Claiming bragging rights. By the comments I got, I think I’m entitled.
A Letter, Unsent (1078 words) – Margery Kempe & Julian of Norwich
This was my actual assignment, the other three long stories are pinch hits. When I offered it I hoped SO MUCH that I’d get it and already had snatches of text floating around in my mind (“fourteen years of age, plain and scholarly, in possession of a modest dowry and plentiful brothers, admirably suited for the convent” is the oldest bit). I had Julian of Norwich’s Revelations of Divine Love open all the time while writing, and I think I succeeded in getting the voice right. One of the hardest things I ever wrote, and hands down the smuttiest. One of the prompts was “Sex with God” and that helped me along enormously. It’s rated Mature, not Explicit, because Julian still speaks in metaphors a lot rather than being completely, well, explicit.
Thank you, Sara, Heather, and whoever’s name I’ve forgotten (possibly patchworkmouse), for helping me brainstorm Cecily’s name.
Piglets Don’t Hum Hums (1257 words) – Piglet (Winnie-the-Pooh)
It was easy to reread the entire canon, and fresh from reading the entire canon it was easy to get the voice right, but I was short on plot for a while until I cycled (can’t swim on things at the moment) on Woozles and Heffalumps. The recipient didn’t have any prompts, and I looked into what they’d written themself and received in other exchanges and that was all MUCH more mature than I wanted to write for this fandom (or mostly at all, except see above). I had to mail the mods to ask if that meant that I had to write smut or could just write something canon-compliant (the latter).
Youth’s a stuff will not endure (1017 words) – Robin Armin (Tam Lin – Pamela Dean)
The summary is straight from canon (Is Robin a clown?” said Molly. “He seems very sober to me.”) and worked as an extra prompt, and so did the title which I found when searching for “Feste quotations” after I learned that Shakespeare had written Feste for Robert Armin. This was difficult but rewarding, I kept moving paragraphs around and thought I’d never get to a thousand words without filler but eventually it cleared up by itself.
With This Ring (1375 words) – Polly/Maladict (Monstrous Regiment – Terry Pratchett)
This is full of darlings I fear I’d feel obliged to kill if it was original writing, but they work very well as Pratchettisms. So much fun to write. Trans Maladict! Deadpan innkeeper girl! Tiny ancient sweet (“you haven’t tasted the bitter”) vampire great-great-great-aunt! Proposal of Marriage! What’s not to love? (And flatteringly many people did love it and jubilated about it in the comments and a couple even bookmarked it)
Three Times Tail-Kinker To-Ennien Outsmarted Spock, And One Time She Didn’t Mind That She Didn’t (410 words) – Evan Wilson & Spock (Uhura’s Song – Star Trek)
Drabble series, the 10 extra words are tiny-chapter titles. Nobody’s noticed the any/Annie joke <sniff> A surprising lot of research went into this, not only canon review but also wiki poking-around.
Ayewards Internship (100 words) – Maree Mallory (Magids – Diana Wynne Jones)
* goes back and labels it “Post-Canon” *
I’m exceedingly proud of the title of this one. Also that I thought of replacing the original “horse” by “mare” to keep the tension up.
Opening Day (100 words) – Carmela Rodriguez & Ronan Nolan (Young Wizards – Diane Duane)
I admit I researched sex toys. (And glue guns.) Faintly inspired by this (my favourite E-rated Young Wizards story).
Friends to Siblings (100 words) – Elda & Claudia (Derkholm – Diana Wynne Jones)
This came into being because I don’t care much for the friends-to-lovers trope, and detest the enemies-to-lovers trope. It’s just girls hanging out.
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