chris | Reading

So I got on a plane this morning and saw my parents and then took my mom to the hospital AGAIN because the dialysis catheter keeps jiggling itself loose or whatever, so it's been a long day. But you know what's not long? Today's fic!

Even shorter than some of the others, this treat is TINY! Also not technically Christmas, because the Dragon Age universe doesn’t have Christmas. They do have Satinalia, which also involves giving presents and some medieval-Christmas-ish traditions, so I have decided that’s close enough.

Dragon Age Calendar 2023: An Appreciative Audience. Varric tells stories. It’s too short to say more.

‘Varric coughs pointedly. “If none of you want to hear this….” A chorus of apologies, as if anyone could stop Varric telling a story once he’s started. There’s a bite in the crisp Satinalia air, beneath the bonfire-scent of autumn, and lazy sparks float from the crackling fire like tiny stars. There are toasts and gifts and ghost stories, and laughter echoing across the hazy hillside.’

A song:I did actually manage to find a Christmas song about a dragon, but it was incredibly cheesy, so you're getting Six White Boomers instead.

And a rec for the road! hurry down my chimney tonight by gusuvibes. (Untamed AU, wangxian)
Rated T

NHS convinces JC and WWX to work as Santa's Elves for the local mall's Christmas grotto. LWJ brings his adorable child A-Yuan to see Santa. You see where things are going.

Back to Day 6 | On to Day 8

ashkitty

We are halfway through! And we’re going back to Oxford. This is maybe cheating a little – the story itself was written for Yuletide, and is dated the 6th of December, but there isn’t anything especially Christmassy in it.

In 2075, OUP publishes a festschrift (this is, for non-academic types, a book of essays honouring a particular distinguished scholar) celebrating the world of James Dunworthy. It is edited by Colin, now a fellow of Balliol himself, who writes the introduction to the volume and the various things in it. It’s one of my favourite Yuletide experiences – something about the connections of people through history, and the value of good teaching, really hit people (including me, unexpectedly, while writing it). So here is:

Paradox (Oxford Time Travel, gen)
Rated G

‘It is traditional to begin this sort of project with a biography of the person to whom it is being presented, and following that, to list the contributed articles and how the author and outcome of each was started on its path by the eminent scholar being celebrated within the pages. In this case, it seems both unnecessary and redundant, as the essays themselves have become more retrospective than tribute.’

Song: Stop the Cavalry (there IS in fact a Christmas song for time travellers!), version by the Cory Band and the Gwalia Singers

Fic rec: Once and Future by phoenixflight (The Dark is Rising, Will/Bran)
Rated T

Christmas is still a good Dark is RIsing time, and this little treat is full of great lines (Bran's reaction to Will getting a bit melancholy about eventually losing him is brilliant) and, like all the best TDIR fics, evokes a strong sense of place and atmosphere.

Back to Day 5 | On to Day 7

ashkitty

Back to Kirk and Spock again! Told you they’re almost half the list. Advent 2012. The Enterprise crew carry out their mission to investigate weird shit wherever they find it. Guided by a Christmas star (kind of) they stumble on an unexpected birth (kind of). One of my favourite things about writing Trek fic is how weird and unexplainable you can make things (this will come up again later).

Nativus (Star Trek Reboot, Kirk/Spock)
Rated G

‘By the time they reach the surface, it is no longer the barren wasteland the initial scans had indicated. They stand surrounded by vegetation, lush and thick and a shade of green so bright it's almost gold; by the sound of trickling streams and the growing thrum of insect life. The tricorders vibrate with each new discovery as lifesigns appear around them with increasing rapidity, and above them coloured clouds rush through the sky like a gymnastic rainbow.…’

Song: Silent Night (There are of course many versions; this is the absolutely haunting one by Sinead O'Connor.)

Fic rec: Feast of the Unwise Men by Drayton (Oxford Time Travel)
Rated G

Technically this is an Epiphany fic, but since I'm doing pre-Christmas days and not post-Christmas days, here we are. It's about those few days after Dunworthy and Colin retrieve Kivrin from the Black Death, and the fallout - while knowledge of the canon will definitely help here, it's also a fic for anyone who has had to deal with university administrations.

