coaltide | Merry Crisis

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2022

Merry Crisis

On the 7^th night of Hanukkah my vindictive author gave to me....

yuletide |

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Ancient Egyptian Religion - I don't know all of these gods mentioned here enough to judge them all well, but it was really well-written, the historical worldbuilding is good and I really loved the atmosphere it evoked and this is very much the fic I would have wanted for Imhotep if I had ever thought to want it. It's happy and loving and beautiful. Shame about the title.

The Culture - I don't know the canon beyond knowing that the ships have obnoxious names, so A+ there if these ships aren't canon. Really well-written and fun, I loved the begrudging relationship that developed between MC and the deeply believable AI warship.

Pern - this is the fic being wanked on above and OMG, author, I apologize for Coal and their lack of reading ability. There is no sexual assault, not even any implied sexual assault. (One character creepily threatens to blackmail MC but not in any explicitly sexual way, and the way the fic ends up they are 100% not going to end up having dragon sex, given that Creep didn't even Impress and MC ended up with a bronze, which is the least rapey outcome of all and means it's basically up to him if he ever wants to have sex at all.) This was a really well-written, canon-true-but-better OC Pern fic, and if Recip wanted an exploration of gender on Pern and didn't DNW background transphobia this would have been 100% a good fic for them.

Star Trek/LHoD - okay I read the other three just because I wanted an excuse to complain about this one. :( It's a perfectly cromulent outsider-POV retelling of Star Trek 2009, and if this was a fest for that it would be fine, but it gets really basic facts about Gethenian worldbuilding and canon wrong and while I wouldn't say Therem's characterization is *wrong* exactly, the base outline is there, it really doesn't read like him at all. This feels like it was written by someone who really wanted to write a Star Trek:2009 retread for Yuletide and was working from extremely vague memories of a LHoD read many years ago. (I'd say they just read the Wikipedia article except several of the canon facts they got wrong are in the wikipedia article.) All the thumbs down.

"not even any implied sexual assault."

I earnestly ask you: do you know how to read?

OK fair, it's more strongly implied than I picked up on first read (because I do tend to skim without noticing I'm doing it when things get uncomfortable.)

It's still not a major part of the fic, and absolutely standard for what goes on in Weyrs, and CNTW would have been fine.

Gifting someone forced outing, blackmail, and implied rape of a trans character unrequested as a holiday gift is hot garbage, pal. It's way worse than the original gay bashing dragon shit.

Okay, fine, you made me actually look up the original request. Recip asked for exploration of gender and gender roles, lgbt characters, exploration of the 'drawbacks' of Weyr life and Impression, mentions liking a cathartic but bittersweet ending, and does not DNW anything around noncon, rape, or transphobia. This isn't what I would have written them, and I can get why it might have upset you browsing the archive, but it was CTNW and it's absolutely in line with what that request could imply they'd want.

Also they have a "promise I'll finish it tomorrow!" letter where the Pern section and all the general bits are missing completely, so honestly, whatever.

" it's absolutely in line with what that request could imply they'd want."

How the fuck is this a happy ending you god damn numbnuts

dc

If you are the recipient and hated it, reject the thing already and stop wanking on anonmemes. If you're not the recipient and you're mad someone wrote something you didn't want to read and CNTW'd for it, get over yourself.

Also if you're the recip, finish your letter next time if you want to be able to complain that you didn't get exactly what you wanted.

"I showed everybody by Impressing a very special Bronze when not even I believed I could" is like *the* cathartic Pern happy ending, kid. Have you ever been in Pern fandom?

"while being casually raped and having my identity held hostage, oh well tee hee"

dc

You are the Apache Wars RPF writer trying to shift attention to another fic and I claim my five pounds.

1) That actually *is* the canonical "happy" ending of the first ever Pern story, because Pern, man, why is it like that. Congrats, this author did way better than McCaffrey managed.

2) That isn't actually how *this* story ends though. Weirdly, "happy ending" doesn't mean "nothing bad has ever happened to me, ever."

"Liking a cathartic but bittersweet ending"

It's not and you are way invested in making this out to be a lot worse than it really is.

I have zero horses in this race but the shot + chaser of "I apologize for Coal and their lack of reading ability." + "I do tend to skim without noticing I'm doing it when things get uncomfortable." is hilarious.

Look I'm also part of coal :p

If you've got the same concern about the Star Trek/LHoD fic I do, I noticed that Estraven's great romance with Ashe seems to be almost entirely in the letters written for public consumption. The cyphered messages are all business and pretty cold, except for the last one after Vulcan's destruction. Which makes me wonder how close they are, in reality, as opposed to the version they are spinning for the Federation.

That's a neat interpretation! It still results in the Therem we get on the page not really showing me much of canon Therem (or Ashe either), though, and given that this is an AU where everything other than Therem is different, that doesn't leave much of the canon.

But no the main thing that got me was kemmer being annual (kemmer is not annual) and then a lot of other little stuff I started side-eying after noticing that. And again it's an AU if they want to change how often kemmer happens, fine, but at that point they've changed so much that what's the point.

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Merry Crisis

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