Dear Yuletide writer,
Oct. 17th, 2024 09:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mary_the_gardenerthank you so much for offering one of my rare fandoms! I'm Mary_the_gardener on Ao3 as well. I am super excited to read something for any of them! So don't worry too much, I'm easy to please and obviously fic-starved, I'm sure I'll love whatever you'll write for me!
First of all, I want you to know that I'm quite easy to please, just follow my DNWs and you'll be sure to succeed and make me very happy with your gift! In case you like to have prompts, I will leave you some further down, but it's totally ok if you prefer to ignore them and surprise me with something else!
Index:
DNWs
General Likes
Opt-Ins
About smut
Fandom sections:
Cassandre
Detective Anna
Diving RPF
F4 Thailand
DNWs:[return]
- romantic marriage proposals and weddings
- MPreg
- prolonged and repeated adultery
- Mafia AUs and Darkfic in general
- Royalty Aus
Not really a hard DNW but something that I don't appreciate much is when a fic ends with the "Do you want to be my girlfriend/boyfriend?" question. Anything less explicit and formal is okay though. Same goes for fluff: established relationship fic where characters are just being sappy to each other or cuddling fluffy animals? Not really my kind of jam. But by this I do not mean that I absolutely don't want any of that in my gift, but just that I'd prefer if it wasn't the main focus of the fic.
Clarification on my adultery DNW and RPF fandoms:
You can chose to deal how your prefer with eventual actual partners of requested characters.
Let's say I'm requesting A/B, but A has a relationship with X. I'm generally okay with ignoring the existence of X, or with acknowledging it and setting the fic in times before/after the relationship, or just letting A/X be and have B pining hopelessly from afar. Or maybe A gets together with X only because they thinks they have no chances with B (whether this is true or not). It's also okay to diverge from the "canon" and shorten/lengthen/move in time A/X's relationship to fit your plot. In general I'm ok with most things as long as you don't make A cheat on X with B for long periods. But for example A cheating on X with B and then shortly after ending things with B (or with X) is okay.
General likes:[return]
misunderstandings and miscommunication, family dynamics, friendship and friendship-related angst, fake dating, arranged marriage, wrongnumber, and they were roommates, there was only one bed, mutual or onesided pining, unresolved sexual tension, flirting, hopelessly oblivious characters, metaphors, introspection and internal monologues, ace and/or aro characters, alternate dimensions and time travelling, time jumps and messed up timelines, missing scenes, questioning of one's principles, epiphanies, road trips, casefics, cooking and food vlogs, magical realism, modern with magic aus, coven aus (of witches, not vampires!), historical aus, hospital aus, actors aus (struggling to make it, theatre, got stuck in method acting), carnival and masquerade balls, soulmates, bodyswap, doppelgangers stories and uncanny circumstances, recovery from physical injuries or only partial recovery and how one mentally deals with it, flowers symbolism and metaphors or similes or anything that has to do with flowers in general, extra bonus if it's daffodils or wisteria.
If you're having some wild ideas and aren't sure I would be ok with that, here's a list of Opt Ins:[return]
treats; art; unusual povs (outisder pov, 1st and 2nd person...); unconventional fanworks & unusual formats (epistolary, podfics, essays, articles, texting or socmed fics, things that require a work skin, interactive fiction...); songfics; a work written in: italian, french, spanish or russian; open, ambiguous or unhappy endings.
If you want to write a crossover, you can check my works, gifts and bookmarks on Ao3 to see which fandoms I know.
If you can't decide which tense to write your story in, know that I currently have a preference for present tense, but if you're otherwise inspired go ahead.
About Smut:[return]
If you want to write smut, I'm open to it for any of my requests.
What I do no not like: lingerie kink; women being passive and not reciprocating; unprotected sex outside of a longterm, exclusive relationship; daddy kink; somnophilia; incest; bellybulge caused by come inflation (it's ok if caused by dick); BDSM.
What I do like: talk during sex (not necessarily dirty talk but also just communication about how they feel, or even random chatting or chirping); appreciation of backs, extra points if they're nicely bendy; characters being very eager to give head; appreciation of forearms.