Back to Day 4 | On to Day 6

ashkitty

On to Day 4!

It wouldn’t be Christmas season without The Dark is Rising! What surprised me the most is how few I’ve apparently written that are actually Christmas-centric, when it’s such an important part of the series! (It might also be that I just don’t have them anymore, or didn’t post them to AO3, because I’ve been writing for this fandom a long time.)

This one was, as the author notes indicate, scribbled out quickly during Christmas Eve church, and fixed for posting afterward. I did go back more recently and do some edits. I didn’t live in Wales yet in 2002, so got a few little things wrong – mostly younger!Ash didn’t quite get the church/chapel divide, and had them all heading into Tywyn to the local Anglican church even though Owen is explicitly noted as going to chapel. The further problem is that by the time this takes place, the chapel in Tywyn was already turned into flats, though I think the one in Abergynolwyn (closer to Clwyd farm anyway) was still going. I realise these details are really not that important to most readers, and especially have no real bearing on the direction of a very short fic about accidentally coming out to your parents, but well, I live here.

It is very short – barely over 1k words – so I don’t want the intro to end up longer than the fic.

While Shepherds Watched (TDIR, Will/Bran)
Rated G

‘It was the first Christmas Eve of his lifetime that he had not spent with his family, noisy and bustling in the bright din of a two-storey farmhouse full of children and spouses and nieces and nephews and neighbours dropping by just to say hello, the smell of cinnamon and apples and pudding, the warmth of the fire interrupted by bursts of cold air when the door opened, the sound of six or seven Christmas carols all jangling together at once.’

Song: While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks by Night
(I wanted the Welsh version but couldn't find a good one, so we went with Carols from Kings for choirboy Will.)

Fic rec: We Wish You a Logical Christmas by little_ogre (MDZS Star Trek AU, wangxian)
Rated M

What caught my attention first about this fic is that it's the JIang, not the Lan, who are Vulcans. Half-Vulcan WWX brings LWJ home during Christmas shore leave, and pon farr happens. It's excellent.

Back to Day 3 | Onward to Day 5

alobear

Over the weekend, I played two games that were new to me:

Castle Combo:
In this game, you purchase cards from a display in the middle and add them to your three by three grid. Each card has an immediate effect (usually providing you with money or keys) and an end-game effect (usually amassing points according to specific criteria). As with a lot of games, it's all about balancing obtaining resources during the game and racking up points for the end of the game. Most of the points relate to where the cards are positioned in your grid, so there's some careful planning involved. It's exactly the kind of game I like, with lots of criteria to fulfil across the course of the game, and I really enjoyed it.

Phantom Ink:
In this game, there are two teams, each of which have a 'ghost' giving them clues to identify a specific word. The teams have cards with questions on them, which they can give their ghost to answer, and the ghost then writes the answer one letter at a time, until the team tells them to stop. The questions gradually build up on both sides, until one team guesses the correct word. It's a bit different to other games like this that I've played, because both teams are trying to guess the same word, which adds layers to the strategy.
I usually prefer to be the clue-giver rather than guessing in these types of games, but I actually really enjoyed both in this one.

I also finished my second Netgalley ARC - Loon Point by Carrie Classon:
In this book, we follow Norry, who runs a holiday resort in rural Minnesota; Lizzie, an 8-year-old whose mother is struggling with drug addiction; and Wendell, an elderly man who thinks his life is terrible.
Over the course of the book, they all come together in various ways, and build connections with each other over the period of a year. All three perspectives are extremely well written, with distinctive narrative voices that match their age and lifestage. I wasn't all that keen on Wendell to begin with, but he had the best arc of all of them by the end.
It's a much quieter story than I was expecting, but I really enjoyed it. It's a bit repetitive in places, but that fits with the nature of the story being told and it didn't bother me that much.
I do like a female protagonist in her mid-40s, and Norry's attitudes and responses to things felt authentic.
I liked the romance aspect a lot, but was glad it didn't overpower the other parts of the story.
There were some logistical issues that weren't quite thought through (particularly in relation to hospital bills) but that didn't really detract from the emotional impact of the book, which was very good.

ashkitty

So the many times I wrote for the K/S Advent Calendar mean there are more Star Trek fics on this list than anything else. This was 2010’s offering, in which Spock convinces Jim to go home to Iowa and see his family for Christmas. We do spend a bit of time grappling with nu!Trek Jim’s troubled childhood, but it’s still ultimately a happy story about growing up, and coming home.

