RatCreature's Journal

In that recent meme round where people listed LJ communities I came across a link to alien_desires a community to point out stories with alien sex, in which Clark's sexuality is different. Now that isn't one of my particular kinks, so I have never specifically looked for stories like that before. I was browsing around that community, following some links, and reading AlienSex!Clark, but most of the stories were surprisingly little SF-like. I mean, surely there are more ways you can make Clark alien than giving him a mating urge? (Or, occasionally, a self-lubricating ass.)

I didn't read all the stories that were linked, but somehow that seemed very prevalent. Don't get me wrong, when handled well, that plot-device can be hot, or even lead to interesting, or funny, character interaction, but I kind of had expected more variety. I don't know whether I expected tentacles or what, but somehow I'm disillusioned.

Just some random thoughts I had while watching this week's Smallville.
( spoilers for 3x03 Extinction ahead... )

Mere Mortals, by deanine.

I found this AU thanks to mecurtin's recent post tracking WIPs. She obviously has a knack for finding the good stuff on ff.net. The story is long, and projected to be a trilogy, The Lost, Genesis and Identity Crisis. As a whole it is still a WIP, but the first book The Lost is finished. The story has a really interesting premise about Krypton's demise and a lot of original ideas about Krytonite. And it is a true ensemble story with lots of plot and good characterization. I started reading today telling myself that I'd just take a look at it to see whether it was worth keeping track of, and was rapidly hooked by the story. My afternoon and evening went a bit differently than planned, but I was well entertained, so who cares about cleaning and doing dishes?

I enjoy reading WIPs, and I have no special prerequisites for reading them, like regular or frequent updates, or that the installments are "chapter-like" and not just the random breaks based on how much was written at a time, however I really like it when authors make it easy to find the previous installments, especially when they post in their LJ or a blog without search function. Of course many authors do this, for example they link to all previous parts in their latest post (which I find the most convenient), they use the LJ memory function, or they have an extra journal for their WIP, however some do nothing like that. And if you read that writer's blog/journal regularly and started to do so before the first post of that WIP it's not a problem, however several times now I've seen a WIP mentioned, with just a link to the LJ it's posted in, and it was really difficult to find the parts, sometimes not even the subject lines indicated that the post contained an update, and more often than not I just gave up.

I mean, I assume if authors post their WIPs they'd like to have an audience, so why make it so hard to find the parts? Surely they don't expect that everybody interested in their WIPs already reads their journal regularly. I'll even go through the subjects of all posts in the last months, but if a WIP started months ago, and not all posts containing parts have a subject line with the WIP title, and they aren't linked or indexed either, I don't get that, how am I supposed to catch up with it? No matter how interesting the WIP sounded to me when someone talked about it, I won't spend more than maybe 15 minutes trying to track down the parts in a LJ or blog.

On a less grouchy note, I enjoyed reading joyfulgirl41's Smallville AU WIP "The Road Not Taken" (its premise is "what if Lex had been raised by his mother and Pamela"), which I only found yesterday thanks to mecurtin's list of WIPs and Joyfulgirl really makes it easy to find all previous parts through links in the most recent one posted to her LJ.

Smallville:
The Yard, by Jenn.
So far I really enjoy this WIP, though in some places I found it just a bit confusing. Still, I'm very curious how this will turn out. The new parts are posted to Jenn's LJ.

The Scientific Method, by Lenore.
It's really funny, I mean how could I not like a story that has lines like: "That's just great. It's like something out of a really bad comic book. The sphincter of steel. Able to maim sexual partners with a single orgasm. Now there's a super power to prize."

Intervention, by Hope.
It's a post Exodus story, and I liked Pete's POV, and the interaction between him and Clark.

LOTR:
Webs, by Roz Kaveney.
I've also recced this on my AU rec page recently, it gives us a look inside Shelob's head, set in a universe where events turn out really well--for her.

