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Other Books By The Same Author
Oct. 4th, 2012 02:28 pmI'm not the only one who knew about the A J Williams oeuvre. This is brilliant. It's touching, sweet, metatextual, and it gives our Amy the send-off she deserves. It's so good it has to be true.
Well Wicked!
May. 7th, 2012 03:36 pmSo, I've been on a Seven & Ace binge recently. I honestly think that era was the best Who has ever been - even better than Four & Romana (although there's not much in it). It has character arcs, and emotional moments that aren't sentimental, and cool surreal bits, and huge amounts of femslashy subtext.
So anyway, here are some selected highlights of my Seven & Ace fanfic reading:
1. Killing Time Seven & Ace & Romana. Versus some Daleks. It is brilliant. Angsty in places, hilarious in others, with some lovely bittersweet shippery bits.
2. A Still More Terrible Night Awaits Us A creepy little slice of psychological horror and historical RPF. In which the line between cosmic wonder and cosmic horror is very fine indeed...
3. Self-Fulfilling Prophecy A horribly plausible look at little Dorothy's screwed-up relationship with her mother.
4. The War of the Roses In which A Charitable Earth branches out. And Gita Chandra's life gets even weirder. Charming and fluffy as only an SJA crossover can be.
5. An Evil Memory Lingering Dorothy's first encounter with Gabriel Chase. Great character moments and really clever use of Ghost Light references.
6. Protect and Survive A chilling alt-history take on the Cold War and the threat of nuclear Armageddon. Particularly horrible if you're a child of the 80s.
So anyway, here are some selected highlights of my Seven & Ace fanfic reading:
1. Killing Time Seven & Ace & Romana. Versus some Daleks. It is brilliant. Angsty in places, hilarious in others, with some lovely bittersweet shippery bits.
2. A Still More Terrible Night Awaits Us A creepy little slice of psychological horror and historical RPF. In which the line between cosmic wonder and cosmic horror is very fine indeed...
3. Self-Fulfilling Prophecy A horribly plausible look at little Dorothy's screwed-up relationship with her mother.
4. The War of the Roses In which A Charitable Earth branches out. And Gita Chandra's life gets even weirder. Charming and fluffy as only an SJA crossover can be.
5. An Evil Memory Lingering Dorothy's first encounter with Gabriel Chase. Great character moments and really clever use of Ghost Light references.
6. Protect and Survive A chilling alt-history take on the Cold War and the threat of nuclear Armageddon. Particularly horrible if you're a child of the 80s.
All is forgiven
Oct. 1st, 2011 08:13 pmOh, Moffat.
You magnificent bastard.
I never should have doubted you for a second.
You magnificent bastard.
I never should have doubted you for a second.
Fic: Strays (Doctor Who/Portal, G)
May. 20th, 2011 11:25 amTitle: Strays
Author: Arachne Kallisti
Fandom: Portal 2/Doctor Who
Rating: G. Actually quite fluffy.
Characters/Pairing: Doctor/TARDIS, sort of TARDIS/Wheatley if you squint
Disclaimer: The Whoniverse belongs to Auntie Beeb, and everything in Aperture Laboratories belongs to Valve.
Summary: Nobody can travel with the Doctor for very long without something about him rubbing off on them.
Author's Notes: Massive spoilers for Portal 2 and Who 6x04 "The Doctor's Wife". Beta-read by the superb![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
chaosdeathfish.
( She never took him where he wanted to go, but she always took him where he needed to. )
Author: Arachne Kallisti
Fandom: Portal 2/Doctor Who
Rating: G. Actually quite fluffy.
Characters/Pairing: Doctor/TARDIS, sort of TARDIS/Wheatley if you squint
Disclaimer: The Whoniverse belongs to Auntie Beeb, and everything in Aperture Laboratories belongs to Valve.
Summary: Nobody can travel with the Doctor for very long without something about him rubbing off on them.
Author's Notes: Massive spoilers for Portal 2 and Who 6x04 "The Doctor's Wife". Beta-read by the superb
chaosdeathfish. ( She never took him where he wanted to go, but she always took him where he needed to. )
Talent borrows, genius steals
May. 3rd, 2011 02:48 pmI thought there was something hauntingly familiar about the denouement of The Day of the Moon, and finally I've dug it up: check out Eight O'Clock in the Morning by Ray Nelson and tell me if you can see the similarities too.
