Yuletide 2021 Letter

[violetvain]

Thank you for considering writing for me! I’m really excited to be participating in Yuletide this year. Whatever we matched on or if you’re thinking about creating a treat for me, I can’t wait to see what you end up creating.

My ao3 name is VioletVain.

Below I have included details about what various things that I like, some clarifications about my DNWs and after that there are specific sections for each request/fandom. I’ve gone into details about all of this here because I personally find it helpful when writing for someone but optional details are of course optional.

I’m generally easy to please. Once it matches the fandom tags in my requests, doesn’t include my DNWs and isn’t actively attempting to write something I wouldn’t like I’ll probably love whatever you write. If you decide to include any ideas from the letter that would just be the cherry on top.

 

Likes

Physical intimacy likes: cuddling, touch starved characters getting cuddled, cuddle piles, casual intimacy, hand holding, hair petting, bed sharing, three plus people sharing a bed, huddling for warmth

Relationship likes (gen and romance): Queer relationships, femslash, poly relationships, compersion, families of choice, friendship, adopted kidfic, mutual (oblivious) pining, enemies to friends to lovers, rivalry, loyalty, praise kink, characters learning how to trust people, lonely characters making friends, characters who think nobody could love them being loved, two characters who are already dating start dating a third

Genre/Format/Narrative style likes: Any (first, second or third) POV, multiple POVs, distinctive narration, epistolary fic, nonlinear narratives, Rashomon-style stories, character studies, fluff, emotional hurt/comfort, comfort no hurt, angst with a happy ending, ambiguous endings, plot heavy fic, missing scenes, romance, gen, worldbuilding

Alternative Universe likes: canon divergent AUs, daemon AUs, everybody lives AUs, crossovers/fusions between requested fandoms, magic/superpowers/SF elements added to existing setting without removing existing setting elements, childhood friends AUs, Peggy Sue AUs

Miscellaneous likes: LGBT characters, trans/non-binary characters, trans female characters, bi characters, internalised homophobia/biphobia (and/or overcoming it), self-worth issues (and/or overcoming them), thought sharing/mind reading

My list of likes is far from comprehensive and is just included to give a general idea of what I tend to like. There are so many things that I like that the letter would be way too long if I listed all of them.

 

Do Not Wants

DNWS: Explicit sexual content featuring characters who are under eighteen or non-consenting or non-sapient, any sexual or romantic content about characters under sixteen, Real Person Fiction, Marina Abramović or other performance artists appearing as a character, unrequested complete setting change AUs, Reader Inserts, COVID-19 Pandemic

Rhythm 0 specific DNW: The appearance of any characters under 18 years of age.

For any characters I request who are canonically survivors of rape or sexual abuse I’m fine with it being included or even for it to be a major focus regardless of the age of the characters once it isn’t shown on page.

For the DNW about characters under sixteen depicting crushes, teens dating similarly aged teens, puppy love, first kisses, kids/teens figuring out they’re queer and any similarly age-appropriate content are all exceptions to the relevant DNW.

For Real Person Fiction references and minor appearances of historical or public figures are not an issue.

For the Marina Abramović/performance artists appearing DNW references to her/them and the works they’ve performed are welcome. I just don’t want them actually appearing in the story as characters.

For unrequested complete setting changes AU I don’t consider canon-divergence, adding additional fantastical elements on top of the existing setting or changing individual or multiple elements of the setting while keeping the broader setting intact to fall under that. For AUs once the setting is recognisable and it retains more setting details than just place names from the canon setting I’m on board.

 

 

Pale (Verona Hayward, Avery Kelly, Lucy Ellingson)

 

Pale is a currently ongoing webserial by Wildbow (probably best known for his superhero story Worm).

Pale is about three teenage girls recently inducted into the magical world tasked with looking into a murder. They later go to magic school where danger lurks. It’s darker than you would expect but never becomes completely grim.