X-Men:
Since these stories have been recced all over the place you probably have read them already (well, if you're interested in X-Men fanfic at least), still, I enjoyed them. I didn't read X-Men fic after the first movie (and don't know the comics), and while my interest now isn't great, it was enough to check out X-Men rec pages during all the recent long holiday weekends (Ascension, Pentecost etc), with predictable results.

The Best-Laid Plans by Victoria P. and its remix The Best-Laid Plans (Art of War Remix) by Ransom. Both Logan/Rogue.

Climb the Wind by Minisinoo. It's sort of a character exploration through action-adventure focused on Logan and Scott. I could have done without some of the detailed medical descriptions of injuries, but I guess they just had their intended effect. Also check out Minisinoo's recent novel in progress An Accidental Interception of Fate, a Scott/Jean romance, but much more than that. I really enjoyed the parts with Scott in college.

Jus Ad Bellum, by Jenn. This one was chilling to read. And brilliant. Rogue from the familiar movieverse timeline (just a couple of years in the future) is thrust into an alternate timeline, where the original Rogue died on the Statue of Liberty. And things turned out really different. This story deals with morality, with terrorism, war and torture, and the choices everybody has to make each day. And it is chilling to experience alongside with Rogue how, confronted with the realities of that universe, her perception and reasoning start to shift, and how easy it is to slide into justifications, to adapt and accept.

Totally unrelated to any fanfic recs, I'd like to say that I thought one of the t-shirts I saw today was really crass: I showed George W. Bush's head with the word "Enemy" above and a bloody bullet hole in the center of his forehead. And I'm down with the anti-Bush sentiment, but with the bullet hole? Not so much, not even if it's meant symbolically.

I enjoyed Macellum by Sylvia a lot. It's an AU where Lionel takes in the stranded alien (who isn't named Clark by him, obviously) and the family dynamics and byzantine plots, machinations and power games of the Luthors are very convincing, and true to the characters, even to Clark's, who of course is different yet brings his own style to his "Luthorness" so that you can see the canon Clark shine through.

I just read I Drive The Car and its sequel You'd Better Not Go Down To The Woods Today by Dyce, and really enjoyed them. They're light-hearted fun adventures, with a focus on Chloe and Lex -- mostly friendship with a bit of flirting, those are not Chloe/Lex stories.

I just watched this ep and I'm really happy with it, undoubtedly because while I'm not really a member of denialcorp, I want Lex and Clark to be friends on the show and CLex goodness on screen. And this ep delivered beautifully.

( Spoilers for Smallville 2x15 Prodigal... (not a synopsis or anything, more like squeeing, probably won't make much sense if you haven't seen the ep) )

Originally I wanted to post a couple of episode comments days ago, but somehow I don't seem to be that good at finishing started blog posts when I intend to, so here are a few brief, late thoughts. Some spoilers for Smallville 2x10 Skinwalker and Birds of Prey 1x08 Lady Shiva ahead...

( Read more... )

And totally unrelated to any of that, a short, seasonally induced rant: It would be really great if people were not posting generic holiday greetings for whatever holiday to large lists, especially not to (supposedly) fiction-only lists. On combined fiction and discussion lists I mind holiday mails less, at least as long as they are vaguely related to the list's topic -- popular around the US Thanksgiving date seem to be mails like "thanks to all authors for the great fiction you posted during the last year" or something along similar lines, even though holiday blanket-feedback isn't something I would do -- but really, I don't need to get my inbox filled with some random holiday greetings, quoted poems, etc. It just makes no sense to post these things to huge fandom lists. Chances are a lot of people don't even share that holiday the poster seems to care so much about, that s/he needs to let hundreds of others know about it. For example, Thanksgiving isn't on the same date everywhere (here usually the first Sunday in October is thought of as Thanksgiving), and here it is no big deal, you don't celebrate on its nominal date. The only time I've seen anything Thanksgiving related were altar decorations in churches.

I just finished watching SV 2x02 Heat.

( spoilers... )