Okay, anybody who knows me probably knows that my love for this movie is completely and totally epic... so most of you won't be surprised to hear that wayyyy back in October, I claimed Saving Face for choc_fic's 100 Days of Color. Hence, a pimp post! :D

( not very plot-spoilery picspam! )

In case you haven't been convinced by the above, there is also fic from Yuletide this year! Three of these stories were written for me, and the last one I wrote as a treat. The first story is the one I'd recommend as a taster, though. &hearts ;)

- Yum Cha
- The Last Gasp of Chivalry
- Spice of Life
- eating together

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+ Prompt collection post is open for the camelot_fleet February Free-for-all! This is for those of you who are craving some more relaxed fandom fun- there are no hard deadlines, just work at your own pace. :) All pairings and characters are welcome (I for one would LOVE to see some more minor character requests... *pokes*), so come and join us, lovelies!



+ dhobikikutti linked to an amazing fic of amazingface! Leap, by harshita; Dil Chahta Hai; I read it completely canon-clueless and was still blown away (and also, that movie just jumped about ten spots up my to-watch list, heh!).

+ sophinisba has a gorgeous Pan's Labyrinth fic: Mexico, about Mercedes and being an immigrant and stories and and and *flails!* omg. &hearts

+ deepad has a booklist up for Black History Month! Lots and lots of awesome, you guys.

+ In the category of things I haven't caught up with: halfamoon, 14valentines, kinkelot!

+ I should be writing and editing and planning for the next few days, so if you see me lurking around these parts too often, please punt me back to where I am supposed to be. *g*

+ ETA for wave of happy & because I couldn't decide:



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+ Carrying on from yesterday: heather11483's put up her LOTR recast! Also, dhobikikutti's started a chromatic recasting masterlist! *\o/* Toss in some more links, or go surfing for the fandoms you've missed. :D

+ brightfame: We are the stories we tell... and read.

+ bana05: Black Women, Slash, Fandom, and Canon (Long Meta Is Long)

+ I watched the first half of the full-length Red Cliff tonight, and HOLY SHIT, YOU GUYS. HOLY SHIT. S:DLKHGS:LDKJFSD:LK &hearts &hearts &hearts SO. FUCKING. EPIC. *incoherent seal-clappy noises of glee*

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&hearts Racialicious reports!

&hearts such_heights tackles Harry Potter!

&hearts entwashian does Buffy!

&hearts dhobikikutti does Chronicles of Narnia!

NNNNGH, YOU GUYS. &hearts I want somebody to tackle LOTR now, that would be so. epic. Also Good Omens, and His Dark Materials, and and and *flails* :D

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Signal-boosts first:

+ help, help, I'm being erased! by such_heights.

+ "It's now time to tell." by sheafrotherdon. Trigger warning for discussion of sexual violence.

+ Reducing the Suicide Stigma, by Suresh Unni. Trigger warning for mention of racially-motivated assault.

Still so angry over this; sleeping on it hasn't helped at all. When I look at this man's incredible, REAL life, I see echoes of the relatives I know and love; Harrison Ford's imaginary scientist is more of a personal violation than any distorted reflections that I have seen of myself. I've been trying to purge myself through words because I keep choking on it, this ugly surge of biliousness- but the right ones won't come. I don't have the vocabulary, I can't gain any distance and the results of my lack of these things are like trying to put out a bonfire with gasoline, so have something beautiful instead:

The Shortcut Home

In my sister's story,
God can't find us
in any of His coat pockets,
not in the empty, and not in the filled.
We're in none of His hands, the kind or the terrible;
none of His shoes, the giant or the minute.
And neither are we hiding inside the apples,
neither in the perfect nor the ruined.
Not in the first mouthful, and not in the last.

In my brother's story,
our death sings to us from the highest branch
of the oldest tree the birds remember
in song, and we wander our father's house
in search of the origin of the hours.

In my story... But I don't have a story.
All I have are a few names of the flowers:
Morning Glory, Seven O'clock, Mother of Wings,
Story Carried Backward Up a Stairs. All I have
is a sown path I follow back to sleep:
Painted Face, Clouded Pane, Song in a Jar,
Burning Threshold, Bloody Scrimmage,
Voice Strewn on the Rocks.

-- Li-Young Lee

... Ficlets by tomorrow, I promise.

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Title: gang aft agley
Recipient: netgirl_y2k
Rating: PG
Warnings: None
Spoilers: Vaguely up to 2x03?
Summary: Arthur and Merlin are Not Talking; Morgana stages an intervention with help from Gwen. Gen/OT4.
Notes: Originally posted here. Many thanks to woldy, such_heights, kelene, and ineffabilitea for their invaluable assistance! This couldn't have happened without you all.

