Once upon a fic Letter 2023
Feb. 4th, 2023 09:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flo_neljaDear Once_Upon_Fic Writer,
I'm glad we have fairy tales and myths in common! I'm sure you will write an awesome story! I signed as Nelja-in-English, Nelja is my usual pseud.
What I like: Worldbuilding, characters being clever and witty, foreshadowing, weird surrealist crack that makes sense, dreams or illusion themes, characters knowing and understanding each other well, unreliable narrators, ethical dilemmas, strong women, queer themes, horror themes.
What I prefer not to read: AUs except for canon divergence, character bashing, pandemics, cheating, humor based on misunderstandings or incompetence, post-canon/AU with a sad ending when the canon has a happy one (except specified otherwise), bashing of either science/rationality or magic/spirituality to make the other one look better.
Christabel - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Link: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Christabel;_Kubla_Khan;_The_Pains_of_Sleep_(1816)/Christabel
Characters: Christabel, Geraldine, Roland, Leoline
I'm interested in so many things in this story! Geraldine's origin: is she a ghost? a witch? a vampire? a changeling? is her father really who she pretends? how did she get supernatural powers? Is she doing gleeful evil, or does she have her own angsty story?
The relationship between the fathers: I like to imagine they were lovers or at least had UST, and that it's a part of their fight, and one of the reason they're so eager for reconciliation. You can write a full backstory without the girls and I'll be happy.
Erotic mind control: damn so hot. If you're here for f/f smut with all sweet angst and corruption themes, I'm here too! Christabel is a very sweet heroine for this.
More about Christabel's relationship with her mother (ghost mother!) would be very interesting too.
And of course, the elephant in the room: I'm dying to see a continuation of the story about what was Geraldine's actual plan about Roland, Leoline and Christabel, and if she will win!
Jorogumo (creature)
Wikipedia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jor%C5%8Dgumo
I'd love to see more interiority of the jorogumos, any stories (or an original one, of course) from their PoV. A big part of their stories is about seducing male humans. Do they pretend to have feelings just for eating Do they actually fall in love but it's still in spider nature to eat their mates? Or only when they get bored? Did one person (man or woman) managed to not get eaten by the jorogumo they were courting once, and what made this story different?
Historical or modern are both good. Though I'd like to see at least some reference to the classic story, it doesn't have to be a rewriting, it can be just some jorogumos talking together, maybe taking care of their fire spiders.
The Little Mermaid - Hans Christian Andersen
Link: http://hca.gilead.org.il/li_merma.html
Character: Søstre | Sisters (Den lille Havfrue | The Little Mermaid)
I love the sisters. I love that they each have their personalities, so if you want to write about specifically one, I'll love it, and if it's a group, I'll love it too!
Of course I'm interested in their relationship with their sister: growing up together, the moment where they got to the sea witch to sell their hair, maybe them mourning their sister in the end, maybe them being made aware she's a daughter of the air now?
If you for for individual stories, it doesn't need to be about the heroine of the tale, but I'd like better no romance with a human or anything that makes her story too close to her sister's.
La Montagne Verte | The Green Mountain (Fairy Tale)
Link: https://flo-nelja.dreamwidth.org/735435.html
Characters: The Devil's Blonde Daughter (The Green Mountain)
She's my fave. I love a character who can be like "it's the moment to put to use my skill of not dying when I'm boiled alive into a cauldron". It can be played for laughs, it can be played for horror. How does the devil raise a girl? How did she learn magic? What are her links to her family? How did she get so good at predicting things, is it magic too, or cleverness? Why did the hero forget her, what is the magic involved here, her father's curse, her inhuman nature, something else?
Fandom-specific DNW: the headcanon where's she's an adopted/kidnapped human and not a supernatural creature.
The Puppet-show Man - Hans Christian Andersen
Link: http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/hersholt/ThePuppetShowMan_e.html
Character: The Polytechnic Professor
Who is he? Is he really a human? To me, it seems liked he provoked the dream, or at least was aware or it. It he some kind of malicious but nice fairy? But he seemed to know things about science, and I must confess the idea I liked more is a fairy who actually went to human school.
It can be his point of view on the adventure, or it can be, if you follow his route, how he decided to go to human science school. Or what happens when he comes home after. I love Andersen tales that explore the mix between science and magic, like The Dryad or the Great Sea Serpent, crossovers are very good!
The Snow Queen - Hans Christian Andersen
Link: http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/hersholt/TheSnowQueen_e.html
Characters: The Robber Girl
I'd like some Robber Girl adventures!
It would be nice if she met some other characters, like the Old Woman who knew magic, or the Crows... Crossovers are good too! I love her natural cheerful violence, and how it's compensated by her rejecting her family and liking Gerda's way better.
I also like fics where she has a huge crush on Gerda. It can be conscious or not. It can be them going together in an adventure, post-canon, or in an AU where Gerda was caught by the Snow Queen and the Robber Girl comes to her rescue.
I'd love no bad ending, bittersweet endings are fine. I'm not here for breaking the Gerda/Kay or for cheating, but I'm open to polyamory (and Kay doesn't have to be in the fic in person either).
The Tragic Death of Cu Roi mac Dairi
Links: http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/celtic/ctexts/curoi.html
https://sejh.pagesperso-orange.fr/keltia/version-en/deathcuroi2.html
Characters: Cu Roi mac Dairi, Ferchertne
I love Curoi as a character a lot. He has the potential to be a very cartoonish character "turned upon the latter, thrust him into the earth to his armpits, cropped his hair with his sword, rubbed cow-dung into his head, and then went home", as much as a very tragic one. I love him as a no-nonsense character, or as a mysterious, fairy-like one.
I love the almost-mythological version where his soul is inside an apple inside a salmon: did he put it here? or was he born this way, and bards needed to prophetize where his soul actually was?
About bards, I ship Ferchertne->Curoi a bit, so don't hesitate to go here!
I'm glad we have fairy tales and myths in common! I'm sure you will write an awesome story! I signed as Nelja-in-English, Nelja is my usual pseud.
What I like: Worldbuilding, characters being clever and witty, foreshadowing, weird surrealist crack that makes sense, dreams or illusion themes, characters knowing and understanding each other well, unreliable narrators, ethical dilemmas, strong women, queer themes, horror themes.
What I prefer not to read: AUs except for canon divergence, character bashing, pandemics, cheating, humor based on misunderstandings or incompetence, post-canon/AU with a sad ending when the canon has a happy one (except specified otherwise), bashing of either science/rationality or magic/spirituality to make the other one look better.
Christabel - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Link: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Christabel;_Kubla_Khan;_The_Pains_of_Sleep_(1816)/Christabel
Characters: Christabel, Geraldine, Roland, Leoline
I'm interested in so many things in this story! Geraldine's origin: is she a ghost? a witch? a vampire? a changeling? is her father really who she pretends? how did she get supernatural powers? Is she doing gleeful evil, or does she have her own angsty story?
The relationship between the fathers: I like to imagine they were lovers or at least had UST, and that it's a part of their fight, and one of the reason they're so eager for reconciliation. You can write a full backstory without the girls and I'll be happy.
Erotic mind control: damn so hot. If you're here for f/f smut with all sweet angst and corruption themes, I'm here too! Christabel is a very sweet heroine for this.
More about Christabel's relationship with her mother (ghost mother!) would be very interesting too.
And of course, the elephant in the room: I'm dying to see a continuation of the story about what was Geraldine's actual plan about Roland, Leoline and Christabel, and if she will win!
Jorogumo (creature)
Wikipedia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jor%C5%8Dgumo
I'd love to see more interiority of the jorogumos, any stories (or an original one, of course) from their PoV. A big part of their stories is about seducing male humans. Do they pretend to have feelings just for eating Do they actually fall in love but it's still in spider nature to eat their mates? Or only when they get bored? Did one person (man or woman) managed to not get eaten by the jorogumo they were courting once, and what made this story different?
Historical or modern are both good. Though I'd like to see at least some reference to the classic story, it doesn't have to be a rewriting, it can be just some jorogumos talking together, maybe taking care of their fire spiders.
The Little Mermaid - Hans Christian Andersen
Link: http://hca.gilead.org.il/li_merma.html
Character: Søstre | Sisters (Den lille Havfrue | The Little Mermaid)
I love the sisters. I love that they each have their personalities, so if you want to write about specifically one, I'll love it, and if it's a group, I'll love it too!
Of course I'm interested in their relationship with their sister: growing up together, the moment where they got to the sea witch to sell their hair, maybe them mourning their sister in the end, maybe them being made aware she's a daughter of the air now?
If you for for individual stories, it doesn't need to be about the heroine of the tale, but I'd like better no romance with a human or anything that makes her story too close to her sister's.
La Montagne Verte | The Green Mountain (Fairy Tale)
Link: https://flo-nelja.dreamwidth.org/735435.html
Characters: The Devil's Blonde Daughter (The Green Mountain)
She's my fave. I love a character who can be like "it's the moment to put to use my skill of not dying when I'm boiled alive into a cauldron". It can be played for laughs, it can be played for horror. How does the devil raise a girl? How did she learn magic? What are her links to her family? How did she get so good at predicting things, is it magic too, or cleverness? Why did the hero forget her, what is the magic involved here, her father's curse, her inhuman nature, something else?
Fandom-specific DNW: the headcanon where's she's an adopted/kidnapped human and not a supernatural creature.
The Puppet-show Man - Hans Christian Andersen
Link: http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/hersholt/ThePuppetShowMan_e.html
Character: The Polytechnic Professor
Who is he? Is he really a human? To me, it seems liked he provoked the dream, or at least was aware or it. It he some kind of malicious but nice fairy? But he seemed to know things about science, and I must confess the idea I liked more is a fairy who actually went to human school.
It can be his point of view on the adventure, or it can be, if you follow his route, how he decided to go to human science school. Or what happens when he comes home after. I love Andersen tales that explore the mix between science and magic, like The Dryad or the Great Sea Serpent, crossovers are very good!
The Snow Queen - Hans Christian Andersen
Link: http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/hersholt/TheSnowQueen_e.html
Characters: The Robber Girl
I'd like some Robber Girl adventures!
It would be nice if she met some other characters, like the Old Woman who knew magic, or the Crows... Crossovers are good too! I love her natural cheerful violence, and how it's compensated by her rejecting her family and liking Gerda's way better.
I also like fics where she has a huge crush on Gerda. It can be conscious or not. It can be them going together in an adventure, post-canon, or in an AU where Gerda was caught by the Snow Queen and the Robber Girl comes to her rescue.
I'd love no bad ending, bittersweet endings are fine. I'm not here for breaking the Gerda/Kay or for cheating, but I'm open to polyamory (and Kay doesn't have to be in the fic in person either).
The Tragic Death of Cu Roi mac Dairi
Links: http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/celtic/ctexts/curoi.html
https://sejh.pagesperso-orange.fr/keltia/version-en/deathcuroi2.html
Characters: Cu Roi mac Dairi, Ferchertne
I love Curoi as a character a lot. He has the potential to be a very cartoonish character "turned upon the latter, thrust him into the earth to his armpits, cropped his hair with his sword, rubbed cow-dung into his head, and then went home", as much as a very tragic one. I love him as a no-nonsense character, or as a mysterious, fairy-like one.
I love the almost-mythological version where his soul is inside an apple inside a salmon: did he put it here? or was he born this way, and bards needed to prophetize where his soul actually was?
About bards, I ship Ferchertne->Curoi a bit, so don't hesitate to go here!