Pale is consistently excellent and I always look forward to new chapters being posted. I love the girls and their friendship. I love the rotating points of view and how different each girl’s viewpoint is, I love the magic system and all the details we get for it, I love how terrifying the antagonists are, I love the Kennet Others (especially Snowdrop and Tashlit and Miss and John) and the rest of the extended cast (especially Ray and Zed and Nicolette and Liberty).

I adore the friendship between these three girls. It’s really what at the core of this story. I love how even with how strong a friendship it is they still have major problems. From Avery feeling insecure about being the new friend to Lucy resenting the possibility of being pushed into the role of being the responsible one to Verona worrying that she might drift into treating her friends how her father treats her.

I really like how we see the individual dynamics develop in canon between each pair of girls and the focus that each individual relationship gets beyond just the group of three together.

I’m reading each new chapter as it’s posted so spoilers are not a concern. If you want to set your story post arc 13 I’m fine with Avery not appearing or with a fic where all three are in Thunder Bay/Kennet/somewhere else entirely.

Canon-typical romance/sexuality involving requested characters is fine.

In general, anything that focuses on the friendship between the three girls will be a story I’ll enjoy.

Prompts

• Verona becomes an Other. Feel free to interpret this as happily or as darkly as you like. Bonus points if she becomes Lucy’s familiar or Avery’s if you want to diverge on Snowdrop becoming her familiar.
• Future fic about Avery, Verona and Lucy when they’re grown up. How do their lives turn out? How do they balance the mundane world and the practise? What implements/familiars/demesnes do they choose?
• A normal day in the Blue Heron Institute where they attend classes and hang out without a major crisis disturbing everything. Bonus points if it features Liberty or Zed or any of the other friends they’ve made.
• More of Verona in the Undercity! Avery running more paths! In general, just more of any or all of the three of them exploring the weird type of realms and paths that have been shown.
• Groundhog Day loops are canonically a thing and I’d be interested in a story where they get pulled into one. Maybe somebody tries to trap one of them in a loop but because they awakened together they all get pulled in.
• Any of the three of them completing one of the major rituals (demesne, familiar, implement). For familiar rituals I’d love Tashlit for Verona or an AU where John accepted Lucy’s offer instead of entering the Carmine Throne contest. I don’t have any specific ideas for the other rituals but I’d love to see what you come up with!
• Just fluff about the three girls hanging out together without any looming crises. Sleepovers! Lucy and Avery going on a double date! Experimenting with magic for fun instead of in a life or death situation! Meeting up with old friends! Making friends with new Others!

 

Rhythm 0 - Marina Abramović

 

Rhythm 0 was a six-hour long piece of performance art by Marina Abramović. Abramović placed 72 objects including a rose, scissors and a gun with a single bullet on a table and left a note with them inviting the audience to do to do whatever they wanted to her during the performance.

I’m a big fan of Abramović’s work and this is the first of her pieces I’ve ever heard about and it’s stuck with me since then. I have somewhat less to say about this fandom then the others but I’d really love to see your interpretation of a fanfic about this piece.

In line with the DNWs please don’t have the artist performing the piece be Abramović or another real person (and likewise don’t base the audience on real people).

 

Prompts

• I’m really interested in how the items laid out effect this. I’d love a story either focusing on the items Abramović chose or how different items being laid out would affect the performance of the piece. Giving the audience different items to use (… or giving them none at all) could radically change how they’d act and the meaning of the piece. Structurally a story consisting of a few short vignettes focusing on different items would be cool.
• I usually don’t prompt for smut but the thought of the items the performer laid out all being sex toys (a vibrator, nipple clamps, a strap-on, handcuffs …) occurred to me and if you want to run with that I’d be happy to read it.
• The other variables you can change in the piece are the audience and the performer. A story where the audience was larger or smaller (or one person) all lend themselves to interesting interpretations. As does a story where the audience consists of friends of the performer or enemies or the performer or rival performance artists. Or go Sci-fi and have the audience and/or performer be aliens. I think anything tweaking the audience or performer or the relationship between them has a lot of potential.
• I think a story about a character following in Abramović’s footsteps and putting on this piece or one inspired themself could be really interesting. Abramović herself is no stranger to repeating other performance artists work as seen in Seven Easy Pieces where she recreated famous pieces of performance art. Repeating a piece that has already been performed changes the context a lot and I’d be interested in seeing that explored.
• I realised when writing these prompts that a lot of them ended up focusing on how you could change details of how Rhythm 0 was performed. While I am interested in that I’d love a story where it’s performed exactly in accordance (or very closely) with the information we have on it just as much!