( Not for the first time, Morgana contemplated locking the two of them in the dungeons together until they'd managed to talk things out. )

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+ camelotsolstice reveals are up, which means I can tell you all that I wrote gang aft agley for netgirl_y2k (aka that gen/OT4 drunk!fic where Merlin and Morgana finally spill)! Also, I can now thank the small village it took to write this story: woldy, for the initial meandering conversation that I took inspiration from in the first place; kelene, who was there to cheerlead when it mattered most; ineffabilitea, who picked up on my faulty word choice/POV issues; and such_heights, who was an awesome beta-on-the-fly and thus put up with a far higher spam-quota than any human being should suffer. *g* &hearts to you all, and also to issahime, who wrote me Shiloh!

+ help_haiti ficlets are coming soon! I plan to finish writing both of them tonight. Anybody interested in looking them over, sometime within the next 24 hours? &hearts

+ I am to do quick book write-ups for yesterday's binge, and you are all to hold me to that, okay? *g*

+ In other news, bossymarmalade's got some awesome ficlets up! Star Trek and Holmes, among others; go and read! :D :D &hearts

+ In other other news, today's linkspam includes two interesting discussions on historical AUs: You don't have to go looking for this stuff, it just traipses across your reading page, you guys, by zvi, and History without oppression?, by naraht. These posts reminded me of sheafrotherdon's The Stories We Tell, although the fic that sparked that essay was in an entirely different fandom/historical context.

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Today was a good day! I am home now, from birthday-ing and book-binging (Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie, which I admired theoretically but did not at all connect with emotionally, A Good Indian Wife by Anne Cherian, which I fell completely into, and then Li-Young Lee's Behind My Eyes, which I caved and bought and devoured on the bus ride home) and bouncing out after half a day of work on a technically-long-weekend, and I am so ready for sleep, you guys, so ready. Before I sack out, though, a couple of posts that resonate with my feelings on Racefail:

+ Why I Think Racefail Was The Bestest Thing Evar for SFF

+ The Cost of Engaging

and also a quick signal-boost:

+ avendya is hosting the 63rd Disability Blog Carnival over at disability! Please check out her submissions post for further details if you are interested.

+ queerlit50, adapted from 50books_poc!

And now I am for bed. Mmm, bed. *collapses* &hearts

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Yuletide for a rainy afternoon: ( more Gattaca, Kill Bill, Bridge to Terabithia, Kuroshitsuji, Bend it Like Beckham, Red Cliff, Love Mode, Kushiel's Legacy, Love Actually )

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- More racist cover art shenanigans from Bloomsbury. Seriously, after last year's uproar over whitewashing Justine Larbalestier's Liar? I just... I've got nothing. This shit was already brought to their attention. Publicly. REPEATEDLY. What is there left to say?

+ I should be working on my ficlets for help_haiti, but... I reread Volume 6 of Wild Adapter this morning (UNF. Hi Minekura-san, you win at hotness forever~ &hearts), and suddenly I want to write Osamu/Ryunosuke. So much. Those last panels! SURELY THIS ALREADY EXISTS ON THE INTERNET. RIGHT? RIGHT??? ;___; Also, I miss Kubotoki a LOT.

+ Things what I also want to write: Saving Face. ANYTHING Saving Face. I mentioned it at springkink, but I kind of don't want to wait for requests to show up. I am trying to resist opening a prompt post, but IT IS DIFFICULT WHEN I KEEP THINKING OF THIS


AND THIS


AND THIS


I know. My life, so hard.

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Seriously. &hearts

I have one spot left over at help_haiti: here! I might open up a few more; we'll see how I do with these first.

Also, I realize that there are many many lists of organizations going around, but here are a few more that I haven't seen mentioned, via my workplace:
- International Medical Corps
- Direct Relief International
- International Relief Teams
- World Food Programme
- World Concern
- Shelterbox

And because you guys are awesome, have something awesome: ( Harbin Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival )

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Three ficlets on offer here! Obscure/Yuletide fandoms welcome; minimum donation of US$5.

ETA for skywardprodigal's list of trusted sources.

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1. Orig-fic first: Chaobell's 100 Candles! Slashy supernatural stuff; hilarious and really fucking creepy by turns. This one's a completely different genre than Shadow of the Templar, but there's a good chance that if you are a Templar fan (aka a sucker for banter/humor), you'll enjoy this one as well.

2. Webcomics commence! Tab Kimpton's Khaos Komix series explores the lives and relationships of various LGBTQ (not just L and G!) teenagers. This one's, well, kind of cutesy, but hey- it's about high school kids, after all. The lack of epic (non-teen) angstfests is a good thing in my book. Also, there's a good proportion of POC main characters, so extra bonus points for that!

3. Jesse Hajicek's Metanoia: really damn gorgeous artwork. &hearts Another slashy supernatural-type story, rather grittier than 100 Candles. This one's got some graphic violence, although it's not particularly gory.

