Pink Toadstool," and "Auntie Bea's Day Out" all feel a lot like the pieces in Stopping for a Spell, being of the "person is unreasonably awful and then gets their comeuppance via magic" type that I really just don't enjoy. I wasn't much of a fan of "Carruthers" either, which feels much the same even though its structure is different, and "No One" was a less-than-confident foray into science fiction.
The three I liked better:
"Warlock at the Wheel" is (loosely) a Chrestomanci story, and benefits from that by having more plot momentum than the ones I mentioned above. After Charmed Life he goes on the lam, but very incompetently, and hijinks ensue. It isn't up to the standards of her novels, and Jemima Jane is rather like the Izzies in The Merlin Conspiracy (by which I mean she sets my teeth on edge), but it did entertain me by confirming the speculation I made when I posted about The Homeward Bounders : Chrestomanci's agent Kathusa has a Kathayack Demon Dog, which is either a hell of a naming coincidence or a direct pointer toward Joris' Home world.
"Dragon Reserve, Home Eight" was the best of the lot for me. It sets up far more complete of a world than any of the others, and ditto characters; in fact, it almost feels like it's connected to something else, but to the best of my knowledge that isn't the case. (Please do mention in comments if I'm wrong.) I would definitely have read more about Siglin and the Dragonate and the Thrallers and the whole heg business.
"The Sage of Theare" is also good, and also a Chrestomanci story. It's more conceptually complicated than "Dragon Reserve, Home Eight," but less successful for me on a character and worldbuilding front (which is why I prefer the other). If it could have married its philosophical ideas about questioning and doubt and order and chaos to a firmer narrative framework, I would love it.
I think I'll do the Dalemark Quartet next, but I'm still open for requests for things people would like to see me tackle sooner rather than later.
"A Plague of Peacocks," "The Fluffy Pink Toadstool," and "Auntie Bea's Day Out" all feel a lot like the pieces in Stopping for a Spell, being of the "person is unreasonably awful and then gets their comeuppance via magic" type that I really just don't enjoy. I wasn't much of a fan of "Carruthers" either, which feels much the same even though its structure is different, and "No One" was a less-than-confident foray into science fiction.
The three I liked better:
"Warlock at the Wheel" is (loosely) a Chrestomanci story, and benefits from that by having more plot momentum than the ones I mentioned above. After Charmed Life he goes on the lam, but very incompetently, and hijinks ensue. It isn't up to the standards of her novels, and Jemima Jane is rather like the Izzies in The Merlin Conspiracy (by which I mean she sets my teeth on edge), but it did entertain me by confirming the speculation I made when I posted about The Homeward Bounders : Chrestomanci's agent Kathusa has a Kathayack Demon Dog, which is either a hell of a naming coincidence or a direct pointer toward Joris' Home world.
"Dragon Reserve, Home Eight" was the best of the lot for me. It sets up far more complete of a world than any of the others, and ditto characters; in fact, it almost feels like it's connected to something else, but to the best of my knowledge that isn't the case. (Please do mention in comments if I'm wrong.) I would definitely have read more about Siglin and the Dragonate and the Thrallers and the whole heg business.
"The Sage of Theare" is also good, and also a Chrestomanci story. It's more conceptually complicated than "Dragon Reserve, Home Eight," but less successful for me on a character and worldbuilding front (which is why I prefer the other). If it could have married its philosophical ideas about questioning and doubt and order and chaos to a firmer narrative framework, I would love it.
I think I'll do the Dalemark Quartet next, but I'm still open for requests for things people would like to see me tackle sooner rather than later.
The DWJ Project: The Merlin Conspiracy
At the request of
![[info]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/hostedimages/1380451598i/2033940.gif)
elaine_th
.
This is, as mentioned before, a sequel of sorts to Deep Secret , albeit a loose one. The only significant connection is the re-use of Nick Mallory as a character; Magids also appear, but this book has much less to do with the Upper Room and other Magid affairs, being mostly about the world Blest.
Like Deep Secret, though, it divides itself between two protagonists: Nick, who gets flung out of our world and has to help three people before he'll be able to come home, and Roddy (Arianrhod), a Blest girl who's trying to stop the titular conspiracy. She, of course, is one of the three people Nick helps (or rather, promises to). And then there's Romanov, a very powerful magician who starts out seeming like an enemy, but ends up being more interesting than that.