Delusions of our Childhood Days (Star Trek, Kirk/Spock)

‘He glanced over at Spock. “Sick of hearing this shit yet? Ready to tell me it’s illogical?”

“Jim,” Spock answered patiently, “I agreed to accompany you on this outing. I am aware I influenced you in choosing to pursue it in the first place for the sole purpose of confronting the emotional upheaval of your past. Since then I have partaken of an intoxicating substance and am sitting with you, in subzero temperatures, on the roof. No part of this scenario is the least bit logical.”

Jim reached for Spock’s hand, holding it between his own, still gazing off toward the trees. “But you’re here.”’

A song to go with it: Thunder Road (not a Christmas song, but relevant to the story)

And a fic rec:The Cold Days of Winter (Eight Days of Luke, David/Luke) by Daegaer
Rated G

So it's probably important to know the canon for this one (and the more about Norse mythology the better) but if you do it's exquisite. There are moments - David's hesitation to light a match, not because he's afraid Luke will appear but because he's afraid he won't, and he'll have to let go of the idea that it was ever more than his imagination. Luke's fierce protectiveness is lovely, but there's a very definite shudder of dark things to come at the end. A good fic for a cold night!

Back to Day 2 | On to Day 4

ashkitty

I've been awake for just over 23 hours so going to dive right in here.

This 2015 Yuletide fic features THREE SEPARATE Christmases, so it’s like a free gift with purchase! Or something. Connie Willis’ Oxford Time Travel Series always makes me think of Christmas, partly because the first one I read was Doomsday Book (which happens over Christmas in several time periods) and second because I wrote Yuletide fics for it three years in a row.

If you don’t know it, you should check it out – it’s not always an easy read, and there are some weird little linguistic catches that can grate (the English people in these books talk like an American imagines English people in the 1920s might have spoken). I found Blackout/All Clear a frustrating slog until suddenly I didn’t, because somehow the experience of going through all that repeatedly with the characters made sense.

Anyway, if you do know it, then this fic follows Colin through the years between Doomsday Book and post-All Clear, but is much shorter than any of those and will not take so much dedication to read.

A Carol of Dreaming Spires (Oxford Time Travel, Colin Templar/Polly Churchill)

‘It was tradition, by now: Dunworthy in his armchair, Badri folded onto one end of the faded sofa and Kivrin curled against him. Colin stretched out on the floor in front of the blocked-off fireplace. The only new addition this year was Polly, perched on the floor with a tartan blanket wrapped around her shoulders. Colin snuck looks at her while pretending to read the book Kivrin had given him.’

A song to go with it: The Atheist Christmas Carol

And a fic rec: Yippee Ki Yay, Father Christmas (Everwood, Bright & Ephram) by Cyren2132

Have you seen Everwood? One of the best shows the CW decided not to keep; the premise is so cheesy but the characters were so, so good. (And Bright is Chris Pratt at his young, pre-being-a-super-Republican-for-some-reason best.) Anyway this is the one where Bright and Ephram get stranded in a roadside motel on Christmas Eve.

Back to Day 1 | On to Day 3

ashkitty

The thing about being in fandom for a long time, or at least one of the things, is that I have written a lot of holiday fics over the years. And I thought it might be fun to do a sort of Advent Calendar and revisit them!

It's a good excuse to give some old fics some air time, and also to spread the love and post some recs for other holiday fics I have loved.

Day 1:

We kick things off with some light-hearted fun! This was written for the Kirk/Spock Advent Calendar in 2011. I’d written a couple more serious fics for the same event in previous years, so wanted to change it up a bit and go full-on ENTERPRISE SAVES CHRISTMAS SPECIAL for this one.

Operation Sugarplum (Star Trek Reboot, Kirk/Spock)
Rated Gen
‘The transporter room was full of them, most in dress uniforms from their cadet days, some in Operations red, and most with a fluffy red Santa hat perched jauntily on their heads. Spock was uncertain where all those had come from. One belonging to a young officer from Medical looked suspiciously as if it had spent a previous incarnation as a sock, but Spock did not consider himself an experienced judge of Santa Claus paraphernalia, so neglected to mention it.’