Fandoms section:
Cassandre [return]
requested characters: Florance Cassandre, Pascal Roche
Disclaimer: I have watched up to 8x2 with the exception of ep 7x3. Most of the following prompts have been written over the years so they may focus on older season. But feel free to write about that season you prefer or span among them, I do love how their relationship evolves.
The cases of the series may be good, but the rest sometimes it's so cliché it's ridiculous, I've lost count of how many tropes they've used. But, honestly? I love it all.
One thing of this ship that absolutely fascinates me is the way they have of talking to each other: one second calling the other by surname, the other by the first name, some other times with their role; and constantly switching between formal and informal language, even if I know this one part doesn't translate too well in english, so, in case you want to, for this one I'm also open to fic in french, italian, russian or spanish, all languages which have formal grammatical forms.
Another thing I enjoy is how these two are constantly at each other's throats, and yet they're always there to comfort and support each other. Both their characters tend to have outbursts of anger or frustration and that puts them in contrast but at the same time brings them closer, with Florence a bit more in control: she apologizes right after and is always there to remind Pascal to keep his cool; how does he feel about this?
I'm a sucker for unfulfilled desires, and the sexual tension through out all the series is so strong, I would just love something that concentrates on how they dance around each other, tying to remain professional but evidently struggling to do it, getting on the same page after several seasons but having to give it up.
I'm okay with any setting change AU as long as it somehow keeps the power imbalance, even if it gets switched and doesn't change the age difference.
I do really appreciate the age difference! In the first season I kind of felt that she was much more mature than him, even if the gap slowly seemed to lose relevance as the series went on. I love that she is a mature woman which has already had husband and a kid and which has somehow abandoned her hopes of a successful career, and that he has an obscure, secret past that his tattoos constantly remind everybody of.
And feel free to add other tropes or just expand on the ones they used already, that sharing a room situation was cut disappointingly short... what if they had stayed there one night already before the dude attacked the priest?
Detective Anna[return]
requested characters: 0; tagset characters: Anton Korobeynikov, Ivan Skryabin, Nina Nezhinskaya, Viktor Mironov (I'm ok with any subset of the tagset characters, including fic focused on a single character; I'm ok with non-nominated characters as long as they're not the main focus of the fic - them being the POV character is ok)
First of all, some general thoughts:
I think they tied up the first season pretty well, the only thing I';m not convinced of is the role of Alice. How did she know Yakov's safe house? And was she looking for the file of Mr Brown there? Who sent her? She said to Anna that she'll tell her who she truly is and then got interrupted, and I really feel like there's an untold story there. Is she even really the same girl that was locked in a cell for years? Or is she someone else who took her place.
As for the second season... I'd rather pretend that the "One month later" scene at the end of episode 40 doesn't exist. My reason for that is that I liked Doctor Skryabin. I simply refuse to let them ruin his character like that! And Polina being Krutin made total sense. Yes, of course there's the open issue of the box buried in the snow, but I think they could have solved it in some other way.
Ivan Skryabin
So, yeah, let's ignore the part where they tried to turn him into the bad guy. I really like his character and I'd like to think that, while a bit grumpy and apparently detached, his actions were actually genuine. I would love to read a charterer study on him, you could explore how he feels settling in Zadonsk and slowly discovering the weird things that constantly happen in the town. Or you could explore either his past or his future: what shaped his character? What made him leave Saint Petersburg? He leaves the capital and then after only a short period in Zadonsk he's on the move again: is he running from something (either real of just a ghost of the past)? I would also love to read about his work in Turkestan.
I can definitely ship him with Anna, in fact I think he won me over the moment he broke into Anna's room and started screaming things at her. He kept a detached facade but it was obvious that he was doing it for her, that he knew she would react and get herself together. Which means that he cared. He cared enough to go all the way to her house and put up that scene. And then he cared enough to offer to tie himself to her forever to grant her freedom from her father. I really would have liked for them to go to Turkestan together. Fake/pretend relationship is one of my fave tropes.
Nina Nezhinskaya
About the very last scene of ep40s2, we can pretend she's actually dead, though I honestly don't mind her having faked it, even if I can't phantom how she did it. Maybe Yakov helped her somehow? I understand that it was the only way for her to avoid the prison, but it was also a way to free Yakov of his marriage and at the same time granting a future to her son. So it was convenient for both of them.... And in that case, if Yakov helped her fake it, would he tell Anna?
