"When a fox is in the bottle where the tweetle beetles battle with their paddles in a puddle on --"

Now that All Has Been Revealed, I can admit that my Yuletide story, A Roll of the Dice (which does not have its original URL or comments because I accidentally deleted it and had to panic PM the archive mods for help reposting it), is yet another giftfic for Quillori -- we tend to get matched on east Asian literary fandoms. The nominal canon is Pu Songling's Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio but it's also a wuxia story and so a crossover into that shared-world 'verse:

In a winter storm in a mountain pass above Xi'an, Chang'an that was, two sworn brothers have a strange encounter with three beautiful sisters. "I would be delighted if master consented to exchange a few stances with this unworthy student."

Specifically, it's a story suppressed from Strange Tales because wuxia was banned at the time for being subversive. Which means it's all original characters and you don't need to know the canon. Important tropes include sworn brothers, sleeves, poetry competitions, my kung fu is stronger than yours, class consciousness, adoptive families, and (of course) strange beings of a spoilery nature. Oh, and sleeves. (You could probably write a master's thesis on the rhetoric of sleeves in Strange Tales.) I can only hope it's as fun to read as to write.

(Fess-up time: I was completely wrong about the author of Cold Autumn Wind. This only increases my glee.)

Another round of YT recommendations:

Flowers of Perhaps - The story of Michal, daughter of Saul and first wife of David. As heartbreaking as you might expect, given the canon. Oh, Palti.

Parades' Beginning, Middle, and End - A hilarious story about Angrboda, Jormungandr, Rainbow Serpent, and the first biannual Bifrost Trans Pride Parade, with bonus mopey poets. Well, poet. Plus a lot of clever plans from Loki. Very, very funny. (For more Norse bawdry, see also Odinstattur.)

Promises Made - The best of this season's Spirited Away fics, more full of the numinous than others stuffed with folklore. Includes, like most Spirited Away fics, a reunion with Haku. (I think you can classify SA fics by Chihiro's age at reunion: here she's in high school.)

A Chance That Doth Redeem All Sorrows - Alternate history as fix-it fic for real life -- in this case, an examination of how, if Anne of Bohemia has survived the plague, the events surrounding Richard II's deposition are changed. Quite moving.

Dwarves Are Very Upsetting - A short fic for Jennifer Cruise's Bet Me set post-novel, requiring knowledge of both that and Sondheim's Into the Woods to make any sense. But if you have those, you'll find this funny and a little illuminating as well.

No More Than Reason - This forms an interesting pair with the next, both dealing with the first major crisis of a marriage from the end of the canon story -- the canon in this one being Much Ado About Nothing, and while Beatrice may have for her cousin's sake let go of what Claudio and Don Pedro did to Hero, she does not yet trust either to stand godfather to her first child. The tag "wordplay is foreplay" is not applied in error, and I am amused by the author's grumbles over having to match how Benedick constantly "code-switches" between you and thou as part of his raillery.

Now Eros Shakes My Soul - I had not known that Emma Woodhouse/Jane Fairfax (or rather technically Emma Knightly/Jane Churchill) femslash would be quite so, um, hot. I should have realized that Emma is, despite her determination to reform, thoroughly top, at least with someone other than Knightly. Bonus: the negotiations for polyamory are amusing to watch when they are constrained to the diction and manner of Jane Austen characters.

Interregnum - Speaking of unexpected slashing, I had not known I wanted to read Athos/Prince Rupert of the Rhine slash. I hadn't even realized that they would, in fact, be contemporaries. If you already knew this, however, this one is for you. The voice is a delight, with ironies even more pointed than Dumas's. Takes place a couple years before The Viscount of Bragalonne, so we get bonus Raoul being a teenage brat (Athos's parenting skills are as dreadful as you might expect).

All His Own Mischance - Technically, it's listed as a "The Lady of Shalott" fic, and while it uses (in a Diana Wynne Jones manner) some details from that, the focus on Lancelot makes this read like a general Arthurian story. Specifically, Lance's troubles at a posh modern public school where he pines after Jen, the girlfriend of his only real friend, Art. (I have to say, I tend to like high school AUs of the Arthurian mythos, because being teenagers explains SO MUCH of the stupid behaviors.)

Kore - A story of Persephone as asexual (to use a term from the future -- don't tell Zeus) that quietly grows its comedy until, by the end, I was chortling every other paragraph. Eminently rereadable, too. Possibly my favorite fic of the season so far.

Please comment if you liked any of these, or have others to share.

---L.

Subject quote from Fox in Socks, Dr Seuss.