In one structural respect, I think this one works a bit more smoothly than Deep Secret did: the alternation between Nick's pov and Roddy's jerks around much less than the Rupert/Maree equivalent. This may partly be because the narration is less explicitly framed as taking place at a specific point in time; aside from the opening couple of lines, that drops away until nearly the end of the book. (Contrast Maree's entries, which were being written more in realtime, which caused unfortunate difficulties.) The flip side is that Nick and Roddy spend much less time on the page together; they're off on near-separate tracks until about page 360.
Which got me thinking: of the DWJ books I know well, nearly all of them are either written from a single pov (third limited or first), or the omniscient perspective of a narrator. The exceptions are all later books: these two and Enchanted Glass; maybe others I'm not remembering. So I'll put it to the LJ hive mind and ask, is this impression correct? Are pov shifts something she started doing later in her career? Because they don't feel like something she was entirely comfortable with on a technical level.
As for details of the plot, we go behind a cut for that.
Having said that, there are a lot of little touches in here I do enjoy. Mini the elephant, for one, and Helga the goat; on a less funny note, the rather unflinching matter of the hurt woman and what her village did to her. I would have liked more development of that, actually -- who she was, and why (other than simple pragmatism) Grandfather Gwyn sent Roddy to collect her knowledge. I also would have liked more denoument, since the upheaval from raising the land has clearly, well, altered the magical landscape. Quite literally.
It reminds me a lot of Charmed Life, though, with the "lower class" magic types rebelling against control from above -- especially since Grundo's betrayed by his own family. (In fact, if they hadn't subbed in Nick as the sacrifice, it would have been even more like Charmed Life.) The Izzies remind me of how Sophie and the others make use of Valerie's tantrums in Castle in the Air, and they seem to fit a general pattern in these books of "obnoxious =/= either useless or evil." They're amoral little monsters, sure -- but then again, so is Grundo occasionally (i.e. that spell on Roddy), and many others throughout her oeuvre. That doesn't stop them from sometimes being good guys, or at least useful.
Expect another post soon, as I finished a second book before I got around to posting about this one.
elaine_th
.This is, as mentioned before, a sequel of sorts to Deep Secret , albeit a loose one. The only significant connection is the re-use of Nick Mallory as a character; Magids also appear, but this book has much less to do with the Upper Room and other Magid affairs, being mostly about the world Blest.
Like Deep Secret, though, it divides itself between two protagonists: Nick, who gets flung out of our world and has to help three people before he'll be able to come home, and Roddy (Arianrhod), a Blest girl who's trying to stop the titular conspiracy. She, of course, is one of the three people Nick helps (or rather, promises to). And then there's Romanov, a very powerful magician who starts out seeming like an enemy, but ends up being more interesting than that.
In one structural respect, I think this one works a bit more smoothly than Deep Secret did: the alternation between Nick's pov and Roddy's jerks around much less than the Rupert/Maree equivalent. This may partly be because the narration is less explicitly framed as taking place at a specific point in time; aside from the opening couple of lines, that drops away until nearly the end of the book. (Contrast Maree's entries, which were being written more in realtime, which caused unfortunate difficulties.) The flip side is that Nick and Roddy spend much less time on the page together; they're off on near-separate tracks until about page 360.
Which got me thinking: of the DWJ books I know well, nearly all of them are either written from a single pov (third limited or first), or the omniscient perspective of a narrator. The exceptions are all later books: these two and Enchanted Glass; maybe others I'm not remembering. So I'll put it to the LJ hive mind and ask, is this impression correct? Are pov shifts something she started doing later in her career? Because they don't feel like something she was entirely comfortable with on a technical level.
As for details of the plot, we go behind a cut for that.
Having said that, there are a lot of little touches in here I do enjoy. Mini the elephant, for one, and Helga the goat; on a less funny note, the rather unflinching matter of the hurt woman and what her village did to her. I would have liked more development of that, actually -- who she was, and why (other than simple pragmatism) Grandfather Gwyn sent Roddy to collect her knowledge. I also would have liked more denoument, since the upheaval from raising the land has clearly, well, altered the magical landscape. Quite literally.