 

Terra Ignota (Worldbuilding)

Terra Ignota is a quartet of novels by Ada Palmer where the final books has just released. The first book is one of the most stunning science fiction debuts I have ever read and the sequels are just as breath taking. The novels are set in the year 2454 by a narrator writing a history in the style of the eighteenth century. It shows us a future vastly different than our present. One that is better than the present in many ways but is still deeply flawed. It explores a world where nation states have been replaced by non-geographic voluntarily chosen hives, religion and gender have become taboo and a centuries long plan to terraform Mars is underway.

I’ve read everything for Terra Ignota posted on ao3 more than once. I love the setting and the characters both. I love the narrative voice and the weird philosophy and the hope for the future contained in it.

More than anything I love the world that is revealed over the course of the four books and I’d love any story that shows us a little more of it.

I’ve read and final book and put the Perhaps the Star specific prompts in a separate spoiler box in order not to spoil anybody who hasn’t yet.

For RPF and readerfic canon-typical digressions where the reader talks with Thomas Hobbes or another long dead philosopher are a canon-specific exception to my DNW for them noted above.

General Prompts

• Anything set during the historical events between our present and the present of Terra Ignota. The Church War, The Great Renunciation, the building of Romanova, the First Anonymous (or any of the 2^nd through 7^th), the foundation of OS, The Set-Set Rights and the assassination of Mycroft Mason, Cahya Rattlewatch election as the youngest ever tribune at 15, the history of terraforming Mars, the Mitsubishi-Greenpeace merger (or any of the other earlier hive-mergers). Terra Ignota paints an intriguing history but we only get glimpses of it. Whether it’s one of the events I listed or something else entirely I’d love anything that showed us a little more of the past of this world.
• I’d love to read a story about the ordinary political process of the Alliance. What do campaigns in the Humanist elections look like and how do its different forms of government function?  What’s the day-to-day life of a Mitsubishi director like? How do intra-hive politics play out? The Strangest Seantor is one of my favourite chapters so I’d love anything focused on the Romanovan Senate.
• All the characters who have a major role in the story are hugely unusual on multiple levels and I’d be interested in reading something about what life is like for someone who is relatively more ordinary. Feel free to interpret ‘normal’ very broadly. A world-famous musician or a renowned Brillist researcher or a Mitsubishi senator could all be ordinary compared to the major characters in Terra Ignota. On the other hand, I’d also love to read a story about a genuinely average person from any of the hives or hiveless or a minor.
• I find everything about the world in these books fascinating and can’t fit in anywhere near everything I’d enjoy reading about so if you have an idea about literally any other aspect of the setting I’d love to read it!

 

Perhaps the Stars Prompts

Spoilers for Perhaps the Stars

• Anything that gives us more insight into what the parts of the war we didn’t see were like would be great. Vivien in South America or Martin crossing North America or Heloise in Casablanca. The Mitsubishi factions or the chaos in Europe. More about what Sniper and its bash were up to. How the Reservations and the UN view the war. Anything from the perspective of an ordinary person in a place we don’t see in the book. I’d love anything that shows us more of what this changed world where the trackers and cars have suddenly vanished was like for the people living in it.
• How the world looks after the new end. How well do the political changes actually work? What new hives emerge? How is the upswell in Nuturism that happened during the war addressed? How does Sniper’s gender commission play out? What scientific developments do Cato (and others) make? How does the law on religion change? What does the far future look when they have spread among the stars look like?