stripytights

Second bunch of recs (still in the anon period, go me!)

I haven’t actually read nearly as much as I’d like - I’m saving a few of the longer fills for next week. But here are a few things I couldn’t not mention first. As always I've linked to the prompt thread so check all kinks.

Also, as always, anything you think I should read, please stick it in the comments, I'd be grateful!

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December meme? Oh you mean that December meme? I joke, I've mostly kept up with doing the entries so I'll start posting tomorrow. Before that though, it's recs time.

I posted some previous minibang recs here and I have two more!

Behold, A Pale Horse - cherie_morte. This is a love story right at its core, beautiful, dark and riddled with hopeless sadness and yet at the end of it all, that intense sense of love and inevitability that always traces Sam and Dean's footsteps. I don't think I've read anything quite like it in a long time (do heed the warnings). I wholeheartedly recommend reading it.

Edges - glovered. This is also heart-touching but in a completely different way. Sam's stretched thin and fading connection with his brother, the slipperiness of the understanding between them, the sadness of Brady in the background and that crushing knowledge of what waits for them all - the title is perfect, because even when there's light in the story there's the future waiting. It was a fantastic mix between the two.

Other fic

see - steeplechasers. True forms. Clever true forms combined with crystal sharp description, and a sense of loss and loneliness in how Dean feels towards Castiel's true form and the changes it goes through. Love it.

You'll No Longer Burn - songlin. I can count on one hand the number of times I've read genderswapped Dean and liked it, and this is one of those times and possibly the only het fic veresion. There's something unapologetically harsh about this conception of Dean and how their family dynamic would be even more messed up that really worked for me, although the story is mostly sex.

To the Devil his Due by monicawoe Wonderfully disturbing Endverse, with all the touches of survival and hope at the beginning, fading into a deeper darker Lucifer and the Sam he's taking back.

What I Wouldn't Do - dollylux Gen/Danneel femslash. With a wonderful sense of place - an absolutely loving portrait of a neighbourhood and a mood, and a great sense of physicality between them, something that seems to go missing in a lot of femslash. I really liked this a lot.

Art

Art for cherie_morte's SDMB by quickreaver, found here. It's stunning, the colouring used in particular, but also the posing of Sam at the end, like some marble statue carved perfectly, and the one of him with blood running down his lip that's giving me strong Art Deco vibes in the construction of Sam's hair, and yeah pretty much all of them. I rarely rec art because I lack art vocab to describe it but these are all perfect.

"...so darkness I became." - cassiopeia7. Okay, I am always going to be a sucker for Pieta style SPN art, and this is no exception, and then to follow it up with Demon eyed Sam crying was perfect, a real sense of story across the two images ( a story I would love to read) and the look on Sam's face in each is heartbreaking. Plus bonus Bela, which I am always appreciative of - especially one again with a story behind her and a magnificently creepy hand. I do love a piece of art with a palpable sense of narrative to it.

Vid rec

Crazy - by justmep. Demon Dean, the song works perfectly in conjunction with the voiceover clips, and yeah, I did love some Demon Dean and this was just really good. I've watched it about ten times now I think.

I'd been looking forward to this fest for some time, and although it didn't go quite as I'd hoped in terms of my own fic (which, because flogging a dead horse is excellent exercise you can read here), I always appreciate getting to read new fic by other people - the best bit of being in a large fandom!

So here are a few recs (for fic because I'm pretty terrible with art recs - there was a lot of lovely art though!)

- Your Children Will Come at You with Knives by steeplechasers- the most visually striking piece of the challenge for me, there was a fantastic sense of terrible inevitability and a beautifully muffled depiction of manipulated emotions and fear. Definitely recommend.

- Juxtaposition by moonyj4m - super tender take on a slow growing closer through shared beds and shared closeness. Really well paced and the slide from (mostly) platonic bedsharing into their relationship was perfect.

- Heaven Sure Ain't Like It Is In The Brochure by righteousbros - wonderful use of canon in particular Dark Side of the Moon, a perfect fixing of all the untied ends. Very sweet and warming. I'll take a slice of that with a cup of tea please.

- The Treadmill by amber1960 As well as fix-its, I adore fics that fixes things without that being the central core of the story - in this one there's a (intriguing) plot, there's Sam time and then this wonderful resolution that ties it up neatly and ends on a hopeful note. Lovely.

- Five Times the Winchesters Pretended They Didn’t, and One Time That Didn’t Work by runedgirl - there may be a theme to these recs (with the exception of the first one!) and this is no different - there's a slow build relationship that I can only describe as pretty - the descriptions, the emotions and then the ending that unites all the different threads into an understated but real happiness.

I will never ever make it as a stockbroker. Playing on the stock market with virtual money gives me the shakes, the thought of actually chucking millions of pounds around terrifies me.

I am also not signing up for spn_reversebang even though I really want to and there's a gorgeous art prompt that is calling me. Must stay strong. I am however signed up for salt_burn_porn and excited about it.

Fic rec: I strongly recommend this DCBB fic Enfleurage by saltandbyrne. D/C generally isn't my jam but this is Sam/Dean/Castiel and it's beautiful. It's not only beautiful and an interesting Cas POV, but it has a great cast of supporting characters (Meg, Bela, Jo in particular) and a marvellous sensuousness to the description of the perfumes and all the other things that Cas can smell. Well worth the read.

Yuletide is here! There are so many good letters (check out the letters post here) and it's a very fun exchange.

Everyone should go here and prompt/fill for Sam's birthday meme.

I filled a gen prompt about Sam gazing at herons called 'the sun upon the lake is low'. The title is nicked from Wordsworth Sir Walter Scott. I found the prompt particularly inspirational given the quantity of herons who live around these parts.

 I highly recommend the art fill for the same prompt by quickreaver which you can find here

Leaving this one unlocked, because recs. I've been reading my way slowly from the beginning using them like miniature incentives to actually do job apps. I haven't read nearly everything that I want to read so take this as my initial sample.

I wrote One Thing After Another for chemm80 which was Gen/Adrianne (where Gen becomes a super-spy!), which was not only fun to write but proves once again that my greatest weakness is tropey femmeslash. Seriously, All the Tropes please.


and I got an absolutely lovely story for spnspringfling

It can be found here: Sweet Abandon and it is Gen/Adrianne which is one of my absolute favourite pairings and not only that, but it's in space which is in my top two AU scenarios of all time. It also happens to be sweet, fun and have great character voice so I thoroughly recommend checking it out.