It reminds me a lot of Charmed Life, though, with the "lower class" magic types rebelling against control from above -- especially since Grundo's betrayed by his own family. (In fact, if they hadn't subbed in Nick as the sacrifice, it would have been even more like Charmed Life.) The Izzies remind me of how Sophie and the others make use of Valerie's tantrums in Castle in the Air, and they seem to fit a general pattern in these books of "obnoxious =/= either useless or evil." They're amoral little monsters, sure -- but then again, so is Grundo occasionally (i.e. that spell on Roddy), and many others throughout her oeuvre. That doesn't stop them from sometimes being good guys, or at least useful.
Expect another post soon, as I finished a second book before I got around to posting about this one.
a couple bits of news
For those who like my Driftwood stories, "A Heretic by Degrees" will be in the IGMS Award Anthology, alongside a number of great tales -- including Von Carr's "Sister Jasmine Brings the Pain" (one of the readers' choice award winners) and Aliette de Bodard's "Horus Ascending."
Also -- a bit belated -- I did a guest blog for Jim Hines while he's out of town, on the topic of fairy tales and how they make no sense.
Also -- a bit belated -- I did a guest blog for Jim Hines while he's out of town, on the topic of fairy tales and how they make no sense.
July 7, 2011
this one's for all the gamer geeks
Tonight's Random Game Concept that sprang up in my head:
(Old) World of Darkness game, cross-genre. Let the players make any kind of PCs they like -- Kindred, mages, changelings, mummies, whatever, and you play a short prologue.
Then the barriers get torn down. All of them. The walls between this world and the Umbra, Shadowlands, Dreaming, Yin and Yang Worlds, all the rest of it.
And you run the rest of the chronicle as a post-apocalyptic Exalted game.
It's a new Mythic Age, not the one from the Exalted books. You're throwing out all the setting information, so you don't have to worry about why your ex-mummy Solar Exalted is cooperating with an ex-mage Sidereal, etc. You get all the fun of apocalyptic world destruction, with GIANT MAGIC POWERS, a legitimate reason why the PCs might be able to really reshape all of reality. It would be EPIC BEYOND WORDS.
. . . I think I want to run this.
(Old) World of Darkness game, cross-genre. Let the players make any kind of PCs they like -- Kindred, mages, changelings, mummies, whatever, and you play a short prologue.
Then the barriers get torn down. All of them. The walls between this world and the Umbra, Shadowlands, Dreaming, Yin and Yang Worlds, all the rest of it.
And you run the rest of the chronicle as a post-apocalyptic Exalted game.
It's a new Mythic Age, not the one from the Exalted books. You're throwing out all the setting information, so you don't have to worry about why your ex-mummy Solar Exalted is cooperating with an ex-mage Sidereal, etc. You get all the fun of apocalyptic world destruction, with GIANT MAGIC POWERS, a legitimate reason why the PCs might be able to really reshape all of reality. It would be EPIC BEYOND WORDS.
. . . I think I want to run this.
July 3, 2011
for Parallelsfic
This is only my second time doing a fanfic exchange, but I had a blast during Yuletide, so I figured, why not? Hopefully you'll have fun writing for one of these fandoms.
General thoughts: I'm not actually involved much in fandom per se, so some of the things I see floating around, like PWP or cracky AU premises, aren't as much my thing. (I do occasionally get wild ideas for crossovers, but none of my requests here are like that.) If I'm interested in seeing fic for a source, it's usually because I want to see more stuff in line with what the canon is like -- so if you love the source enough to offer it, you probably love exactly the things I'm looking for!
I like "missing scene" fics, canon events shown from other characters' points of view, and prequel or sequel stories with actual plots in them (if you have the time and will to write something long enough to have a plot). AU in the sense of "what if X moment had gone differently?" can also be great. Humour is good, and so is angst, depending on the source in question (Tokyo Babylon pretty much comes with angst installed; K-20 generally begs for humour). And, given that this exchange is for Asian fandoms, I'm deeply in favor of stories that get their setting details right, insofar as you're able to manage that.
If you'd like to see what fanfic I've written and received in the past, I'm russian_blue on AO3.
