Yuletide 2024 (+Madness) reveals
Jan. 1st, 2025 08:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
primeidealAs usual this is probably tl;dr about my fics, if you're not interested in that kind of thing then Just Walk Out, Hit The Bricks, Etc.
Oxford Time Travel Universe: when I read "To Say Nothing of the Dog" in June, my first reaction to the setup was "this is too much low-stakes shenanigans/misunderstandings/frustrating animals." But by the time I was putting together my offers in October, it had grown on me, in the sense of "if I just reread the parts that I liked at the end, that will be fine, it really stuck the landing." So that probably says something.
My recip mentioned enjoying slice of life and humor, so I felt like "domestic fluff, curtain fic" would be a good choice, but I wasn't confident I could make a solid plot out of it. Then (again, browsing random newspapers when I'm listless at work, shush) I came across a book review about the English Civil War period, and the reviewer pointed out "you know, the Republic era feels like a failure today, but the people living through it at the time didn't know that, the future wasn't inevitable," and that felt like a good way to start the story. It wound up not being super relevant to the rest of it, but oh well!
Part of the problem with trying to write clever twists is that what seems like clever and subtle foreshadowing the first time I write something can feel signposty or heavy-handed when I'm reading it for the third or fourth time, so it's gratifying to hear when people like my twists and think they work well.
Post Bills Here (500 words, G, no archive warnings apply)
The promo post introduced me to Turning A Sphere Outside In, which is a gag dub of an educational video from 1994 about topology (featuring what was then pretty top-of-the-line computer graphics!), starting off along the same lines of the original video but then going in a...different direction. Obviously I needed to watch this. Actually I was not familiar with this field of topology; in complex analysis there's something called the "winding number" which I think is similar to the "turning number" as described here, but the math stuff was new for me!
So, of course, this called for fic. And fortunately, there's another famous (?) result about spheres, the Banach-Tarski Paradox. My main source for the writeup was this webcomic and explanation (yes, I have studied this in math class, no, I don't remember the proof of the top of my head). There's also a relevant xkcd, because of course there is.The most difficult thing about typing it up was finding out how to typeset the disjoint union symbol into LibreOffice. This says something about me.
The fandom tag for this video was synned to the enormous "Video Blogging RPF." It seems impossible to find anything in there, much less something for a Yuletide-sized fandom (or fandom of one), so I may have left the "Unspecified Fandom" tag on out of saltiness. I recognize that the Minecraft YouTube people probably aren't happy about this system either! Sorry, guys, I feel (some of) your pain.
My OTTU fic was set in IKEA; this one features a joke about the band sometimes known as AbBa [sic]. Weird Swedish acronyms, something something something, two nickels.
Is the entire fic a setup for a terrible shaggy dog pun? It might not be.
Turning a Sphere into Two Spheres (2.2k, T, no archive warnings apply, canon-typical innuendo)
When I saw Rayuela | Hopscotch in the tag set I was intrigued. I really did not like this book! And I definitely would not be willing to risk offering it, because what if I matched to someone who was like "I loved this, the characters were so deep and nuanced, the anti-fiction setup was so profound, please write me more of the same!" But when requests became visible, the prompt was for someone who suggested "You can also roast the living hell out of the book if you want, the way the hitherto only existing fanfiction for Rayuela does" (that fic being my three-sentence ficathon spitefic). Which was very gratifying.
So, Rayuela is kinda-sorta-already a "choose your own adventure" book designed to be read with the chapters in alternative orders, which made me think interactive fic would be fitting. One of the (relatively few) parts of canon worth the trip is Chapter 41, in which our hero steadfastly tries to imagine he's stuck in an extremely cold climate as a way of coping with the extreme heat (his neighbors don't get it), makes up wordplay games with his buddy (riffing on the imagery of dictionaries as "cemeteries"; dead/stale/boring use of language), and then tries to build a completely impractical bridge between their apartment windows so his buddy can get him a drink without them having to climb downstairs in the heat. I happen to be interested in polar exploration fandom and the differences between Antarctic and Arctic exploration; I'm far from fluent in Spanish but I like linguistics and wordplay, and the prompt mentioned that apparently that "bridge" scene provided the impetus for the book itself! Okay, cool, this could work.
The author of the anti-novel story-within-the-story is named "Morelli." When I first read the book, this made me think of Tom Morello, the rock musician from the bands "Rage Against the Machine" and "Audioslave." Which I'm mostly familiar with because a buddy from another site has been riffing on "Audioslave" in his RP settings for many years. So obviously Morello needed to make an anachronistic cameo. This is the kind of high-quality commentary you come to my blog for.
