Yuletide 2014 recs post 10

This is the final Yuletide recs post (with the exception of one more fandom-specific recs post which will have some Yuletide stories and some not), hope you have enjoyed!

Winter Kept Us Warm, Summer Surprised Us. Okay, so, I would have thought that this Magicians story would have been everything I would dislike - an Alice who feels inadequate compared to Quentin, when my headcanon Alice is always, always ahead of him. And it's soppy about cats and pet ownership, which, bleeaaaah. I guess it turns out I like Alice so very much that I'm interested in any alternative Alice someone happens to imagine, even if she's come back a bit nerfed and pet-stupid.

Nimona. Look, I am pretty firmly in the camp of "everyone in main canon (as opposed to the gay dads AU) will be better off if Nimona is loooong gone from their lives". That said, All I Want For Christmas is a short and pretty adorable they-find-Nimona story.

And then on the other hand, When There's Nothing Left to Burn is a long (18K) recovery-and-reformation story featuring a Nimona that is essentially unrecognizable as the character I remember reading, but, like, if you think it would work for you to pretend that a seething nest of wasps is an industrious hive of bees making delectable honey, then this story is a pretty satisfying resolution to things left unfinished in the comic.

Fair Winds and Homeward Sail. This is a novel-length (nearly 50000 words) prequel and outsider POV to Persuasion, mostly from the perspective of Mrs. Croft. Very well-written and completely delightful, it has everything you might want in a Regency/Age of Sail novel: romance, naval careers, research details in slang and period references. I know the audience for this among my recs-readers is probably smaller than for a thousand words of Nimona breathing fire but if you *are* in the audience for this one you definitely want to read it.

Dissuasion. I also liked this short look at Anne in the years between.

New Beginnings. Monstrous Regiment post-canon, Polly/Mal, 4K. I like this one because it also has some good Sergeant Polly bits.

Winter Quarters. Polly/Mal, 5K. This one is a bit meandering but I like Polly in it at the end.

Kisses Don't Last (Except When They Do). Polly/Mal, 23K. This is the best of them, long and very funny and full of romantic yearning. Polly gets invited to Ankh Morpork and meets Angua and Death and I have said before that I don't ever need to read another vampire romance story but this one does great things with it.

Dark City. One Discworld story that isn't Polly/Mal. This is about Vimes and Sybil and Vetinari and the rise of the popular novel in Ankh Morpork and it's a bit long (11K) for its heft but has a couple of really good lines.

why no Belle though

I know the Oscars are not for me, like, they are interested in almost nothing that I'm interested in as an audience member. But:

Best Picture - Belle
Best Director - Amma Asante
Best Actress - Gugu Mbatha-Raw
Best Original Screenplay - apparently there was a giant fight between the original writer credited with the screenplay in the credits, Misan Sagay, and the director Amma Asante who did extensive rewriting, over who should get writing credit, so an award here might be sort of awkward, but whoever it is who should get the credit deserves the nomination
Costume Design - Belle
I can't remember now if I actually noticed/liked the music enough to want to nominate it for Best Original Score or if I just thought it was cool the composer was a woman, but why not.

Hmmph.