On to the fandoms themselves:
K-20: The Fiend with 20 Faces -- I just watched this again tonight, and adored it as much as ever. All of the characters are fabulous. I only put Yoko into my request because, as I said in the notes there, one of the things I'd be interested in seeing could just be about her; anything prequel-ish about her and "the basics of being a lady" and where she learned to do all that stuff would be great. Feel free to shoehorn in any of the other characters, if you like -- maybe wee!Yoko visited the circus once and met wee!Heikichi? Or, since I really do love them both, a sequel fic about Heikichi doing something cool as K-20, with Yoko continuing to be awesome. Heck, you can bring back Akechi if you like -- whatever! There's no character in that movie I don't love, so as long as you have fun with them, I probably will, too.
Om Shanti Om -- I've always been really struck by the sad, creepy touches with Shanti at the end of the film, so a story that explores that further could be really neat. Was she aware of the years passing? Or did she "sleep," and only rouse to wakefulness when Om and/or Mukesh returned? If that idea doesn't float your boat, do whatever you like with the character. Heck, if you want to undertake the writing of an epic -- what if she and Om basically swapped places in the second half of the movie? Okay, I'm not even sure that makes sense, but whatever.
Onmyouji -- Hee. So I got onto these movies because of Tokyo Babylon sparking my interest in onmyodo, and man, is Seimei smirky or what? He and Hiromasa are hilarious. I'm afraid I don't have much in the way of specific suggestions here, except to say I'm not interested in seeing their friendship sexualized; I think they're great just the way they are. Maybe Hiromasa falls for another lady and wacky mystical hijinks ensue. Maybe Seimei gets in trouble and Hiromasa has to save him. Anything, really; the world needs more Heian-era buddy-film fun.
Tokyo Babylon -- Oh, man, where do I start? I could pretty much go for anything in this fandom, including slash (so long as it's not just straight-up porn). I used to think Subaru and Seishiro were slashy when I watched X; then I read Tokyo Babylon and realized it's freaking canon, in the creepiest way possible. I only requested Subaru because he's the common denominator for the things I could think up: Subaru and Hokuto pre-canon, maybe during his training, or when they find out Hokuto doesn't have any talent for onmyodo. Hokuto's perspective on her twin and the stuff in the series. Something playing off the utterly screwed-up dynamic Subaru and Seishiro have. So many possibilities! Don't be afraid to get twisted with this one, if you like; the source practically begs for it.
Above all, have fun. (Even with the twisted stuff. Especially with the twisted stuff.) I deeply love all four of these sources, so the mere thought of getting fic from one of them fills me with glee. And my Yuletide experiences led me to feel this is a case where giving really is as enjoyable as receiving, if not more -- so I hope you enjoy writing one of these!
General thoughts: I'm not actually involved much in fandom per se, so some of the things I see floating around, like PWP or cracky AU premises, aren't as much my thing. (I do occasionally get wild ideas for crossovers, but none of my requests here are like that.) If I'm interested in seeing fic for a source, it's usually because I want to see more stuff in line with what the canon is like -- so if you love the source enough to offer it, you probably love exactly the things I'm looking for!
I like "missing scene" fics, canon events shown from other characters' points of view, and prequel or sequel stories with actual plots in them (if you have the time and will to write something long enough to have a plot). AU in the sense of "what if X moment had gone differently?" can also be great. Humour is good, and so is angst, depending on the source in question (Tokyo Babylon pretty much comes with angst installed; K-20 generally begs for humour). And, given that this exchange is for Asian fandoms, I'm deeply in favor of stories that get their setting details right, insofar as you're able to manage that.
If you'd like to see what fanfic I've written and received in the past, I'm russian_blue on AO3.
On to the fandoms themselves:
K-20: The Fiend with 20 Faces -- I just watched this again tonight, and adored it as much as ever. All of the characters are fabulous. I only put Yoko into my request because, as I said in the notes there, one of the things I'd be interested in seeing could just be about her; anything prequel-ish about her and "the basics of being a lady" and where she learned to do all that stuff would be great. Feel free to shoehorn in any of the other characters, if you like -- maybe wee!Yoko visited the circus once and met wee!Heikichi? Or, since I really do love them both, a sequel fic about Heikichi doing something cool as K-20, with Yoko continuing to be awesome. Heck, you can bring back Akechi if you like -- whatever! There's no character in that movie I don't love, so as long as you have fun with them, I probably will, too.
