Dear Yuletide Writer 2025
Oct. 23rd, 2025 08:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
scribefindegilHello! This is my second year doing Yuletide and I'm so excited to participate! Thank you for writing for me!
General Things I Like:
General DNWs: No explicit sexual content, no non-canon ships (unless you wanna make up some OC Librarians Of Babel and put them in a relationship in which case knock yourself out). Would prefer to avoid AU settings.
Fandoms:
Ancillary Trilogy (Ann Leckie)
Requested Character: Justice of Toren One Esk Nineteen | Breq
These are some of my absolute favorite books. I love the worldbuilding, I love everything the books do with linguistics without including a single actual word of conlang, I love the singing and the different gender systems and so many of the character relationships. But especially I love Breq! Give me more of Breq's relationship with any of the other characters (ideas below, or choose your personal favorite) and I'll be happy!
I really love the weird queerplatonic Thing that Breq, Seivarden, and Mercy of Kalr have going on by the end of the trilogy and it would be great to see some more exploration of that post-canon. Maybe them continuing to negotiate and grow comfortable in their dynamic, outsider POV trying (unsuccessfully) to figure out what the deal is with them, or Seivarden and Mercy of Kalr conspiring to find Breq some new songs. I also really like Kalr Five, so something focused on her relationship with Breq (either individually or how she fits into the Breq/Seivarden/MoK situation) would be great! If you wanted to do some specific Ace Breq exploration it would warm my little asexual heart, and I think Karl Five would be a great lens on that: she's witnessing Seivarden crawling into Breq's bed every night but knows there's nothing sexual going on, so maybe her disabusing some of the other crew members who make incorrect assumptions, or her being ace/uninterested in sex herself and feeling comforted that Breq has found a way to be content without compromising her desires.
(Side note: I love the translation conceit in general but especially how it applies to poetry. If you wanted to use a Radchaai 'translation' of a song lyric, either integrated into the fic or as a title, I would be delighted!)
The Raven Tower (Ann Leckie)
Requested Character: The Strength and Patience of the Hill
I just want more stories about my favorite rock. What is its reunion with the Myriad like? What other stories are there about their past together? After Eolo flees at the end of the book, do they ever meet again? Are there other important humans in its past we didn't hear about? I love the worldbuilding and the layered POV choices in this book, so feel free to play around with the format and writing style. Maybe something from another character's point of view giving us another perspective on S&POTH, especially another god given all the restrictions that truth-telling places on how they talk, but I'd also be interested in something from Eolo's point of view. What are some stories that you have heard?
The Library of Babel
Requested Character: Worldbuilding
I'm fascinated by the world depicted within this story and would love something exploring some of the different sects within the Library: the Inquisitors, the Purifiers, the mystics who have visions of a great circular chamber and a cyclical book which is God, those who believe in the Man Of The Book who has obtained true knowledge and become God, those who believe that there is no more meaning to be found in the books than can be found in the lines of your palm, the futile search for books of Vindication . . . and these are only the ones that our narrator happens to know about. In a near-infinite Library, surely there are countless more. What is the story behind the "wandering decoder" who knows many different languages? Who else wanders far enough from their communities that they reach floors where they can no longer understand what is being said? The narrator believes that humanity is failing, the population dwindling from illness and suicide until only the Library will remain. Is he correct? How does it feel to live in this place? How do people find meaning in a world that seems so fundamentally opposed to it? Give me a Librarian and tell me their story. This can go in whatever direction you want, whether it's hopeful or tragic.
I would also love a work involving the searchable Library Of Babel website: https://libraryofbabel.info It's possible to locate specific text strings within the hexes and link back to them; once you have the hex you can click through to wall, book, and page, so you could leave "directions" to specific pages as all or part of the fic. Is it a message from a Librarian or another wanderer? Did they escape the Library or was the message left for other Librarians to find? Imagine if the technology to search the Library was discovered: how would that change things? Now you can locate anything, but only if you already know what it says. What sort of new schisms and factions does this create? Do they go on pilgrimages in search of texts that are in hexes it would take months or years to travel to, hoping that the neighboring pages will give them some deeper insight? How does this affect the belief in the "true catalog" of the Library?
Rivers of London
Requested Character: Varvara Sidorovna Tamonina
I loooooove Varvara and I'm so delighted by her villain domestication arc. She was a terrifying enemy and then she just lived in their house! For months! She and Peter and Nightingale canonically got drunk together! They're letting her teach magic to a teenager! I'd love any fic that focused on the period between Broken Homes and Foxglove Summer when she was living in the Folly: Peter adjusting to sharing a house with an evil Russian witch while also reeling from the biggest betrayal of his life, her and Molly interacting, Varvara trying (and utterly failing) to flirt with/seduce Nightingale, or anything else involving that period of Weird Domesticity. Alternately, Varvara POV on some of the events of Foxglove Summer. Does Nightingale take her when he finally drives out to the country after hearing that his apprentice traded himself to the Fae? What was that roadtrip like? Was Toby there? Varvara and Abigail magic lessons would also be fun, or one of the times (as mentioned in the comics, image below) when Peter and Nightingale temporarily bust her out of jail to help them with their inquiries and also have a nice lunch. If Nightingale shows up please keep him aroace.
(This. This forever.)
General Things I Like:
- Intense platonic/queerplatonic/ambiguous relationships, especially where one or more of the characters involved are ace- or aro-spec. Just general "whatever those people have going on" dynamics. I love the whole spectrum from healthy and wholesome to exquisitely fucked up.
- Non-sexual intimacy.
- Character exploration and missing scenes, alternate character POV on canon events. I like things that fill in gaps or that really delve into what's going on in a character's head.
