coaltide | C.R.E.A.M

Entry tags:

2021

C.R.E.A.M

Coal ruins exchanges around me - spitey spitey fic y'all.

Sign-ups: Fri 15 Oct to Sat 23 Oct (~~Countdown~~)
Assignments out by: Mon 25 Oct
Default deadline: Sat 11 Dec
Assignment deadline: Sat 18 Dec
Reveals: Sat 25 Dec

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....and a Partridge in a Pear Tree!

Yuletide Discord for Hippos & Exchanges After Dark Discords for Namespace ~~drama~~ 18+ discussion. Google Group for PHs.

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You can also use a tag for this - if you make your letter link "https://username.dreamwidth.org/tag/yuletide2021letter" and then make sure you use that tag on your letter, it will take people to a cut-tag-enabled version. (I'm going to do that this year so I can use spoiler cuts.)

As a bonus that way you don't need a placeholder because the tag link will work no matter when you post the letter as long as it has the tag.

Yeah, a lot of that stuff reads like a) I am trying to be so open to all kinks I don't actively hate that I scare people off and b) I am fetishizing old-style two-white-dudes slash fic where you can tell who tops by the hair color and c) I am extremely socially awkward and bad at current fandom discourse.

But the "modern western genders" stuff is pretty clearly "I'm an actual real-life transphobe," otherwise they wouldn't think "modern western genders" means trans stuff. (I am super tempted to write them an Imperial Radch AU that meets all their qualifications. Definitely no modern Western genders there! Don't know how else to avoid it.)

For the record I'm using the mobile letter links from the app because I'm not out here to deal with horrible themes and colour schemes. If these letters look like shit that's their business.

Tarlan
🚩 Starts off letter with an apology (why) for letter length (what) and the letter isn't even that long (sigh)
🚩 Looks like they tried to sneak in extra fandoms in the first version of their letter.
☑️ Beautifully clear & simple formatting of the username info at the top, everyone please just copy this.
☑️ Concise but open prompts. I could work with their likes.

The whole YES PLEASE / NO THANKS for likes/dislikes is cute, but if there's a MUST HAVE like there is here then just put it at the top of the yes list, don't fuck around.

Are they requesting Old Guard actors in other roles and asking for crossovers in the hopes of getting an Old Guard fic? I've never seen it, but I wondered why Tarlan was fine with a crossover with any of the actors' other characters and that's the film they have in common.

Blurble
☑️ AO3 username.
☑️ Great general formatting.

Solid letter. I have no notes.

If this is the coalie who was promoting Last Scenario a while ago then I want you to know that I gave it a go on my phone but the controls were so ass I had to quit. I appreciate that it actually works, unlike other games from that era made with those tools, but no one has time for a 4:3 rpg with overlaid directional buttons and no touch menus, c'mon son. I will probably check out the LP though.

theflirtmeister
🚩 "As you can see from my Ao3 page-" does not link AO3 page or username.
🚩 I might just be tired but I read that Coco prompt 3 times and I don't get it.
☑️ Simple DNWs.

Low effort, haphazard. Not impossible to work with, but gives you very few options. Overall, a typical tumblr letter.

chokolattejedi
☑️ AO3 username.
☑️ Clear OR outs.
☑️ Includes mini-challenges.
🚩 A paragraph from the Are You being Served section is copied into the Hercules section

Maybe the missing paragraph has the explanation for it, but the write-up for Disney's Hades seems more interested in the unfair treatment of Greek Myth Hades. Aside from that, one other request does get all ranty, but the vast majority of the letter is enthusiastic and detailed without being too overwhelming. Good shit.

DC

Yeah, as it is, it reads as "DNW: any attempt to write the POV character's narrative voice IC" to me, which seems pretty ??? I can't imagine trying to work around this DNW for something like Discworld or Jeeves and Wooster. Whereas something more specific like "DNW: footnotes" or similar more concrete aspects of the formatting and framing would make a lot more sense to me.

Well, there's my Yuletide ruined!

??? Signups haven't closed yet?

are you new, bruh?

They send out a preliminary email to the pinch hit list prior to signups closing. No actual PHs have gone out yet.

Seriously. Don't expect coal to be anything but judgmental.

I did once request a modern-AU non-pastiche sewer digression fic in that fandom, but nobody ever wrote it. :(

ootl

I mean, I can actually see it for something like Discworld or Jeeves? They have the kind of voice where someone trying to pastiche and failing can be like nails on a chalkboard, so something like "pterry's writing style is so distinct that only he can pull it off, I'd rather see something about the characters in your voice, writer" would be mildly wanky if someone is overly judgemental but not fundamentally bad?

if "more like canon, but poorly done" bugs someone enough that they have to make it an enforceable DNW, though, yuletide just might not be the exchange for them.

If you got a sign-up with no DNWs in the optional details and a letter thread that said outright "I have no DNWs in these fandoms", would you believe them or would you assume they were naive?

Naive

How about "I have no DNWs for these fandoms up to and including literal squicking"

+1

There are some canons where getting the voice wrong is worse than just doing plain transparent prose.

And given yuletide there are some canons where you say "I love canon but if you give me actual cuneiform tablets I will also need an English prose translation"

Then make a canon-specific "DNW: fic that imitates the Wodehousian voice". It will turn off some writers, but so will "only imitate the canon voice if you can do it well", and that's not enforceable.

If I received that in a letter, I'd still err on the side of sticking close to canon content and tone.

I still wouldn't include extremely controversial content unless I got a specific go ahead. (Eg "I have no DNWs, and I'm fine with character death, torture, and noncon.")

I definitely would use common sense about sensitive subjects, and not take this as a challenge to write the darkest fic I could. (Eg "Character A tries to save Character B from dying of COVID!")

Now I'm imagining someone uploading a photo of their clay tablet with the little reed strokes, and arguing with the mods about how to calculate the word count in the syllabary.

I'd believe them because they said so outright! It's not just a void situation. But I also never write very out there things unless they're specifically prompted anyway, not because I'm scared to but because my natural wheelhouse tends pretty vanilla.

What if one of the fandoms had canon vivisection kink? Would you at least assume it meant anything up to what's in canon is fine? I don't want to have to list out everything I'm fine with and end up like Renault person upthread, but I honestly can't think of anything that would be over my line this year.

For something as unusual as vivisection, I'd probably be more comfortable writing it if the letter said, "Anything up to what's in canon is fine."

Naive. I'd take them a lot more seriously if they specified "I have no DNWs for these fandoms including common squick and triggers, from character death and gore to out-there kinks and controversial subjects".

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Page 29 of 173

C.R.E.A.M

Re: Formatting Woes

Re: Letter 3T1L - Mary Renault book letters

Re: Letter 3T1L - Disney Animated Villains

Re: DNW Workshop

Re: DNW Workshop

Re: Pinch hit email out

Re: Letter 3T1L - Mary Renault book letters

Re: Pinch hit email out

Re: Letter 3T1L - Mary Renault book letters

Re: DNW Workshop

Re: Pinch hit email out

Re: DNW Workshop

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