I think Nina's character is quite well rounded: in the beginning she seems rather flat, and I can't deny that I didn't like her at all, but how can I not like her when I see her desperation, how she's trapped in the grip of the Prince? A position she consciously got herself in to save Yakov. Yes, she's often ruthless and cold blooded, but she has to be like that to survive.
She also told Anna that in Saint Petersburg she was the one helping Yakov, and I would like to see some of her adventures at court and how they fell in love. Was Nina already involved with the Prince or did she tie herself to him to save Yakov from his cards debt?
If you want to dwell on her relationship with Yakov while in Zadonsk I'd prefer if it were in Nina's pov. It must have been really hard for her to see him get closer to Anna and farther from herself, and being unable to do anything about it because of how she's in debt with the Prince.
Anton Korobeynikov
Anton is one of my favourite characters. You can call him naive but I'd call him pure. He's always such a gentleman, and in the first season I often thought that he deserved Anna way more than Yakov did! He never belittled her, never doubted her and her world. And then, in the second season we find out that he proposed to her, and we didn't get to see it!? Outrageous! He deserves the girl!! Can't she see how husband material he is!?
Furthermore, he's extremely loyal; when asked to write a report to incriminate Yakov, he writes one praising and thanking him instead. And when Yakov disappears, he desperately searches for him, you can see how heartbroken he is!
I would love either a romantic or platonic story of the two. On the romantic side, my heart races every time they hug, and I totally lost it when in the episode about the werewolf they make a comment about Yakov smelling his garlic breath, as if they regularly kissed. On the friendship side, I would love some extra angst about how mad at Yakov he is when he reappears out of nowhere at the beginning of season 2. It would also be nice to see how he adjusts to working without Yakov in between the seasons, how he deals with the new power and responsibilities that he inherits along with Yakov's position.
Viktor Mironov
I really, really admired Viktor in the first season, the way he grew Anna up, the way he dealt with his drunkard brother and the way he sticks to his principles when doing his job. And then season two happened and they just had to destroy his character with that stupid affair. So, if you want to ignore the affair with Liza, that's very much ok with me, but you can also address the issue, I would very much like to know what he duck was going on in that head of his!
Diving RPF[return]
requested character: 0; tagset characters: Chang Yani, Chen Yiwen, Maddison Keeney
I've been watching diving competitions for ages and I've never seen a chinese girl as open and friendly as Yiwen, the way she and Yani are constantly laughing and hugging with Maddie fills me with joy. I wanna read all about their friendship, how did it start? What shenigans do they get up to? How do they deal with the fact of being competitors? Do they take care of each other when one has a bad day?
F4 Thailand[return]
requested character: Gorya Thitara Jundee, Ren Renrawin Aira (I'm ok with any subset of the tagset characters, including fic focused on a single character; I'm ok with non-nominated characters as long as they're not the main focus of the fic - them being the POV character is ok)
In brief, I ship them. So I'd love you if you said screw the canon and make Ren and Gorya end together instead (of course, if you don't want to go the ship way that's okay too).
I don't actually have anything against Thyme, I'm just hopelessly soft for Ren. He's so quite but also observant. He doesn't say anything but you can see in his eyes that he's suffering inside. And I am whipped for his kicked puppy face. I'd totally love a fic on how he struggled in Paris, feeling how he didn't belong while Mira perfectly fitted and didn't really need him anymore. Or about him hopelessly pining for Gorya. Or the two together!
Going back to the ship, I would also love if you went the AU way. You could take the texting and social media part from canon for a nice wrongnumber fic. It would probably work with even just a partial AU. Am I making sense? In any case, AUs about them getting together smh are appreciated.
As are AUs about Gorya being the badass she is and fighting her way through the hardships of life. I would love to see more about her life when she runs to work with her parents in the country (though I don't really care about her pining for Thyme). I really love how headstrong she is!
Please don't think that the length of a fandom section is an index of how interested I am about it, it's not. Some of them are shorter because it's the first time I'm requesting them and I'm lazy, some are longer because I've been requesting them for several years, or they have more characters I'm interested in, I've consumed the canon more. But regardless of that I'm only requesting things that I really really want to read about.