The "yuletideanon" username on itchio was something I claimed in 2018 but did not figure out how to use then. If I wind up creating another IF work and want to keep it anon, not sure how well I'll do at maintaining anonymity.
And then I got a rec from someone who was like "I don't even know canon but after reading this I'm going to check it out," so...task failed successfully?
A Very Normal Day In The Life Of A Polar Explorer (interactive fic, about 3400 words if you play through every path, T, choose not to warn)
I reread Catch-22 earlier this year and highlighted some lines like "the chaplain is having dreams about Yossarian, true love!" and "he's willing to lie on Yossarian's behalf after recognizing the handwriting." And of course, "is anyone in the John, Milton?" continues to be hilarious. So, some more silliness and literary allusions were in order. (There's a longer, shippier fic for these two, with canon-typical smash cuts and non-linear chronology, which is great, so do check that one out!)
Shouldst be living at this hour (1.1k, G, no archive warnings apply)
In the False Doctrine duology, Peachy is an important character in the first book but doesn't appear in the second. However, putting the books together, I see parallels between Peachy and Charlie, as well as between Peachy and Sara, so I wanted to explore Peachy's POV to seeing his friends and loved ones go off to war (again). Most of it is from Peachy's POV, but the first section is from Charlie's, mostly for the sake of a terrible choir nerd pun I've been that carrying around a while and waiting to use. No regrets.
(It's not clear to me when Kit left; Charlie says that he didn't learn Kit had re-enlisted until after Charlie himself had enlisted, which makes me think he spent a while longer in Canada doing logistical stuff after he'd officially signed the forms.)
Da Capo al fine (2.7k, G, no archive warnings apply)
I was pretty sure I owned A War of Gifts, a novella in the Ender's Game universe, at some point. But it wasn't on my shelves, and when I texted the family I knew I'd be visiting at Christmas, it wasn't on either of the shelves in their house I suspected it might be. Fortunately the PH had already been claimed when I got back, but I thought of one more shelf to check...and it's fortuitious that I did so because guess what I found? A duology version of two of the early Miles Vorkosigan books that I had no idea I/we owned! So that's going on the list for bingo next year... :D
Okay and then I found and revisited this canon. I don't want to get too much into RL-politics, but sometimes, progressive quibbling about language gets stupid and distinction-without-a-differency; like, is the phrase "illegal immigrants" offensive because the adjective "illegal" is hurtful? Would "undocumented workers" really be better? On the other hand, I can see how turning an adjective into a noun can sometimes be more dehumanizing; "the illegals" is not a very nice way to refer to people (maybe in much the same way "female employees" is fine, "females" is sometimes iffy). So on this read, the way the Fleet officers talk about Zeck's youngest sisters stood out to me. And then of course, in the context of OSC books, there's the whole slew of "how much can/should you feel shame about something you had limited control over" themes...
Unto the Thousandth Generation (1.3k, G, no archive warnings apply)
Fic in a Box is kind of frustrating sometimes because it's like, I have an idea for a fic, but that doesn't exactly fit within the request as specified, and there's still a zillion words of outstanding PHs due, there's no way to estimate how long a plot bunny will be...blah blah blah, I just want to get a good grade in exchanges which is normal to want and possible to achieve, the usual. Anyway, I saw some intriguing prompts for Remembrance of Earth's Past (Three-Body Problem) trilogy, for the in-universe video game and/or Yun Tianming. The fic didn't come together for that event, but I figured it would fit in Madness.
The annoying pebkacX42 is a loose composite of too many annoying people I've run into online. I'm sorry to say that I have at some points in time probably been the “to be fair you really need to have a high IQ to appreciate [whatever fandom]” meme :( On the one hand, everyone likes what they like, Your Canon Is Not My Canon And That's Okay. So when I rec things I'm into, it's with the caveat that it might not be for everyone. On the other, I recognize that those guys usually come off as condescending as heck, and that's something I'm very sensitive to. So I will...try not to do that. But I'm not perfect.
Title source: Klein Four (the group that did YouTube hit "Finite Simple Group (Of Order Two)" have an entire album of bad math pun songs, including "Three-Body Problem" (using the physics concept as a metaphor for a love triangle), which namedrops "degrees of freedom," which is a phrase with a technical meaning that's not important here. Again, aren't you glad you read this whole silly post.
Degrees of Freedom (2.7k, T, choose not to warn; canon-typical themes)
Oxford Time Travel Universe: when I read "To Say Nothing of the Dog" in June, my first reaction to the setup was "this is too much low-stakes shenanigans/misunderstandings/frustrating animals." But by the time I was putting together my offers in October, it had grown on me, in the sense of "if I just reread the parts that I liked at the end, that will be fine, it really stuck the landing." So that probably says something.
