Hooooly crap, that was fast. Sorry, author, I thought I'd have more than... 14 hours to flesh out my requests with some context.

Wheeeeeee, yuletide!

In general (and moreso than usual, as I have straight up copied this from last year: ( a few general things )

( fandoms: Colditz (2005), The Silver Branch, Great British Bake Off RPF, BBC Historical Farm, Manhattan, Tennis RPF )

As always, my previous exchange letters are filed under my dear author tag, recs are at AO3 or pinboard and pretty much anything there in terms of preference or even story ideas for other fandoms is fair game if you're looking for inspiration. My tip-of-the-iceberg preferences meander around a bit, but if I said I loved something three years ago, it's still a safe bet.

( general things )

( Colditz (2005), Enlisted (TV), Tennis RPF, The State Within, Would I Lie To You? RPF, Manhattan (TV) )

( more yuletide recs in Dead Poets Society, The Breakfast Club, and Heard on the Subway: Talking About Your Gay Son (blog post) )

So I made it from T back around through H before reveals, but not even because I bookmarked most of the longer fic to come back to, like Annum Novum" and some other stuff that seems really promising.

I sort of want to read more, or do some 2013 meme, or just do the general AO3 meme because I haven't yet, but the. there's snowflake_challenge and some fandom-stocking stuff I still hope to write. And all the stuff that I didn't have time to sort before I had people over last night, so I piled it up and stashed it behind things...

Happy New Year!

I haven't made it past the fandoms I received gifts in yet. (Whoops, hey there, unexpected midday nap!), but: Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Caffeine and Unpaid Overtime (19335 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Frontier Wolf - Rosemary Sutcliff
Rating: Explicit
Relationships: Alexios Flavius Aquila/Hilarion, Alexios Flavius Aquila/Cunorix
Characters: Alexios Flavius Aquila, Hilarion (Frontier Wolf), Cunorix (Frontier Wolf), Original Female Character(s)
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Medical, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, First Time, First Kiss, First Meetings, Slow Burn, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fluff and Angst, Tea, Doctors & Physicians, Paperwork
Summary:

“Um,” Alex tried to regain his power of speech. “Are you Hilary?”

“Dr Aquila, I presume,” the young man answered, and leant back against the doorframe, arms folded, regarding Alex appraisingly. “So you do exist after all. I was starting to fear the personnel department was in the grip of a delusion and our rota a tissue of deceit.”

After an incident, Dr Alex Aquila is relocated to an obscure ward in a tiny hospital in the north of England. There are too many patients, too much paperwork and his SHO Hilary is impossible to work with. But at least surgical trainee Connor has shown him some friendliness. With a life to rebuild, and many challenges ahead, can Alex figure out who he is and what he really needs?

You guys! I always say I like AUs and crossovers, and all that, and whooooo boy is this an AU, so I'm sure it's probably not for everyone who loves Frontier Wolf for Frontier Wolf's sake, but it's such a solid story, I hope it'll pick up fans from elsewhere. It also makes me want all the Take Your Fandom to Work Day stories ever.

I don't think I've ever seen anyone cast Alexios (Alex, here) but either Paul Bettany or Laurence Fox would make an excellent Hilarion (Hilary). I'm mostly in the fandom for Hilarion, if I'm honest, but I love a good Alexios, and this is a good Alexios, making the best out of a bad situation, doing the right thing, trying to bring order to perceived chaos and then realizing that some of the chaos is actually character.

---

Nothing In This World (3495 words) by Anonymous
Fandom: Tennis RPF
Rating: Mature
Relationships: Roger Federer/Rafael Nadal
Additional Tags: First Kiss, Revelations, Love, Fluff and Angst, Requited Love, Locker Room, Friends to Lovers
Summary:
Sometimes it’s a bit of a struggle. Particularly with Rafa. Rafa, who used to look at him like he hung the stars in the sky.

After losing to Rafa at the World Tour Finals in 2013, Roger doesn't particularly want him in his locker room. But Rafa seems to have something on his mind.

This one depends a quite bit more on knowing the canon, as it were, but it's so lovely and full of feeling, and it's so rich with detail. Like, several hours later, out of nowhere, things keep coming back to me. And I definitely dreamed, in my nap, that Rafa messed up one of his routines and lost a match in absolutely mortifying fashion, and I might need to go back and read this again and possibly read All the Other Things where Rafa finds love, to get the (wholly imaginary!) dejected look on his ridiculous face out of my head.

---

( more excellent Tennis RPF )

I did an embarrassingly bad job of reading Yuletide fics, and of remembering to click "bookmark" on the ones I did. So, reconstructing some of that from history and comments pre-reveal by like a minute.

( Goon, Allstate Insurance 'Mayhem' Commercials, Sports Night, Body (movie concept), You Belong With Me - University of Rochester Yellowjackets (Music Video) )

Ha, and of course LJ is broken as I go to post these to the community. Of course.

yuletide brainstorming post is up!

So far I've offered to nominate Tin Man (DG & Cain for them, not sure which characters for me, but probably Zero again) for someone else, and I'm looking for help picking a dance routine, or conceivably two, to nominate. I referenced the Thought of You animated short in talking about it, and at least one person was excited about that, so I don't know.

I still love the concept for Wade Robson's Little Green Bag routine for Pauline and Peter. I'm looking for something a little more unique than "This is about a relationship..." but with room to explore before/during/after.

I? Have Yuletide fatigue.

If you are desperately curious as to what I've been reading, I'm bookmarking everything on my Ao3 account, and instead of duplicating that, I'm just going to highlight a few stories that I wish were getting more attention.

This first one's outside the cut, because I really, really, really wish more people would read it and tell the author it's fabulous. It's about as close as you can get to a five-minute fandom, and you can google book about 70% of the script for the scene, and pick up the rest on youtube. (There are many versions on youtube, bless them all for filming their efforts, that's one of the better ones, though perhaps not the best.)

Fall on Your Knees (2584 words) by Anonymous
Fandom: Almost Maine - John Cariani
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Chad (Almost Maine)/Randy (Almost Maine)
Characters: Chad (Almost Maine), Randy (Almost Maine)
Summary:

Chad and Randy navigate the sometimes-awkward territory of moving from lifelong best friends to lifelong best friends who have confessed their love to each other. There are some bumps in the road.

( Bull Durham, Frontier Wolf, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are dead, Persuasion, Macdonald Hall )

If you ever believe anything that I have posted in this journal, believe me when I say that I am delighted - DELIGHTED - and I do not use that word... uh... lightly. Anyway. Very much enamored of the stories that I received for Yuletide. I can't decide where to go next in the archive, because while I am sure there are hundreds if not thousands of stories that I could enjoy with a minute on wikipedia to look up the character names, this stories are MINE from canons that are dear to my heart for various and sundry reasons, and this is definitely luck rather than anything I have ever done to deserve them or will ever do to be worthy of the blessing.

Seriously. I am that happy.

( Warrior, The Breakfast Club x2 and Kicking and Screaming, recced in the order they showed up on my gifts page )