I really hope you liked my prompts and found them inspiring, and whatever you'll make of it I'll be
your happy receiver
Mary_the_gardener
First of all, I want you to know that I'm quite easy to please, just follow my DNWs and you'll be sure to succeed and make me very happy with your gift! In case you like to have prompts, I will leave you some further down, but it's totally ok if you prefer to ignore them and surprise me with something else!
Index:
DNWs
General Likes
Opt-Ins
About smut
Fandom sections:
Cassandre
Detective Anna
Diving RPF
F4 Thailand
DNWs:[return]
- romantic marriage proposals and weddings
- MPreg
- prolonged and repeated adultery
- Mafia AUs and Darkfic in general
- Royalty Aus
Not really a hard DNW but something that I don't appreciate much is when a fic ends with the "Do you want to be my girlfriend/boyfriend?" question. Anything less explicit and formal is okay though. Same goes for fluff: established relationship fic where characters are just being sappy to each other or cuddling fluffy animals? Not really my kind of jam. But by this I do not mean that I absolutely don't want any of that in my gift, but just that I'd prefer if it wasn't the main focus of the fic.
Clarification on my adultery DNW and RPF fandoms:
You can chose to deal how your prefer with eventual actual partners of requested characters.
Let's say I'm requesting A/B, but A has a relationship with X. I'm generally okay with ignoring the existence of X, or with acknowledging it and setting the fic in times before/after the relationship, or just letting A/X be and have B pining hopelessly from afar. Or maybe A gets together with X only because they thinks they have no chances with B (whether this is true or not). It's also okay to diverge from the "canon" and shorten/lengthen/move in time A/X's relationship to fit your plot. In general I'm ok with most things as long as you don't make A cheat on X with B for long periods. But for example A cheating on X with B and then shortly after ending things with B (or with X) is okay.
General likes:[return]
misunderstandings and miscommunication, family dynamics, friendship and friendship-related angst, fake dating, arranged marriage, wrongnumber, and they were roommates, there was only one bed, mutual or onesided pining, unresolved sexual tension, flirting, hopelessly oblivious characters, metaphors, introspection and internal monologues, ace and/or aro characters, alternate dimensions and time travelling, time jumps and messed up timelines, missing scenes, questioning of one's principles, epiphanies, road trips, casefics, cooking and food vlogs, magical realism, modern with magic aus, coven aus (of witches, not vampires!), historical aus, hospital aus, actors aus (struggling to make it, theatre, got stuck in method acting), carnival and masquerade balls, soulmates, bodyswap, doppelgangers stories and uncanny circumstances, recovery from physical injuries or only partial recovery and how one mentally deals with it, flowers symbolism and metaphors or similes or anything that has to do with flowers in general, extra bonus if it's daffodils or wisteria.
If you're having some wild ideas and aren't sure I would be ok with that, here's a list of Opt Ins:[return]
treats; art; unusual povs (outisder pov, 1st and 2nd person...); unconventional fanworks & unusual formats (epistolary, podfics, essays, articles, texting or socmed fics, things that require a work skin, interactive fiction...); songfics; a work written in: italian, french, spanish or russian; open, ambiguous or unhappy endings.
If you want to write a crossover, you can check my works, gifts and bookmarks on Ao3 to see which fandoms I know.
If you can't decide which tense to write your story in, know that I currently have a preference for present tense, but if you're otherwise inspired go ahead.
About Smut:[return]
If you want to write smut, I'm open to it for any of my requests.
What I do no not like: lingerie kink; women being passive and not reciprocating; unprotected sex outside of a longterm, exclusive relationship; daddy kink; somnophilia; incest; bellybulge caused by come inflation (it's ok if caused by dick); BDSM.
What I do like: talk during sex (not necessarily dirty talk but also just communication about how they feel, or even random chatting or chirping); appreciation of backs, extra points if they're nicely bendy; characters being very eager to give head; appreciation of forearms.
Fandoms section:
Cassandre [return]
requested characters: Florance Cassandre, Pascal Roche
Disclaimer: I have watched up to 8x2 with the exception of ep 7x3. Most of the following prompts have been written over the years so they may focus on older season. But feel free to write about that season you prefer or span among them, I do love how their relationship evolves.