Om Shanti Om -- I've always been really struck by the sad, creepy touches with Shanti at the end of the film, so a story that explores that further could be really neat. Was she aware of the years passing? Or did she "sleep," and only rouse to wakefulness when Om and/or Mukesh returned? If that idea doesn't float your boat, do whatever you like with the character. Heck, if you want to undertake the writing of an epic -- what if she and Om basically swapped places in the second half of the movie? Okay, I'm not even sure that makes sense, but whatever.
Onmyouji -- Hee. So I got onto these movies because of Tokyo Babylon sparking my interest in onmyodo, and man, is Seimei smirky or what? He and Hiromasa are hilarious. I'm afraid I don't have much in the way of specific suggestions here, except to say I'm not interested in seeing their friendship sexualized; I think they're great just the way they are. Maybe Hiromasa falls for another lady and wacky mystical hijinks ensue. Maybe Seimei gets in trouble and Hiromasa has to save him. Anything, really; the world needs more Heian-era buddy-film fun.
Tokyo Babylon -- Oh, man, where do I start? I could pretty much go for anything in this fandom, including slash (so long as it's not just straight-up porn). I used to think Subaru and Seishiro were slashy when I watched X; then I read Tokyo Babylon and realized it's freaking canon, in the creepiest way possible. I only requested Subaru because he's the common denominator for the things I could think up: Subaru and Hokuto pre-canon, maybe during his training, or when they find out Hokuto doesn't have any talent for onmyodo. Hokuto's perspective on her twin and the stuff in the series. Something playing off the utterly screwed-up dynamic Subaru and Seishiro have. So many possibilities! Don't be afraid to get twisted with this one, if you like; the source practically begs for it.
Above all, have fun. (Even with the twisted stuff. Especially with the twisted stuff.) I deeply love all four of these sources, so the mere thought of getting fic from one of them fills me with glee. And my Yuletide experiences led me to feel this is a case where giving really is as enjoyable as receiving, if not more -- so I hope you enjoy writing one of these!
July 1, 2011
And sixty thousand words!
So, after a very difficult decision (in which I had to convince myself that buying extra icon space on LJ would only lead go overload in the long run), I have settled on not one but two winners for the A Natural History of Dragons icon contest. First,
scottakennedy
, for something wonderfully period (though I may ask you to switch the text just as soon as I make up my mind what I want!), and second,
pathseeker42
for hitting a target she didn't even know she was aiming at. From the book:
Compare that to this:
Yeah, you see why I had to take both.
So congrats to you two! E-mail me your mailing addresses (send them to marie {dot} brennan {at} gmail {dot} com) and I'll get ARCs of Fate on their way toward you shortly.
scottakennedy
, for something wonderfully period (though I may ask you to switch the text just as soon as I make up my mind what I want!), and second,
pathseeker42
for hitting a target she didn't even know she was aiming at. From the book:When I was seven, I found a sparkling lying dead on a bench at the edge of the woods which formed the back boundary of our garden, that the groundskeeper had not yet cleared away. With much excitement, I brought it for my mother to see, but by the time I reached her it had mostly collapsed into ash in my hands. Mama exclaimed in distaste and sent me to wash.
Our cook, a tall and gangly woman who nonetheless produced the most amazing soups and souffles (thus putting the lie to the notion that one cannot trust a slender cook) was the one who showed me the secret of preserving sparklings after death. She kept one on her dresser-top, which she brought out for me to see when I arrived in her kitchen, much cast down from the loss of the sparkling and from my mother's chastisement. "However did you keep it?" I asked her, wiping away my tears. "Mine fell all to pieces."
"Vinegar," she said, and that one word set me upon the path that led to where I stand today.
If found soon enough after death, a sparkling (as many of the readers of this volume no doubt know) may be preserved by embalming it in vinegar. I sailed forth into our gardens in determined search, a jar of vinegar crammed into one of my dress pockets so the skirt hung all askew. The first one I found lost its right wing in the process of preservation, but before the week was out I had an intact specimen: a sparkling an inch and a half in length, his scales a deep emerald in color. With the boundless ingenuity of a child, I named him Greenie, and he sits on a shelf in my study to this day, tiny wings outspread.
Compare that to this:
Yeah, you see why I had to take both.
So congrats to you two! E-mail me your mailing addresses (send them to marie {dot} brennan {at} gmail {dot} com) and I'll get ARCs of Fate on their way toward you shortly.