A song to go with it: Santa Claus is Comin to Town, of course!

And a rec: merry christmas ya filthy animal by belovedmuerto
(The Untamed, wangxian but it's Jin Zixuan POV, modern AU)
Rated Teen

Picked this one because I'm headed to L.A. tomorrow and because I wanted to get an MDZS fic in - none of mine are going to be, as I haven't written any AUs and there is an understandable lack of Christmas in Ancient Fantasy China. It's the final one of a series, but I read them out of order and it was fine - they're pretty standalone, as long as you grasp the uncomplicated premise that WWX ran off to California where LWJ lived. I love the whole series because I love L.A. and it's so full of place, and this is just one of those warm fuzzy things where people basically get along and have a cosy time together and it's all very sweet.

On to Day 2

alobear

A Castle in the Clouds by Kerstin Gier is a quirky novel about a young woman working as an intern at a hotel in the mountains. It was very highly recommended to me a while ago, but I just didn't get on with it at all. I don't know how much was down to the audiobook narrator putting on lots of different (admittedly relevant) accents for all the different characters - but I also didn't really like Sophie as a protagonist and nothing about the story interested me much. I had intended to persevere but ultimately decided it wasn't for me and gave up.

alobear

The Island of Eternal Love by Daina Chaviano is a multi-strand story, charting the lives of various families that all have a connection to Cuba. In the 1990s, Cecilia meets a mysterious old woman in a bar and listens to the tale of her ancestors, while also investigating the appearances of a ghostly house in Miami, the city where she lives.
I do like a multi-generational family saga - but I found it a bit difficult to connect to this one. I wasn't all that keen on Cecilia as a protagonist, and the various strands of the story felt to disparate and remote to form a cohesive whole. The inclusion of the supernatural aspects took me by surprise and felt a bit jarring, as well. It was also pretty grim in places, especially dealing with what happened to a lot of the female characters.
It did all come together by the end, and I enjoyed it overall, but the final twist was a bit cliched and the book didn't feel wholly satisfying to me. I did learn a lot about Cuba, though, which was all very interesting.

The Wormworld Saga by Daniel Lieske is a middle-grade comic book series, which follows Jonas through a glowing painting in his grandmother's attic to a strange world full of monsters. He is told he is the prophesied saviour, who is tasked with stopping an ancient evil from escaping its prison.
It took a while for me to get fully into the story, which I definitely did by the end of volume 4 - and it went to some very interesting places after that. There are certainly a lot of different narrative layers due to play in in future instalments!
I liked a lot of the characters and some of the art is absolutely gorgeous. I also liked the presentation of Jonas' panic disorder and the way this presented obstacles to his quest, despite him being seemingly invulnerable to harm in the alternate world.

alobear

I think I need to stop listening to paranormal romance trilogies by Nora Roberts - after I finish the Three Sisters Island series, of course...
Dance Upon the Air is the first in that series, and it follows Nell, who is fleeing an abusive husband and finds an unexpected sense of belonging on the island, as well as a thriving catering business and a romance with the local sheriff.
It follows a very similar format to the Keys trilogy (which came out two or three years later) and the Lost Brides trilogy (which concluded this year, nearly 25 years later), though there's a fair amount less of the supernatural stuff and the story focuses almost entirely on the romance and mundane business aspects.
Much like with the Keys trilogy, I was rather disappointed by the romance - even though it's clear to him that Nell has been damaged by a previous relationship, Zack still bullies her into accepting his advances - and his reaction to her later revelations about her past made me pretty angry.
Still, again much like the other series, I loved the other characters - especially Mia and Ripley, who are the protagonists of the other two books in this trilogy.
So, while this one didn't really blow my socks off in any way, I'm still invested enough in the world and the other two women to want to see it through.

althea_valara

Boy am I late with this...

I did a LOT of knitting in a very short timeframe in November, and TBH it pooped me out and I think I'm still recovering. BUT! I successfully knitted a pair of legwarmers to wear to the A New World concert! Here they are:

A pair of cabled legwarmers. Yes, one's bigger than the other.

