Aurora's Sundry Notes

I'm trying to do a few more Fandom Snowflake thingies! I'm just doing whatever I have the brain space to do now, so there's stuff in between I might yet do.




Day 6
In your own space, create a list of at least three fannish things you'd love to receive, something you've wanted but were afraid to ask for - a fannish wish-list of sorts.

Well, I've already done fannish wishlists recently, over at my Fandom Stocking (you can still post fills until January 19!), and the recent Chocolate Box letter is also a nice collection of fannish wishes I have - although I didn't include everything I could have because I was too tired to write up new prompts! So anything I requested in those is something I wish to receive - I'm especially a fic reader, but I enjoy fan art as well. In my stocking I also request other things, like recs for podcast drama. Also, anything else I've requested in other exchanges and such is still wanted, even if it's not on these lists.

But here are a few other things:

1) I would love icons based on some of the fan art I recommended in the Day 2 post, in particular some of the Doctor Who Flowers series (esp. Nyssa, Martha, Vicki, Victoria) and the picture titled Velcro-Scot. And if someone wants to make me icons of some of my favourite Two/Jamie fan art, I can quickly get together a few more links!

2) I've been thinking of wanting new writing or reading themed icons, and possibly a ballet icon or two. If you know where I can get some, let me know!

3) I could use more beta readers! I have some lovely ones, but sometimes I'm writing a lot at once in the same fandom, or my betas are busy, or I write in a fandom I don't have a native-speaker beta for. I'm not a native English speaker, so native speaker betas are particularly needed, to weed out the instances where I use a word in a way that Just Isn't English, or structure my sentences weirdly. I write especially for Doctor Who, both Classic and Modern. I used to write some Torchwood but it's been dormant since I discovered Classic Who, which is way healthier for me. The rare lit fandoms I also occasionally write in include Becky Chambers's Wayfarers series, Dumas's Count of Monte Cristo, various Jane Austen works, and I'd also like to give a try to writing for the Murderbot series and the Imperial Radch series. I tend to write gen, f/f, m/m, and the very occasional m/f. I never write graphic violence, but I do sometimes write Mature or Explicit level sexual content. My AO3 page is here if you want to check out more before volunteering. You can comment to me here or send a PM if you'd like to beta for me sometimes!

4) Recommendations of historical novels or other written historical fiction. I love history and historical stuff, but I mostly find recs of science fiction and fantasy, meaning I probably don't know about many of the things I'd love to read. So rec me historical fiction you think I might enjoy! It doesn't have to be available in English, either - I'm Finnish, so I'll find out if it's translated into my language, or is written in another language I speak. I should specify a few requirements:
- Takes place preferably before the 20th century, or possibly very early 20th century or 1920's/1930's. I'm not interested in recs for fiction about either of the World Wars or post-WWII world - I get those far too easily, and my historical interest is in earlier eras.
- Preferably something other than US history, because it's so prevalent it's not hard to find recs for that. Although I might make an exception for 18th century or earlier, if it sounds tempting enough.
- I'm looking for pure historical fiction here, not historical fantasy, steampunk etc. I do love those genres, but I have a lot of recommendations for them already, because there's so much awesome SFF fan media that I read or listen to.
- I don't want to read works that contain: graphic violence, gory stuff, torture, sexual violence, or a lot of war. (War in the background for home front stuff might be okay if it's not too depressing.) Also, I generally don't want to read something that focuses much on depictions of cruelty towards women, children, animals, LGBTQ+ folks, and other vulnerable groups. Of course people being people, there's a lot of that in history, but I can't read stuff that gets really graphic or detailed about it or implies that life was nothing but that ever in the past. There are so many books that seem to be just collections of Horrible Stuff That Happens To Women In History, and I want something else. And yeah, I know I've now disqualified a lot of works - that's why I have to ask for recommendations! I've got mental health beasties that are activated and make my life very unpleasant if I read the aforementioned things, so that's why I have to be careful. If you'd like to rec something but aren't sure if it crosses the line of having too much of the thing I don't want, tell me about it with that caveat. I can look around for reviews, descriptions and such and make my own call.
- I'm not terribly interested in historical fiction that's primarily male/female romance. Doesn't mean it can't have such a romance, as long as there's enough other stuff going on as well.
- Stuff I'm especially much into: awesome women, women learning and reading, female scientists and inventors, scientists and science in general, arts and culture, LGBTQ+ stuff, people of colour, history of everyday life.
- I'm mostly not a very literary fiction reader, I tend to look more for good-quality genre fiction.

Feel free to also direct me to an already existing rec list that might help me!

5) Recommendations for good Second Doctor era genfic, or Two/Jamie or Zoe/Isobel or other Zoe femslash that's not on AO3 or Teaspoon.

6) More people to post recs in tardis_library!

7) Crossover fics between the fandoms I love! Basically I love Doctor Who (Classic, New, some Big Finish) and then lots of rarelit fandoms: Becky Chambers's Wayfarers series, Gail Carriger's Parasol Protectorate, Custard Protocol and Finishing School series, Martha Wells's Murderbot novellas, Ann Leckie's Imperial Radch series (I'm still reading the last book of the trilogy, but I expect I'll have finished it within a couple of days), Jane Austen's novels, Alexandre Dumas's The Count of Monte Cristo...