My recip mentioned enjoying slice of life and humor, so I felt like "domestic fluff, curtain fic" would be a good choice, but I wasn't confident I could make a solid plot out of it. Then (again, browsing random newspapers when I'm listless at work, shush) I came across a book review about the English Civil War period, and the reviewer pointed out "you know, the Republic era feels like a failure today, but the people living through it at the time didn't know that, the future wasn't inevitable," and that felt like a good way to start the story. It wound up not being super relevant to the rest of it, but oh well!
Part of the problem with trying to write clever twists is that what seems like clever and subtle foreshadowing the first time I write something can feel signposty or heavy-handed when I'm reading it for the third or fourth time, so it's gratifying to hear when people like my twists and think they work well.
The Cat Tree (2.2k, G, no archive warnings apply)
My favorite part of The Difference Engine were the glimpses of RL historical figures in this alternate history, which turned into in-universe documentation at the end. So clearly what this book needed was more in-universe documentation. Since it's basically just Silly References: The Fic, I will not bore you to death with explanations, you can search the internet or ask if there's something specific you're curious about. I will say, though, that I had checked out "To Say Nothing of the Dog" again for purposes of the prior fic, so when I was trying to brainstorm "more Victorian namedropping" I went to the part where Dunworthy gives Ned a one-paragraph summary of Everything You Need To Know About The Victorian Era, and that was what inspired me to work Turner into this fic. ;)Post Bills Here (500 words, G, no archive warnings apply)
The promo post introduced me to Turning A Sphere Outside In, which is a gag dub of an educational video from 1994 about topology (featuring what was then pretty top-of-the-line computer graphics!), starting off along the same lines of the original video but then going in a...different direction. Obviously I needed to watch this. Actually I was not familiar with this field of topology; in complex analysis there's something called the "winding number" which I think is similar to the "turning number" as described here, but the math stuff was new for me!
So, of course, this called for fic. And fortunately, there's another famous (?) result about spheres, the Banach-Tarski Paradox. My main source for the writeup was this webcomic and explanation (yes, I have studied this in math class, no, I don't remember the proof of the top of my head). There's also a relevant xkcd, because of course there is.The most difficult thing about typing it up was finding out how to typeset the disjoint union symbol into LibreOffice. This says something about me.
The fandom tag for this video was synned to the enormous "Video Blogging RPF." It seems impossible to find anything in there, much less something for a Yuletide-sized fandom (or fandom of one), so I may have left the "Unspecified Fandom" tag on out of saltiness. I recognize that the Minecraft YouTube people probably aren't happy about this system either! Sorry, guys, I feel (some of) your pain.
My OTTU fic was set in IKEA; this one features a joke about the band sometimes known as AbBa [sic]. Weird Swedish acronyms, something something something, two nickels.
Is the entire fic a setup for a terrible shaggy dog pun? It might not be.
Turning a Sphere into Two Spheres (2.2k, T, no archive warnings apply, canon-typical innuendo)
When I saw Rayuela | Hopscotch in the tag set I was intrigued. I really did not like this book! And I definitely would not be willing to risk offering it, because what if I matched to someone who was like "I loved this, the characters were so deep and nuanced, the anti-fiction setup was so profound, please write me more of the same!" But when requests became visible, the prompt was for someone who suggested "You can also roast the living hell out of the book if you want, the way the hitherto only existing fanfiction for Rayuela does" (that fic being my three-sentence ficathon spitefic). Which was very gratifying.
So, Rayuela is kinda-sorta-already a "choose your own adventure" book designed to be read with the chapters in alternative orders, which made me think interactive fic would be fitting. One of the (relatively few) parts of canon worth the trip is Chapter 41, in which our hero steadfastly tries to imagine he's stuck in an extremely cold climate as a way of coping with the extreme heat (his neighbors don't get it), makes up wordplay games with his buddy (riffing on the imagery of dictionaries as "cemeteries"; dead/stale/boring use of language), and then tries to build a completely impractical bridge between their apartment windows so his buddy can get him a drink without them having to climb downstairs in the heat. I happen to be interested in polar exploration fandom and the differences between Antarctic and Arctic exploration; I'm far from fluent in Spanish but I like linguistics and wordplay, and the prompt mentioned that apparently that "bridge" scene provided the impetus for the book itself! Okay, cool, this could work.