The cases of the series may be good, but the rest sometimes it's so cliché it's ridiculous, I've lost count of how many tropes they've used. But, honestly? I love it all.
One thing of this ship that absolutely fascinates me is the way they have of talking to each other: one second calling the other by surname, the other by the first name, some other times with their role; and constantly switching between formal and informal language, even if I know this one part doesn't translate too well in english, so, in case you want to, for this one I'm also open to fic in french, italian, russian or spanish, all languages which have formal grammatical forms.
Another thing I enjoy is how these two are constantly at each other's throats, and yet they're always there to comfort and support each other. Both their characters tend to have outbursts of anger or frustration and that puts them in contrast but at the same time brings them closer, with Florence a bit more in control: she apologizes right after and is always there to remind Pascal to keep his cool; how does he feel about this?
I'm a sucker for unfulfilled desires, and the sexual tension through out all the series is so strong, I would just love something that concentrates on how they dance around each other, tying to remain professional but evidently struggling to do it, getting on the same page after several seasons but having to give it up.
I'm okay with any setting change AU as long as it somehow keeps the power imbalance, even if it gets switched and doesn't change the age difference.
I do really appreciate the age difference! In the first season I kind of felt that she was much more mature than him, even if the gap slowly seemed to lose relevance as the series went on. I love that she is a mature woman which has already had husband and a kid and which has somehow abandoned her hopes of a successful career, and that he has an obscure, secret past that his tattoos constantly remind everybody of.
And feel free to add other tropes or just expand on the ones they used already, that sharing a room situation was cut disappointingly short... what if they had stayed there one night already before the dude attacked the priest?
Detective Anna[return]
requested characters: 0; tagset characters: Anton Korobeynikov, Ivan Skryabin, Nina Nezhinskaya, Viktor Mironov (I'm ok with any subset of the tagset characters, including fic focused on a single character; I'm ok with non-nominated characters as long as they're not the main focus of the fic - them being the POV character is ok)
First of all, some general thoughts:
I think they tied up the first season pretty well, the only thing I';m not convinced of is the role of Alice. How did she know Yakov's safe house? And was she looking for the file of Mr Brown there? Who sent her? She said to Anna that she'll tell her who she truly is and then got interrupted, and I really feel like there's an untold story there. Is she even really the same girl that was locked in a cell for years? Or is she someone else who took her place.
As for the second season... I'd rather pretend that the "One month later" scene at the end of episode 40 doesn't exist. My reason for that is that I liked Doctor Skryabin. I simply refuse to let them ruin his character like that! And Polina being Krutin made total sense. Yes, of course there's the open issue of the box buried in the snow, but I think they could have solved it in some other way.
Ivan Skryabin
So, yeah, let's ignore the part where they tried to turn him into the bad guy. I really like his character and I'd like to think that, while a bit grumpy and apparently detached, his actions were actually genuine. I would love to read a charterer study on him, you could explore how he feels settling in Zadonsk and slowly discovering the weird things that constantly happen in the town. Or you could explore either his past or his future: what shaped his character? What made him leave Saint Petersburg? He leaves the capital and then after only a short period in Zadonsk he's on the move again: is he running from something (either real of just a ghost of the past)? I would also love to read about his work in Turkestan.
I can definitely ship him with Anna, in fact I think he won me over the moment he broke into Anna's room and started screaming things at her. He kept a detached facade but it was obvious that he was doing it for her, that he knew she would react and get herself together. Which means that he cared. He cared enough to go all the way to her house and put up that scene. And then he cared enough to offer to tie himself to her forever to grant her freedom from her father. I really would have liked for them to go to Turkestan together. Fake/pretend relationship is one of my fave tropes.
Nina Nezhinskaya
About the very last scene of ep40s2, we can pretend she's actually dead, though I honestly don't mind her having faked it, even if I can't phantom how she did it. Maybe Yakov helped her somehow? I understand that it was the only way for her to avoid the prison, but it was also a way to free Yakov of his marriage and at the same time granting a future to her son. So it was convenient for both of them.... And in that case, if Yakov helped her fake it, would he tell Anna?