Note: anxiety of influence and all that aside, I'm not calling the Moff a rip-off artist or anything like that. I just think it's an interesting intertextuality/influence/shout-out to a fairly obscure bit of SF history.
Note: anxiety of influence and all that aside, I'm not calling the Moff a rip-off artist or anything like that. I just think it's an interesting intertextuality/influence/shout-out to a fairly obscure bit of SF history.
RIP Lis Sladen
Apr. 20th, 2011 01:13 pmLis Sladen died last night. It's been a terrible shock - she was filming Series 5 of SJA only recently.
I'm going to miss her terribly. Sarah Jane was one of my favourite companions, and such an inspiration to me. From what I've seen of her from interviews and con reports, Lis Sladen was warm, friendly, enthusiastic and charismatic. We've lost one of the good people.
There's a rather lovely tribute to her over at i09.
I'm going to miss her terribly. Sarah Jane was one of my favourite companions, and such an inspiration to me. From what I've seen of her from interviews and con reports, Lis Sladen was warm, friendly, enthusiastic and charismatic. We've lost one of the good people.
There's a rather lovely tribute to her over at i09.
Five Rounds Rapid
Feb. 23rd, 2011 12:52 pmNicholas Courtney has died at the age of 81, after a short illness.
He will be much missed - not only was he superb as Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge Stewart, but he was the honorary president of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society, a regular and charming participant at conventions, and by all reports a thoroughly good chap.
( Video tribute below the cut: some of the Brig's many Crowning Moments of Awesome )
He will be much missed - not only was he superb as Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge Stewart, but he was the honorary president of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society, a regular and charming participant at conventions, and by all reports a thoroughly good chap.
( Video tribute below the cut: some of the Brig's many Crowning Moments of Awesome )
Writing Hyperintelligence
Oct. 14th, 2010 01:51 pmI've just been thinking over the fandoms I'm really drawn to, and it occurs to me that one thing they have in common is incredibly intelligent characters: Sherlock Holmes, Miles Vorkosigan, the Doctor, Batman, the Culture's Minds, Q, Agatha Heterodyne, Willow, Toshiko, Romana...
The question is, how does one go about writing characters like that? At the baseline, you've got the ones who are at the top end of human intelligence, and then you're off into the realm of the superintelligences.
I think it was Vernor Vinge who claimed that authors cannot write convincing characters who are smarter than themselves: if you could work out what a really smart person would do in a given situation, then you are as clever as that really smart person.
( The problem with this particular point of view is that authors can cheat. )
Any good ones I've missed? Any more caveats on how to deploy those three?
The question is, how does one go about writing characters like that? At the baseline, you've got the ones who are at the top end of human intelligence, and then you're off into the realm of the superintelligences.
I think it was Vernor Vinge who claimed that authors cannot write convincing characters who are smarter than themselves: if you could work out what a really smart person would do in a given situation, then you are as clever as that really smart person.
( The problem with this particular point of view is that authors can cheat. )
Any good ones I've missed? Any more caveats on how to deploy those three?
Tags:
Angels of Anarchy
May. 20th, 2010 08:11 pm...although I thought [the surrealists] were wonderful, I had to give them up in the end. They were, with a few patronized exceptions, all men and they told me that I was the source of all mystery, beauty, and otherness, because I was a woman – and I knew that was not true. I knew I wanted my fair share of the imagination, too. Not an excessive amount, mind; I wasn't greedy. Just an equal share in the right to vision.
- Angela Carter, The Alchemy of the Word
The F Word posted a fantastic review of the Angels of Anarchy exhibition in Manchester, a display of the neglected work of all the women Surrealists you never get to hear about in the mainstream history of the movement. I'm shocked to discover how much damn fine Surrealist work I never got to see before, and how many talented artists I'd never even heard of. Thanks ever so much, sexist art historians.
The exhibition's over now, but the website still has some images and resources on there, including the results of what happens when you play Exquisite Corpse on Twitter.
Incidentally, whilst we're on the subject of awesome surreal women: I recently discovered a load of Iris Wildthyme stories are available online. Iris Wildthyme, for your information, is a renegade Time Lady who travels through time and space in a number 22 Routemaster bus that is slightly smaller on the inside than the outside. She may be one of the Doctor's exes. She may be an alternate-universe version of him. She has frequently accused him of stealing all her best stories. If you want some cracky, metafictional New Wave style Who fic, she's your woman every time.