ETA 8) I knew I forgot something... Feedback for my fan fics always makes me happy, whether it's comments or kudos or recs or what. I'm sometimes a bit slow at replying to comments (I'm so behind right now) but I really appreciate them. Also, feedback for the fanfics by my friends, or the fics I've recced at tardis_library or bookmarked on AO3.

Okay, enough! I'll do another day yet, but in a different post, because this got a bit lengthy. more tomorrow, because I accidentally deleted the other thing I'd written and I'm too tired to rewrite it now. It was shorter, thankfully, so it won't be hard to recreate it once I've slept and stuff.

Continuing with my very-behind Fandom Snowflake challenge!




Day 2: Rec at least three fanworks that you didn’t create.

All righty! I could be at this all night, but let's try not to. First, here are a few fics, old and new, across various fandoms.

First, my Yuletide gift from this year totally deserves to be mentioned again, though I did squee about it on the day of the reveals.
An Example of Benevolent Selfishness (5724 words, General Audiences) by Alona, Jane Austen: Emma, Emma Woodhouse & Jane Fairfax with a hint of femslash. A truly beautiful, excellent and in character canon divergence AU where Emma and Jane become friendly earlier, and this has important changes for Jane and her life - I would say better than things turn out for her in the book, all things considered. Their relationship is developed beautifully and gradually and awesomely, and it's amazing and makes me happy.

Another from the latest Yuletide:

The Pelerins Progress, or a Long Wei to a Smalle Angri Islet (1220 words, General Audiences) by UrsulaKohl, Becky Chambers - Wayfarers series, featuring the characters and pairings from The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet. Basically it's the story of the book told in Middle English as a Chaucerian miracle tale and it's awesome. Go enjoy the uplifting adventures of the fair Rosmarine and all the other pilgrims of the Pelerin.

Then some Doctor Who fics from my bookmarks on AO3:

Gravity (4179 words, General Audiences) by kathkin, Doctor Who (1963), Second Doctor/Jamie McCrimmon. Undoubtedly my favourite Two/Jamie writer, she gets both of their personalities and their dialogue and all so well, and I probably haven't recced this one anywhere yet. A lovely fic set early in Jamie's time with the Doctor, containing awesomeness of space and the universe, things Jamie learns, and very cute Two/Jamie moments.

Precipice (1761 words, Explicit), also by kathkin, also Doctor Who (1963) and Second Doctor/Jamie, but this one has very explicit sexual content. It's gorgeous and smutty and fluffy and adorable.

I should probably rec some gen as well because I actually totally like Jamie and the Doctor simply as two touchy-feely friends, too, but when I look on the tag I discover that all the ones I remember what they're like are also by kathkin... Ah, what the heck, have Too Much, a cute little gen ficlet from the Two & Jamie & Ben & Polly era, in which the Doctor sometimes finds his companions a bit too much - or maybe not.

This one I haven’t yet read all the parts of, but the parts I did read so far are great, and I trust the remaining ones are, too. Fabulous Investigations by john_amend_all, with Zoe and Isobel (and Zoe/Isobel). Zoe and Isobel being awesome in several stories!

Finally, some New Who:

When She's Ten Feet Tall by Nancy Brown, a Doctor Who / Alice In Wonderland crossover in which Martha Jones is awesome. You know with all the things Martha has gotten through, she can deal with Wonderland as well!

Sub-Subliminal, by 51st Century Fox, in which Jack Harkness, working for Torchwood in 1969, meets The Silence.

Memory of Water by weakinteraction, a beautiful, stunningly lovely Bill/Heather story from the latest Femslash Exchange.



Second, here's some Doctor Who fan art, because I've recently realized that if I go to DeviantArt and type in characters I like, I have a good chance of finding images that I'm very happy to look at. And I should share! (Also, trying to not totally flood tardis_library with my fan art recs.)

First (and I’m going to rec this at tardis_library, too, but it’s too lovely not to be posted in more than one place) Miss-Alex-Aphey’s Doctor Who Flowers series with various female companions from all eras of Doctor Who drawn with flowers that suit them. While the idea combining women and flowers may sound cliched and trite, it’s not so with these pictures - the characters look just as sharp and active as they are in canon, they’re all gorgeously drawn, and the flowers are vivid and awesome. Many of these are my favourite fan art ever for that character. Here are links to a few of them, and you can go on and find others:
Martha Jones
Amy Pond
wee!Amelia Pond
Nyssa of Traken
Victoria Waterfield
Ace
Vicki

A couple of funny Second Doctor era drawings by julianwilbury
Velcro-Scot. Second Doctor & Jamie. To quote the description: "There is a term used among bird owners, particularly those who own very personable, loving birds such as cockatoos that would be content to spend their whole day in their owners arms cuddling or clinging to them in any other way, in which such clinging birds are called "velcro birds.” (…) It was seriously only a matter of time would apply this to Jamie."

And here is Zoe getting nose-booped by the Doctor!

A cute drawing of Jamie, Zoe, and an iPod by ladyyaxetel.

Finally, here’s a lovely Two & Jamie drawing by EttelwenAilinon Safety Cling No more shippy than canon, trust me. That’s them in approximately every other scene.