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Yuletide Delight
Dec. 30th, 2022 07:10 pm I was gifted a wonderful story for Yuletide set in the fun, mad (yet oddly believable) world of The Invisible Library series by Genevieve Cogman. The series is about (summarising, badly) a somewhat secret society of librarians who acquire/steal particular rare books from different dimensions while carefully observing neutrality between the chaotic forces of the Fay (individualistic creatures who focus their existence on playing archetypal roles e.g. a scheming mastermind, a pure-spirited princess, a rogue-with-a-heart-of-gold) and the ordered powers of the Dragons (dragons who can shapeshift at will into human form and live in stiflingly hierarchical societies). All three of the sides are problematic.
My request was for a story about Lord Silver, a Fay with the archetype of an (approximately) eighteenth century libertine who is a series regular who tends to get told off for doing things like standing around on rooftops at night in a dramatically billowing cloak. I got a great character piece (with plot!) showing him moving from being at odds with the series heroine to – well, that would be telling, but to an attitude that is in-line with his canon characterisation. Really well written with an eye for the amusing detail.
On the Outside by Anonymous
Thank you very much, still unknown benefactor.
I've been away for a few days so haven't had a chance to read much of the Yuletide archive. One story that did jump out at me this morning was set in the world of Joe Abercrombie's First Law trilogy. The Honeymoon. Glokta (bitter, crippled torturer) and Ardee (alcoholic, pregnant with another man's child) have a honeymoon. I can't actually remember if the Union has honeymoons as part of its culture, but it's an obvious enough Europe-analogue that it probably does. Anyway, this story could easily have been flat and awful, but instead it manages to show the characters being fucked up, yet still caring about each other, and gets in some good lines, as Abercrombie characters are prone to.
My request was for a story about Lord Silver, a Fay with the archetype of an (approximately) eighteenth century libertine who is a series regular who tends to get told off for doing things like standing around on rooftops at night in a dramatically billowing cloak. I got a great character piece (with plot!) showing him moving from being at odds with the series heroine to – well, that would be telling, but to an attitude that is in-line with his canon characterisation. Really well written with an eye for the amusing detail.
On the Outside by Anonymous
Thank you very much, still unknown benefactor.
I've been away for a few days so haven't had a chance to read much of the Yuletide archive. One story that did jump out at me this morning was set in the world of Joe Abercrombie's First Law trilogy. The Honeymoon. Glokta (bitter, crippled torturer) and Ardee (alcoholic, pregnant with another man's child) have a honeymoon. I can't actually remember if the Union has honeymoons as part of its culture, but it's an obvious enough Europe-analogue that it probably does. Anyway, this story could easily have been flat and awful, but instead it manages to show the characters being fucked up, yet still caring about each other, and gets in some good lines, as Abercrombie characters are prone to.