- Angela Carter, The Alchemy of the Word
The F Word posted a fantastic review of the Angels of Anarchy exhibition in Manchester, a display of the neglected work of all the women Surrealists you never get to hear about in the mainstream history of the movement. I'm shocked to discover how much damn fine Surrealist work I never got to see before, and how many talented artists I'd never even heard of. Thanks ever so much, sexist art historians.
The exhibition's over now, but the website still has some images and resources on there, including the results of what happens when you play Exquisite Corpse on Twitter.
Incidentally, whilst we're on the subject of awesome surreal women: I recently discovered a load of Iris Wildthyme stories are available online. Iris Wildthyme, for your information, is a renegade Time Lady who travels through time and space in a number 22 Routemaster bus that is slightly smaller on the inside than the outside. She may be one of the Doctor's exes. She may be an alternate-universe version of him. She has frequently accused him of stealing all her best stories. If you want some cracky, metafictional New Wave style Who fic, she's your woman every time.
The End of Time: WTF RTD?!
Jan. 3rd, 2010 12:07 amIt was a bit like eating a smoked salmon, asparagus, white truffle and champagne risotto made by someone who can't actually cook. All the ingredients were fantastic, but had been put together with only the haziest idea of in what proportions, in which order, and for how long. Still, if you prodded the sticky mess and picked off the charred bits, there were some delicious morsels in there.
( Autopsy of an Epic Mess: contains spoilers for both parts of the End of Time )
Anyway, this has kind of inspired me to go hunting fics for my favourite fascinatingly wrong Slashy Nemeses again, and here are some recs:
1. Chasing The Paradox - a lovely, twisty, timey-wimey Doctor/Master romance, kind of sweet and deeply disturbing at the same time.
2. Intoxication - Academy-era fic, in which Ushas has to cope with Koschei's attempts to seduce Theta Sigma crashing through her study whilst she is trying to revise. Fairly dark comedy, in which Koschei comes over distinctly stalkery, with some dubious consent issues.
3.The one where Koschei goes all BDSM on Theta's arse - Academy-era fic, as NSFW as you might imagine, all psychological and creepy with definite consent issues.
4.Bit of femmeslash for a change of pace - Rani/GLaDoS. It really does work.
( Autopsy of an Epic Mess: contains spoilers for both parts of the End of Time )
Anyway, this has kind of inspired me to go hunting fics for my favourite fascinatingly wrong Slashy Nemeses again, and here are some recs:
1. Chasing The Paradox - a lovely, twisty, timey-wimey Doctor/Master romance, kind of sweet and deeply disturbing at the same time.
2. Intoxication - Academy-era fic, in which Ushas has to cope with Koschei's attempts to seduce Theta Sigma crashing through her study whilst she is trying to revise. Fairly dark comedy, in which Koschei comes over distinctly stalkery, with some dubious consent issues.
3.The one where Koschei goes all BDSM on Theta's arse - Academy-era fic, as NSFW as you might imagine, all psychological and creepy with definite consent issues.
4.Bit of femmeslash for a change of pace - Rani/GLaDoS. It really does work.
The Sound of Drums
Dec. 29th, 2009 12:20 amIt's at times like this that I really wish I could do fanvids. Because is this the ultimate Doctor/Master song or what?
If anyone wants to make that vid, or knows someone who does, I'd love to see it.
If anyone wants to make that vid, or knows someone who does, I'd love to see it.
Why Fanfic?
Sep. 1st, 2009 06:31 pmIt's a question I get asked a lot. Quite a lot of people can't quite see what the appeal is of working in quite such a restrictive genre, with so very little leeway in terms of setting and characterisation, and no commercial prospects. Quite often, they're expecting some kind of answer about how it's good practice, since having character and setting defined frees you up to work on things like plotting and dialogue, or how pastiche is an interesting technical problem.
The thing about answers like that, though, is that they seem to regard working on fanfic as a kind of necessary evil, a tedious exercise for a writing student who'd really rather be getting on with original work. They don't explain why people who aren't aiming at a writing career would choose fanfic as a hobby, and they certainly don't explain why anyone would bother reading fanfic.
( Wild theorising cut to save your Friends page )
The thing about answers like that, though, is that they seem to regard working on fanfic as a kind of necessary evil, a tedious exercise for a writing student who'd really rather be getting on with original work. They don't explain why people who aren't aiming at a writing career would choose fanfic as a hobby, and they certainly don't explain why anyone would bother reading fanfic.
( Wild theorising cut to save your Friends page )