I think Nina's character is quite well rounded: in the beginning she seems rather flat, and I can't deny that I didn't like her at all, but how can I not like her when I see her desperation, how she's trapped in the grip of the Prince? A position she consciously got herself in to save Yakov. Yes, she's often ruthless and cold blooded, but she has to be like that to survive.
She also told Anna that in Saint Petersburg she was the one helping Yakov, and I would like to see some of her adventures at court and how they fell in love. Was Nina already involved with the Prince or did she tie herself to him to save Yakov from his cards debt?
If you want to dwell on her relationship with Yakov while in Zadonsk I'd prefer if it were in Nina's pov. It must have been really hard for her to see him get closer to Anna and farther from herself, and being unable to do anything about it because of how she's in debt with the Prince.
Anton Korobeynikov
Anton is one of my favourite characters. You can call him naive but I'd call him pure. He's always such a gentleman, and in the first season I often thought that he deserved Anna way more than Yakov did! He never belittled her, never doubted her and her world. And then, in the second season we find out that he proposed to her, and we didn't get to see it!? Outrageous! He deserves the girl!! Can't she see how husband material he is!?
Furthermore, he's extremely loyal; when asked to write a report to incriminate Yakov, he writes one praising and thanking him instead. And when Yakov disappears, he desperately searches for him, you can see how heartbroken he is!
I would love either a romantic or platonic story of the two. On the romantic side, my heart races every time they hug, and I totally lost it when in the episode about the werewolf they make a comment about Yakov smelling his garlic breath, as if they regularly kissed. On the friendship side, I would love some extra angst about how mad at Yakov he is when he reappears out of nowhere at the beginning of season 2. It would also be nice to see how he adjusts to working without Yakov in between the seasons, how he deals with the new power and responsibilities that he inherits along with Yakov's position.
Viktor Mironov
I really, really admired Viktor in the first season, the way he grew Anna up, the way he dealt with his drunkard brother and the way he sticks to his principles when doing his job. And then season two happened and they just had to destroy his character with that stupid affair. So, if you want to ignore the affair with Liza, that's very much ok with me, but you can also address the issue, I would very much like to know what he duck was going on in that head of his!
Diving RPF[return]
requested character: 0; tagset characters: Chang Yani, Chen Yiwen, Maddison Keeney
I've been watching diving competitions for ages and I've never seen a chinese girl as open and friendly as Yiwen, the way she and Yani are constantly laughing and hugging with Maddie fills me with joy. I wanna read all about their friendship, how did it start? What shenigans do they get up to? How do they deal with the fact of being competitors? Do they take care of each other when one has a bad day?
F4 Thailand[return]
requested character: Gorya Thitara Jundee, Ren Renrawin Aira (I'm ok with any subset of the tagset characters, including fic focused on a single character; I'm ok with non-nominated characters as long as they're not the main focus of the fic - them being the POV character is ok)
In brief, I ship them. So I'd love you if you said screw the canon and make Ren and Gorya end together instead (of course, if you don't want to go the ship way that's okay too).
I don't actually have anything against Thyme, I'm just hopelessly soft for Ren. He's so quite but also observant. He doesn't say anything but you can see in his eyes that he's suffering inside. And I am whipped for his kicked puppy face. I'd totally love a fic on how he struggled in Paris, feeling how he didn't belong while Mira perfectly fitted and didn't really need him anymore. Or about him hopelessly pining for Gorya. Or the two together!
Going back to the ship, I would also love if you went the AU way. You could take the texting and social media part from canon for a nice wrongnumber fic. It would probably work with even just a partial AU. Am I making sense? In any case, AUs about them getting together smh are appreciated.
As are AUs about Gorya being the badass she is and fighting her way through the hardships of life. I would love to see more about her life when she runs to work with her parents in the country (though I don't really care about her pining for Thyme). I really love how headstrong she is!
Please don't think that the length of a fandom section is an index of how interested I am about it, it's not. Some of them are shorter because it's the first time I'm requesting them and I'm lazy, some are longer because I've been requesting them for several years, or they have more characters I'm interested in, I've consumed the canon more. But regardless of that I'm only requesting things that I really really want to read about.
I really hope you liked my prompts and found them inspiring, and whatever you'll make of it I'll be
your happy receiver
Mary_the_gardener