4. Bayou, by Jeremy Love and Patrick Morgan. This one was recced to me by ruffwriter, and... holy shit. Totally mindblowing. First off, the sheer amount of effort that went into this comic is incredible- the artwork is stunning, and the setting and details are palpably well-researched. The story is a sort of Alice-in-Wonderland derivative, but it's also so much more than that. It's set in the south of the US in the early 20th century with a young black girl as the Alice-like figure, and draws on many folktales/cultural references that I know I'm missing.

Because of the setting, it's also an incredibly difficult read. The creators never flinch away from showing us the interracial power dynamics: the prejudices, the stereotypes, the racially-motivated violence. This is a horror/fantasy story, it's true, but much of the horror is rooted in the reality of USian black/white race relations in various historical contexts; there are many, many instances that may be triggering. The pacing and the intricate plot arcs helped me to get past some of the difficult parts, but please take care if you decide to give Bayou a try.

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So, um, I was all ready to snark about Sarah Palin joining Fox news, but then I saw that bossymarmalade has recast the X-men with actors of color, and my grumpy basically exploded in fireworks of utter gorgeousness! GO FORTH AND BEHOLD THE CRITICAL MASS OF PRETTY, GUYS. IT IS X HOURS OF YOUR LIFE WELL SPENT. :D

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Some rs_small_gifts:
- No one saw us this evening hand in hand, by crooked (written for me! thank you SO MUCH, AGAIN! &hearts)
- Secret Garden, by brighty18
- After Life, by magnetic_pole

One go_exchange fic, now that reveals are up: A Series of Vignettes From the USS Enterprise (Under the Command of Captain Adam Young), by ineffabilitea! Full disclosure- I did a quick and dirty beta for this, but I stand by its fabulousness. Star Trek with the Good Omens cast- what's not to love?? More recs to come when I've managed to catch up!

And finally, back to Yuletide: ( Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Hot Fuzz, A Sex Therapist, Scooby Doo, Onmyouji, Ibis Trilogy, Chinese Mythology, Beauty and the Beast (fairytale), Casino Royale, Meredith Pierce's Darkangel trilogy, Darker than Black )

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Hello everyone! :) A few years back, I decided that it would be a good idea to do a post-reveals friending fest, so that we can have our small-fandom squee year round. Come and get a little more love for your Yuletide stories past and present, and see who else is in your Yuletide fandoms!

[Comments on at Dreamwidth only, for purposes of centralization. Feel free to comment using OpenID!]

<b>name:</b> <b>fandoms:</b> <b>Yuletide years:</b> (was this your first Yuletide, or your fourth?) <b>i wrote:</b> <b>primary journal/blogspace:</b> <b>journaling habits:</b> <b>hobbies/interests/anything else you'd like to add:</b>

( **for example:** )

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while i'm mucking about with html coding, have two Morgana/Gwen drabbles from... sometime in October, heh!

title: that the sweetest leave no trace
rating: pg
written for bossymarmalade
( prompt: food )

***

title: Frank-Starling's Law*
rating: pg
written for suaine & slightlytookish
*[title source]
( prompts: something blacksmith-y, moving )

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Have just come back from the movie and my reaction was basically AGS:DLFKHS:DLKJG: *\o/*!!! More thoughts later, maybe.

ALSO, HAVE A VERY SLASHY PROMO INTERVIEW (thanks for the pointer, osolone! &hearts :D) WITH RDJ & JUDE LAW. [WARNING: contains spoilers, including movie clip.]



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Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers: A History of Lesbian Life in Twentieth-Century America, by Lillian Faderman.

I'm not finished reading yet- I'm taking my time for once, because there's a lot of information to turn over in my head- but points for talking about intersectionality with regard to race and class, even though I'm not yet entirely positive about how deeply it's been explored! This one's tentatively going on the reclist of doom.

In other news (while I'm compiling my next batch of recspam), a quick poll, since it's nearly time to do that Yuletide friending fest again:



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Happy new year, loves! :)

We spent the night at home, my sister and I, with cheap lobster and unopened wine, nearly sleeping through the last few seconds of 2009. (Our parents rang in the new year at Taipei 101, in the company of old and rarely-seen friends- a getaway that they fully deserve, although my dad remains chained to his work and his laptop.) I passed the time watching CSI and NCIS and (ha) The Replacements rather than any of the new year's countdowns, and was quite content with that.

( 2009: me and you )

Anyway! Moving right along, here's a fandom/writing retrospective:

( Fic )

***

( On race )

Phew. Apparently I wrote a lot more than I thought I did. *g* Icons and more Yuletide recs to come later!

ETA: Yuletide reveals! This year my assigned story was five exercises in aggravation {Junjou Romantica), and I also wrote eating together (Saving Face) for Yuletide Madness. I find it inordinately amusing/amazing that all of the Saving Face fic this year was written either for or by me. &hearts &hearts xD

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