- Weird Domesticity, and especially the labor of domesticity and how it ties into the broader material culture. The fantastical becoming mundane with time. The work of cooking, cleaning, mending etc as expressions of care for the community, as expressions of devotion to specific people, or as a burden to be managed.
- Weird and unusual formats: poetry, in-universe documents, odd POV choices, interactive fiction, hidden codes, playing with metatext, it all delights me! (I've got some further ideas for this in my comment on the Unconventionyule mini-challenge! yuletide.dreamwidth.org/353442.html)
- Treats :)
General DNWs: No explicit sexual content, no non-canon ships (unless you wanna make up some OC Librarians Of Babel and put them in a relationship in which case knock yourself out). Would prefer to avoid AU settings.
Fandoms:
Ancillary Trilogy (Ann Leckie)
Requested Character: Justice of Toren One Esk Nineteen | Breq
These are some of my absolute favorite books. I love the worldbuilding, I love everything the books do with linguistics without including a single actual word of conlang, I love the singing and the different gender systems and so many of the character relationships. But especially I love Breq! Give me more of Breq's relationship with any of the other characters (ideas below, or choose your personal favorite) and I'll be happy!
I really love the weird queerplatonic Thing that Breq, Seivarden, and Mercy of Kalr have going on by the end of the trilogy and it would be great to see some more exploration of that post-canon. Maybe them continuing to negotiate and grow comfortable in their dynamic, outsider POV trying (unsuccessfully) to figure out what the deal is with them, or Seivarden and Mercy of Kalr conspiring to find Breq some new songs. I also really like Kalr Five, so something focused on her relationship with Breq (either individually or how she fits into the Breq/Seivarden/MoK situation) would be great! If you wanted to do some specific Ace Breq exploration it would warm my little asexual heart, and I think Karl Five would be a great lens on that: she's witnessing Seivarden crawling into Breq's bed every night but knows there's nothing sexual going on, so maybe her disabusing some of the other crew members who make incorrect assumptions, or her being ace/uninterested in sex herself and feeling comforted that Breq has found a way to be content without compromising her desires.
(Side note: I love the translation conceit in general but especially how it applies to poetry. If you wanted to use a Radchaai 'translation' of a song lyric, either integrated into the fic or as a title, I would be delighted!)
The Raven Tower (Ann Leckie)
Requested Character: The Strength and Patience of the Hill
I just want more stories about my favorite rock. What is its reunion with the Myriad like? What other stories are there about their past together? After Eolo flees at the end of the book, do they ever meet again? Are there other important humans in its past we didn't hear about? I love the worldbuilding and the layered POV choices in this book, so feel free to play around with the format and writing style. Maybe something from another character's point of view giving us another perspective on S&POTH, especially another god given all the restrictions that truth-telling places on how they talk, but I'd also be interested in something from Eolo's point of view. What are some stories that you have heard?
The Library of Babel
Requested Character: Worldbuilding
I'm fascinated by the world depicted within this story and would love something exploring some of the different sects within the Library: the Inquisitors, the Purifiers, the mystics who have visions of a great circular chamber and a cyclical book which is God, those who believe in the Man Of The Book who has obtained true knowledge and become God, those who believe that there is no more meaning to be found in the books than can be found in the lines of your palm, the futile search for books of Vindication . . . and these are only the ones that our narrator happens to know about. In a near-infinite Library, surely there are countless more. What is the story behind the "wandering decoder" who knows many different languages? Who else wanders far enough from their communities that they reach floors where they can no longer understand what is being said? The narrator believes that humanity is failing, the population dwindling from illness and suicide until only the Library will remain. Is he correct? How does it feel to live in this place? How do people find meaning in a world that seems so fundamentally opposed to it? Give me a Librarian and tell me their story. This can go in whatever direction you want, whether it's hopeful or tragic.
I would also love a work involving the searchable Library Of Babel website: https://libraryofbabel.info It's possible to locate specific text strings within the hexes and link back to them; once you have the hex you can click through to wall, book, and page, so you could leave "directions" to specific pages as all or part of the fic. Is it a message from a Librarian or another wanderer? Did they escape the Library or was the message left for other Librarians to find? Imagine if the technology to search the Library was discovered: how would that change things? Now you can locate anything, but only if you already know what it says. What sort of new schisms and factions does this create? Do they go on pilgrimages in search of texts that are in hexes it would take months or years to travel to, hoping that the neighboring pages will give them some deeper insight? How does this affect the belief in the "true catalog" of the Library?
Rivers of London
Requested Character: Varvara Sidorovna Tamonina
I loooooove Varvara and I'm so delighted by her villain domestication arc. She was a terrifying enemy and then she just lived in their house! For months! She and Peter and Nightingale canonically got drunk together! They're letting her teach magic to a teenager! I'd love any fic that focused on the period between Broken Homes and Foxglove Summer when she was living in the Folly: Peter adjusting to sharing a house with an evil Russian witch while also reeling from the biggest betrayal of his life, her and Molly interacting, Varvara trying (and utterly failing) to flirt with/seduce Nightingale, or anything else involving that period of Weird Domesticity. Alternately, Varvara POV on some of the events of Foxglove Summer. Does Nightingale take her when he finally drives out to the country after hearing that his apprentice traded himself to the Fae? What was that roadtrip like? Was Toby there? Varvara and Abigail magic lessons would also be fun, or one of the times (as mentioned in the comics, image below) when Peter and Nightingale temporarily bust her out of jail to help them with their inquiries and also have a nice lunch. If Nightingale shows up please keep him aroace.
(This. This forever.)