A pair of cabled legwarmers. Yes, one's bigger than the other.

[Image Description: A pair of knitted legwarmers. They are Aran colored (think natural undyed yarn) and feature a folded ribbed cuff at top, with lazy cables on the body and an intricate cable at the back. One is larger than the other.]

So yeah, this pattern comes in small and large sizes. Small wouldn't fit me, but large was TOO big. I altered the pattern some for my first one, taking some stitches out to make it smaller. Well, I finished it and tried it on and nope, too big. So for the second I took even MORE stitches out of the pattern. This one felt like it fit well, but as soon as I started walking, it drooped.

I didn't have time to reknit them, so I made do with them as is, and used elastic headbands under the cuff to keep them up. That worked well! Also, I shortened the pattern because in the pattern pic, the lower edge was dragging on the ground and I didn't like that. Unfortunately, I shortened it TOO much. I might unpick the bind off and knit them a bit longer, but for now, they work. And no, I am likely not going to reknit the too big one. TOO MUCH WORK.

I also made progress on a hoodie!
Central Park Hoodie November 2025 Progress

Central Park Hoodie November 2025 Progress

[Image Description: a sleeve in progress for a knitted hoodie. It's mostly gray in color and features deep ribbing at the cuff. A center cable panel runs up the middle, in teal.]

At the beginning of the month, I had one cable cross done. Now I have two. So not much progress, but hey, progress is progress.

I also did some work on the Versailles Scarf, a small true lace knitted scarf. I wanted to finish this for the concert as well, but decided the legwarmers were more important. It'd be nice to get this done for Christmas, but with the lack of crafting I've been doing so far this month, it's not gonna happen.

FOLKS! I had a cat for 20 minutes!
A photo of a calico kitty who visited our house for about 20 minutes.

[Image Description: A photo of a calico kitty visited our house for a bit.]

She came up to our patio door before the snow hit, when it was still decent out, and we decided to let her in for a bit, once we closed the bedroom doors. I, of course, was enamored. Mom less so. Being a cat, she did cat things, like scratching at an area rug (mom yelled at her, poor thing, but I can't really fault mom for that) and jumping on the kitchen table to try to get to our Christmas cactus. I kept a close eye on her the entire time she was in the house, so when I saw you going for the plant, I gently picked her up and deposited her back on the floor, because well, I don't know if those plants are safe for cats.

She was inquisitive and explored a lot, and liked to rub against legs. At one point, she was in our living room and started trotting towards the kitchen, so I called out to mom to let her know she was headed mom's way. Unfortunately mom was distracted and didn't hear me, and the cat, being friendly, came up behind her and rubbed her legs and mom almost tripped on her. :(

We considered calling an animal shelter, but due to her friendliness, decided to just let her back outside. Not before she jumped on the table AGAIN, though. I tried to grab her to deposit her back on the floor, but she jumped on the back of one of our chairs, and well, the chair tipped over.

Which means mom has declared NO CATS. :( I had really hoped she'd come around and we could, like, adopt a senior kitty, and my older sister made noise about us doing just that at Thanksgiving, but I don't think mom would be happy with a cat. Alas. But at least I had one for 20 minutes.

Current Mood: cold

lathany

We did Christmas at Kew again this year. I had a rather excellent boozy, loaded hot chocolate and steak teryaki.

And the lights were wonderful.

Current Mood: sleepy

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
					1	2
3	4	5	6	7	8	9
10	11	12	13	14	15	16
17	18	19	20	21	22	23
24	25	26	27	28	29	30
31

A game for one to thirteen billion players

12 Days (til) Christmas Day 7

12 Days (til) Christmas Day 6

12 Days (til) Christmas Day 5

12 Days (til) Christmas Day 4

Games and Books

12 Days (til) Christmas Day 3

12 Days (til) Christmas Day 2

Twelve Days of (until) Christmas, Day 1

A Castle in the Clouds

Islands and Wormworlds

Dance Upon the Air

Crafting Update, November 2025 + 20 Minute Kitty!

Christmas at Kew

Profile

August 2025

Most Popular Tags

Page Summary

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags