Dear Yuletide Author (2025) - Now Expanded a Bit!

[opalmatrix]

Thank you for writing me a story for Yuletide! My biggest request is no tragedies, no darkness unless followed by light. I think we could all use a little light and brightness in these times, and I in particular have mood troubles when the days are short. But, contrariwise, I am a definite believer in the idea that tensions or even pain make a sweet ending better, so go for salt caramel or even black licorice rather than cotton candy.

Have some optional details about what I like and don't like in a story.

Preferences

I Don't Like:

• Sickly-sweet, coy, cutesy romantic stuff (anything in the "tee-hee-hee, is he looking at me?" category is definitely out)
• Extensive use of epithets, or epithets that don't match the character POV (no one should think of his or her long-time lover as "the green-eyed man," for example): these will throw me right out of a story
• Characters acting out of character, especially if the purpose is to force them into a relationship (doubly bad if that relationship is romantic or sexual)
• By-the-numbers, every-action-described sex (a/k/a Ikea Erotica - link goes to TVTropes). Note that actual sex is fine (I love me some sexy stories) — just don't like it when the descriptions turn into a set of exact stage directions.
• Mpreg, rape, forced sex (including sex pollen and fuck-or-die), hatesex. Dubcon is OK, especially the sort when the reluctant partner really wants the other person but is just not quite feeling ready yet or doesn't think se wants it in this particular way but gets off on it anyway.
• Humiliation or betrayal (without a damn good plot reason) of a character by a friend or lover
• A/B/O and related kinks/tropes, incest (unless canon), scat/watersports/emetophilia, tentacles, non-human genitalia.

I Like:

• Strong characterization (including character-appropriate dialog: no earthy, uneducated characters using $100 words)
• Positive emotional payoffs that are well-earned
• Passions that are strong without being mushy/fluffy
• Moments of realization — satori
• Friendships - although I am a romantic person, not every relationship must be romantic (I do like the trope of friends becoming lovers, however)
• Families of choice and/or nakama (true companions)
• Wry and even dark humor in the course of a more serious story
• And I like any of the following "cool bits":
  • for Yuletide, wintery/solstice seasonal details where possible but not overtly religious except if it goes with the canon (so the real winter holiday in Japan is New Year's, although Christmas as a non-religious festival has showed up in large cities) (note that I'm Jewish but I do attend friends' Christmas events)
  • hurt-comfort
  • being cozy indoors when it's rainy or snowing
  • senses of smell and touch and memories attached to them
  • warm and oversized bathrobes/dressing gowns or sweaters/jerseys
  • impulsive acts of valor (especially on behalf of the weak or an underdog)
  • an autumn leaf or item of clothing as the only bit of color in a bleak landscape
  • the sound of music from a distance, including music the amplifies the emotional mood of the scene (note that I am Old - 67 this year - and don't always know current popular music)
  • food porn
  • finding in a fight that one's ally feels like a protective wall
  • cynics with secretly soft hearts
  • drops of water or snowflakes clinging to hair and/or skin
  • the moon seen through wind-blown branches
  • leaning comfortably against a friend or lover; feeling them chuckle or speak
  • in-jokes among family members or close friends: silly things that make them laugh but that would be senseless to others
  • shopping or low-tension planning scenes, where people are working together to pick things out
  • caper-type operations: crazy elaborate plans that work out well in the end, especially if parts of them are silly/funny
  • unexpected gifts that turn out to be Just Right
  • snark, whether on the part of the narrator or from a character (this should not be mean, just apt and funny)
  • a high-control/driven person being persuaded to slow down and enjoy
  • pleasant ambient sounds: patter of rain when one is indoors, a brook in an outdoor setting, waves on a beach or sea wall,, the sound of a crackling fire indoors on a cold day, the non-sound after a snowfall, contented domestic bustle of someone cooking, etc.

  I'm quite content with both straight and gay relationships. I do tend to ship the canon relationships, unless it's a character who has had no clear relationships shown in the story. I'm not comfortable with sexual relationships shown in children under the age of, say, 14 or so, and even then it's better in context (teens with other teens or in a societal setting where girls expect to marry by 16-18 anyway).

  Me & the Fandoms

  Here I'm going to talk about what the fandoms mean to me and things I like about them.

  Alliance-Union - C. J. Cherryh

  My main jam from these books is the found family that forms among members of the crew. The Hellburner Four are my overall favorites. They are a group where I can find elements of myself in every single one of them. I probably feel the most for Meg, as the oldest member of the team, and the way she ends up counseling each of them from time to time.

  I also have a huge weakness for Jurgen Graff. However, we can only pick four for Yuletide, so it is what it is. But if you need a senior officer to drag them out of something, he's right there!

  World of the Five Gods - Lois McMaster Bujold

  I love the way Pen, in some ways the logical and analytical representative of the 21st-century reader, keeps running into the gods, sometimes in person. The Bastard is understandable, but Pen's encountered the Son in person twice! (And even scolded Him in "Knot of Shadows."). So I'd love an encounter with one of the gods, or one of their representatives (like the saints - I love the idea of the petty saints, too).

  There should be a mystery, of course: this is, at heart, a mystery series.

  The Rising World Series - Martha Wells

  In the sign-up, I mentioned the time between both of the canon timelines - the period when Kai is raising Dahin and presumably helping raise ZIede's children at Avagantrum. Other thoughts I've had about this period and place: Did Bashasa grant them this home? What was it like, establishing themselves there and making it theirs? Feel free to bring in other cast members who would enhance your story.

  A completely different idea would be some more about Kaiisteron when he was Kai-Enna, a child of the Kentdessa Saredi. It might include his being dispatched from the Underworld to occupy Enna's body (including admonitions about not marrying but having babies), meeting witches for the first time and experiencing how they fit into the demon-Saredi community, or maybe just some worldbuilding and family/clan feelings. This could of course include Arn-Nefa (Arnsterath) and Kai's almost-brother, almost-betrothed Adeni and the others who would be in that never-marriage..

  The Goblin Emperor Series - Katherine Addison

  You should know that I was disappointed about how the author handled the Thara/Iäna situation, and I'd like to explain why. My own theory is that Addison wrote herself into a corner: the Clenverada developed into a much more physical and political threat than she'd originally intended, and so Thara needed a much better warrior and outdoorsman as a protector. But Thara's out-of-character fanboy-ish crush on Olgarezh, plus the fact that unlike Iäna, Olgarezh had not been with Thara when he needed a refuge from the dirty politics of Amalo's clerical world, or someone to guide him around the demimonde, or someone to help him burgle an office, or someone to comfort him when he lost his ability to speak with the dead, meant that I can't regard Olgarezh as anything but an unwelcome intruder into a very fraught situation that had gone deep into my heart.

  Anyway, I identify with Thara in a number of ways, and I really like his friendships with Iäna and with Anora. I am also very fond of Nebeno, the idea of her raising her son as an independent single mother, and the place that she has created in Torivontaram, both as a location and as part of the community.

  Nine Worlds Series - Victoria Goddard

  I only first read this series starting in the holiday season 2024-2025. It is so wonderfully rich and funny and heartfelt. It's as if The Dark Is Rising series went up to 15th or 20th level, gaining a more mature (but still youthful) point of view and losing the need for grown-up Old Ones to show up and save the protagonists whenever things get scary -- and no condescending Old-Ones-Know-Best memory-wiping here, either.

  Clearly there is going to be more of this series, and the timeline has been fairly direct and continuous, without many breaks for side stories. I actually am just re-reading Plum Duff (for the third time), and this time I noticed that Jemis is going to be scrying in the water in the trough in the Chapel for New Year's, and also that the dark agent who is sitting in the window during the Winter Eve vigil calls Jemis "little wren." That made me think of the Hunting of the Wren, but that occurs on Dec. 26 in our world. So this is the kind of thing I think of with this series, the layers of richness and peril.

  Tuyo Series- Rachel Neumeier

  This is a new series for me, this year. I love the unapologetic "we're not in Kansas anymore" of the different magical regions of the world, with no logical (from our scientific viewpoint) reasons for why things are this way. I also love how present the Moon is for the Ugaro, and how close their families are with each other. (Although ... we also have Tano's story *shiver*.) The authorial voices that Neumeier uses for the various volumes are distinct, with an almost folkloric feel for stories set among the Ugaro, as opposed to a more modern narrative feel (a bit like Rosemary Sutcliff, actually) for the stories set in the lands of the Lau, and I think this really helps bring out the two cultures.