Yuletide Dear Author Letter 2021

[hiddencait]

 Dear Yulegoat,

You are amazing. I want to tell you that up front, because you are.

Please don’t stress about this assignment. Just the fact that you are writing for any of these fandoms in the first place will make me ridiculously happy. Also, I love gifts in general, so I’ll be chuffed to get a prize of any shape and size. I know this letter is ridiculously long as I tend to babble and want to offer as much inspiration as possible, but don’t let that scare you off.

DNW:  Infertility/miscarriage; Covid; slave worlds; possession/mind control; prostitution; noncom/dubcon; requested character death; non-canon infidelity; love triangles/jealousy focus (I am far more fond of OT3ing it up); A/B/O; gangster/mob/noir settings; Modern AUs that remove canon SFF elements; amnesia; loss of limb/amputations; mpreg; gender swap; teacher/student relationships; focus on drug abuse/alcoholism; or non-canon sibling incest. Please no 2nd person or 1st person POVs (Unless the source material for the fandom is in 1st person – then go for it!).  

For M-rated fics, please no knife/blood/gun play (only in a sexual context – canon action scene type violence is fine); embarrassment/mocking of a Sub by their Dom; scat and/or watersports; rape-as-fantasy-scenes; and any kind of direct blow in a sexual connotation, including spanking/flogging.

Yes Please: Competency kink, post-apocalypse; slice of life/domestic fic; epistolary/found documents style stories (especially for Worldbuilding requests); found family dynamics; crossovers between requested fandoms; crossovers with characters ending up at the Gertrude Hunt of Ilona Andrews’ Innkeeper Chronicles series; AUs (particularly Regency, Black Jewels trilogy verse, steampunk, Sentinel/Guide, Old West, and Pacific Rim fusions); outsider POVs; supernatural elements like hauntings/werewolves/fae/etc.; fixit fics to bring back killed off characters; and 5 and 1 style fics.

For M-rated fics, I particularly love dirty talk; Dom/Sub dynamic (Service Dom and Service Sub a plus); a Dom ordering their Sub around; hair-pulling; restraint i.e.: ropes/handcuffs/holding partner down; wall sex; shower sex; cramped vehicular sex; biting/marking (without major blood being drawn); mate bonds; “OMG we didn’t die” sex; and “sharing body heat” leading to sex.

FYI Challenges: I am game for gifts/treats that fit the various Yuletide challenges if that’s your thing. The specific ones I've "signed up" for in the blogs are: Yulebuilding, Yuleporn, Two for One Crossovers Challenge, Make the Yuletide Gay, and Three Turtle Doves. I'll probably do Mrs. Claus and Femme Slash Festivus if I see those pop up, as well, and who knows maybe some of the others LOL. Not a requirement of course, but I’ve noticed those occasionally get my brain moving so I figured I’d point them out! The only one I'd really prefer NOT to get (as I like more hopeful fics this time of year) is a Crueltide fill.

Rolling in the Deep Series – Mira Grant (including both Prequel novella ROLLING IN THE DEEP and sequel novel INTO THE DROWNING DEEP)

Any including: Victoria “Tori” Stewart, Olivia Sanderson, Ray Marino, Hallie Wilson, Worldbuilding, and Mermaids 

Y’all Seanan McGuire (and her horror pen name Mira Grant) has claimed my all-time fave author title, and these books are the perfect example of why. Deep. Sea. Murder. Mermaids. DEEP SEA MURDER MERMAIDS. Run amok here seriously, I’m game for anything including crossovers especially though I have NO IDEA how you’ll pull it off with some of the other fandoms I’ve requested LOL. Specific character focused fic would rock, but you could definitely go for non-character specific worldbuilding/mixed media or the mermaids in other time periods/fandoms, too if that’s your thing. Prompt wise:  1) Pacific Rim AU with Tori/Olivia as pilots against the massive monstrous females of the species who’ve finally figured out how to survive out of the deepest depths long enough to reach shore to hunt? 2) Ray & Olivia’s bromance was one of my fave relationships here and I’d love to see him survive – fixit fic for the win! 3) Anything playing with the mixed media format from the books: transcripts from the survivors of the Melucine, Hallie’s lexicon of mermaid sign, Tori & Louis’s scientific presentation of their findings, emails between Oliva and/or Ray and Imagine? 4) The previous “mockumentaries” Imagine did – were they all actually fake or did the people on site cover something up? Were Olivia and Ray (and possibly Anne?) involved in tracking down Bigfoot or a chupacabra? Is Tori dragged along in their wake for the next mockumentary after the Melucine?  Aside from that, I’m always a fan of stories that crossover various fandoms by the same author, so I’d totally be game with a related Seanan McGuire/Mira Grant verse character or setting colliding with this one!

Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen 
Colonel Brandon, Eleanor Dashwood

This pairing is one that fandom totally sold me on. Eleanor and Brandon really do feel like a better match than the ones they got, with a quiet glorious competence and respect between them that I could see growing into a strong, contented marriage. It might be a quieter love than one with Marianne involved, but that doesn’t mean it would be any less strong (honestly in my opinion I think that would be a stronger relationship!). I definitely do want shippyness for this fandom if possible though it definitely can be pre-ship. I would prefer if you didn’t kill off or thoroughly ruin Marianne to make it happen, but I do want my Brandon and Eleanor to end up together and happily in love instead of the attitude that they are just “settling” for each other. This is another that I’d be especially game for crossovers for, especially with other Austin stories (Pride & Prejudice and Sanditon are my other faves) or the other fandoms requested here.

Crimson Peak (2015) 

Edith Cushing, Thomas Sharpe, Alan McMichael

Man this is so my aesthetic in the best of ways. The semi-sentient (and not remotely benevolent) mansion, the moths, the tragic siblings, the ghoooooooosts, Edith’s everything, Tom Hiddleston being utterly magnetic despite the truly terrible things he’s done (or allowed to be done), and Alan’s quite steady competence and support and surprise interest in ghosts along with Edith. I just loved this film. I have been surprised, however, by how few Thomas/Edith/Alan fics there are. Something about that nod between Alan and Thomas at the funeral and the moment of connection (literal with a knife LOL) at the entrance to the mansion really just worked for me. So yeah, if at all possible, I would love fix it fic to keep Thomas alive that ends up OT3’d. I have no idea how to get there: should it be after everything with Thomas surviving bc Alan is an amazing doctor? Have the three of them been negotiating this behind Lucille’s back throughout Edith’s courtship? Was Alan actually the one to win Edith’s hand but then realizes he and Edith are both still fascinated with Thomas and set out to woo him together, winning him free of the hold Lucille has over him? What if Edith and Alan never met Thomas in Buffalo, could their mutual interest in ghosts lead them to Allerdale Hall eventually? So. Many. Options)!  Alternately, if OT3 isn’t your thing, I’d be game for either Edith/Thomas or Edith/Alan working their way to as happy an ever after as is possible with all of their combined trauma (Edith/Alan ghost hunters would be love here). I would prefer NOT to have solely Thomas/Alan with Edith sidelined however. Also, please avoid discussions of Edith having infertility or miscarriages, and I’d prefer to have Lucille off screen as opposed to a very present side character to the requested three if that makes sense? Like ghost Lucille existing sure, but not a heavy focus on her in the present story timeline.

 “The Proper Thing” – Seanan McGuire Patreon Short Story/Novella 

Any including: Maisie, Valentine, Samuel Delacroix, and/or Worldbuilding

Why yes this is another Seanan McGuire fandom and no I don’t regret anything! This story was only released over at her Patreon here https://www.patreon.com/posts/proper-thing-36645089, but y’all, for the amount of stories/backlist she has up there, the minimum monthly support of only $1.00 is totally worth it. Anyway, this is one of the longest stories she’s released as a “short story” and is easily one of my fave things she’s written (which is saying a lot considering how many of her books I own). Magical cheese, different magical storefronts of specialty items all linked through hallways existing out of linear space, people created from animals having to learn how/if they even want to truly be people… it’s just glorious, seriously. I’m game with any of the suggested characters or even none of them with world building/a story from one of the mentioned shops that we don’t spend more time in (If you like crossovers, are some of the characters from my other fandoms working or visiting these shops as customers?). I would prefer we don’t have anything centered on the story’s fox villain, but other than that, I’m totally game. But yeah, honestly, I’m so thrilled by this story in general that I don’t know how to prompt for it, because honestly my answer is that I would happily read anything related to it!

Whew that’s it, I think! I’m impressed if you managed to read through all of this ridiculously long letter, but I appreciate it if you did and I’m so so excited to see what you come up with!