dolorosa_12: (yuletide stars)
a million times a trillion more ([personal profile] dolorosa_12) wrote2020-10-16 03:59 pm
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Friday open thread: Yuletide

Another week has passed, and it's time for another Friday open thread!

I still have a lot of prompts remaining from your suggestions, but I thought, given sign-ups have just opened and I've seen a number of Yuletide letters appearing among my circle, today might be a good day to do a Yuletide open thread.

Please interpret this topic as broadly as you'd like. If you are planning to participate this year, you might want to talk about your requested fandoms and why you're choosing them, whether you have any ideas (obviously don't provide specifics) for gifts/treats already based on the letters you've seen so far, your own writing goals this time around, or any other topic.

If you're not planning to participate this year (or ever), is there a reason? Are you going to sit this Yuletide out but maybe write some treats or pinch hits?

Basically, use this open thread to ramble away about anything Yuletide-related in the comments.



Yuletide is pretty much an exchange geared towards how I do fandom. I read and write fic almost exclusively in tiny fandoms — the idea of doing so in a megafandom is stressful and overwhelming. This makes participating in fannish activity a rather solitary affair — until Yuletide comes around, and suddenly everyone is writing and reading fic in the types of fandoms that interest me!

I don't think I've ever requested fic in what was a 'big for Yuletide' fandom — generally it's tiny microfandoms of the heart — and over the six years I've participated so far, I've been delighted with the gifts I've received in those tiny fandoms. Writing fic for similar fandoms is also incredibly liberating — it may be something that only interests a single person, but if you put in some effort and get things right, the happiness brought to that person is far, far more satisfying (in my opinion) than writing something read by thousands of people.

This year my requests cover two dear old favourites, perennial requests of mine that I've been seeking year after year, and this year's shiny new-to-me fandom. None are what you would call big, even by Yuletide standards — they have 80, 23 and 6 fics on AO3 respectively (and in the latter case three out of the six were written by me!). I'm really happy with my choices, and the idea of a gift in any three of these fandoms fills me with delight.

As far as my own goals for Yuletide, they remain similar to in previous years: I aim to write a minimum of four fics in total (i.e. the main assignment, and at least three treats), and to comment on at least fifty fics in the main collection and at least 20 in Madness. I try to be a good Yuletide citizen, and that, for me, means doing more than the bare requirements of the exchange. December has the potential to be extremely busy and disruptive for me this year, so we'll see how realistic those plans are when 25th December rolls around...
lirazel: A vintage photograph of a young woman reading while sitting on top of a ladder in front of bookshelves ([books] world was hers for the reading)

[personal profile] lirazel 2020-10-16 04:59 pm (UTC)(link)
This is my eleventh or twelfth year doing Yuletide, and I've never written the same fandom twice, which is what I love about it. Yuletide for me is much more about the writing than the receiving--I usually enjoy my gift, but I never get the kind of THIS IS THE FIC OF MY HEART feelings that a lot of people do. And that's just fine, because, like I said, it's about the writing.

I always offer only fandoms I've never written before, but this year I'm going to offer for The Queen's Thief, which I wrote for several years ago. Since we just got the last book, I have a feeling there are a lot of people who are going to be requesting it, so I'm happy to offer to do it, especially because I just reread the entire series.

I'm requesting Queen's Thief, too (either Costis and Kamet or minor characters like Sophos's sisters, Gen's parents, etc.) as well as Fiddler on the Roof, where I'm hoping for Hodel/Perchik fic. If I get someone who doesn't want to write the ship, sister fic would be nice too. The last fandom I know I'm requesting is the kdrama Crash Landing On You, where I'm asking for something focused on the second female lead, Seo Dan. I'd love a shippy rewrite of the ending, but if not, something character-focused.

I'm waffling about whether to ask for Benjamin January fic this year, but no matter what I decide, I definitely intend to ask for it (and offer to write it!!!) next year.

I haven't been through the tag set yet. Of course I'll be doing that to find out which fandoms I want to offer to write for, but in the process, I might find one or two more I want to request as well. I love when that happens--you're going through the fandoms and see something it never occurred to you to request but that you would love fic from.
lirazel: Pooh and Piglet in a snowy field, the text reads, '"Is it Yuletide yet?' asked Piglet hopefully."" ([misc] yuletide)

[personal profile] lirazel 2020-10-18 10:19 pm (UTC)(link)
It's funny because, yes, I have been doing it for over a decade, but I still feel like I'm a newcomer to it! I don't feel like the old guard of Yuletide at all because it had been going on since 2003!

but I have a handful of reliable old standbys to which I keep returning

Yeah, that especially makes sense since you have mostly only tiny fandoms to begin with. To be able to revisit them for Yuletide must be wonderful.