The author of the anti-novel story-within-the-story is named "Morelli." When I first read the book, this made me think of Tom Morello, the rock musician from the bands "Rage Against the Machine" and "Audioslave." Which I'm mostly familiar with because a buddy from another site has been riffing on "Audioslave" in his RP settings for many years. So obviously Morello needed to make an anachronistic cameo. This is the kind of high-quality commentary you come to my blog for.
The "yuletideanon" username on itchio was something I claimed in 2018 but did not figure out how to use then. If I wind up creating another IF work and want to keep it anon, not sure how well I'll do at maintaining anonymity.
And then I got a rec from someone who was like "I don't even know canon but after reading this I'm going to check it out," so...task failed successfully?
A Very Normal Day In The Life Of A Polar Explorer (interactive fic, about 3400 words if you play through every path, T, choose not to warn)
I reread Catch-22 earlier this year and highlighted some lines like "the chaplain is having dreams about Yossarian, true love!" and "he's willing to lie on Yossarian's behalf after recognizing the handwriting." And of course, "is anyone in the John, Milton?" continues to be hilarious. So, some more silliness and literary allusions were in order. (There's a longer, shippier fic for these two, with canon-typical smash cuts and non-linear chronology, which is great, so do check that one out!)
Shouldst be living at this hour (1.1k, G, no archive warnings apply)
In the False Doctrine duology, Peachy is an important character in the first book but doesn't appear in the second. However, putting the books together, I see parallels between Peachy and Charlie, as well as between Peachy and Sara, so I wanted to explore Peachy's POV to seeing his friends and loved ones go off to war (again). Most of it is from Peachy's POV, but the first section is from Charlie's, mostly for the sake of a terrible choir nerd pun I've been that carrying around a while and waiting to use. No regrets.
(It's not clear to me when Kit left; Charlie says that he didn't learn Kit had re-enlisted until after Charlie himself had enlisted, which makes me think he spent a while longer in Canada doing logistical stuff after he'd officially signed the forms.)
Da Capo al fine (2.7k, G, no archive warnings apply)
I was pretty sure I owned A War of Gifts, a novella in the Ender's Game universe, at some point. But it wasn't on my shelves, and when I texted the family I knew I'd be visiting at Christmas, it wasn't on either of the shelves in their house I suspected it might be. Fortunately the PH had already been claimed when I got back, but I thought of one more shelf to check...and it's fortuitious that I did so because guess what I found? A duology version of two of the early Miles Vorkosigan books that I had no idea I/we owned! So that's going on the list for bingo next year... :D
Okay and then I found and revisited this canon. I don't want to get too much into RL-politics, but sometimes, progressive quibbling about language gets stupid and distinction-without-a-differency; like, is the phrase "illegal immigrants" offensive because the adjective "illegal" is hurtful? Would "undocumented workers" really be better? On the other hand, I can see how turning an adjective into a noun can sometimes be more dehumanizing; "the illegals" is not a very nice way to refer to people (maybe in much the same way "female employees" is fine, "females" is sometimes iffy). So on this read, the way the Fleet officers talk about Zeck's youngest sisters stood out to me. And then of course, in the context of OSC books, there's the whole slew of "how much can/should you feel shame about something you had limited control over" themes...
Unto the Thousandth Generation (1.3k, G, no archive warnings apply)
Fic in a Box is kind of frustrating sometimes because it's like, I have an idea for a fic, but that doesn't exactly fit within the request as specified, and there's still a zillion words of outstanding PHs due, there's no way to estimate how long a plot bunny will be...blah blah blah, I just want to get a good grade in exchanges which is normal to want and possible to achieve, the usual. Anyway, I saw some intriguing prompts for Remembrance of Earth's Past (Three-Body Problem) trilogy, for the in-universe video game and/or Yun Tianming. The fic didn't come together for that event, but I figured it would fit in Madness.
The annoying pebkacX42 is a loose composite of too many annoying people I've run into online. I'm sorry to say that I have at some points in time probably been the “to be fair you really need to have a high IQ to appreciate [whatever fandom]” meme :( On the one hand, everyone likes what they like, Your Canon Is Not My Canon And That's Okay. So when I rec things I'm into, it's with the caveat that it might not be for everyone. On the other, I recognize that those guys usually come off as condescending as heck, and that's something I'm very sensitive to. So I will...try not to do that. But I'm not perfect.
Title source: Klein Four (the group that did YouTube hit "Finite Simple Group (Of Order Two)" have an entire album of bad math pun songs, including "Three-Body Problem" (using the physics concept as a metaphor for a love triangle), which namedrops "degrees of freedom," which is a phrase with a technical meaning that's not important here. Again, aren't you glad you read this whole silly post.
Degrees of Freedom (2.7k, T, choose not to warn; canon-typical themes)
