reccing a fest, two fics, and some meta

Hey, sign-ups are open at purimgifts, the multifandom short fic exchange for characters who are Jewish and/or women and/or persecuted by evil viziers. This was one of the most enjoyable things I did as a fan last year and I would encourage anyone who's tempted to go for it. It's a fun, low-pressure fest and I still think it would be really cool if someone wrote Éowyn fic for it. :) I still haven't signed up myself but that's because I'm stressing about some RL stuff this week and pretending I want to cut back on fannish stuff for a while, but I will almost certainly cave before the sign-ups close on January 22nd. Sign-ups are here and rules here.

Last year I wrote a set of crossovers, including Aladdin/Lost, for the mod, roga. And as it happened, she ended up writing one of my favorite fics at this year's Yuletide, the Aladdin fic Whole New World. You know, I didn't do a lot of Yuletide reccing this year because I was busy, what with Claudia being here and all, and I didn't make that one a priority because it was already a big hit and being recced all over the place. I realized talking to roga the other day though that it's nice to post about fics you like, even if they're already getting a lot of attention, because then you get the extra fun of going back and adding in the authors' names after the reveal. And sometimes that is a chance to discover a writer you hadn't heard of before, or sometimes you find out it's someone you know and that is also very cool.

Anyway, the thing I wanted to say about this fic is that Roga's version of the Genie makes a lot more sense than what you see in the movie, which is, you know, Robin Williams showing off and making all kinds of crazy cultural references that don't have anything to do with the story and don't really add up to anything. This fic has that some kind of all-over-the-place feel to it at first but then she ends up bringing all the different pieces of it together and it is painful and meaningful and great. Really, you should read it!

Another great Yuletide fic with some similar themes is deepad's One Thousand One and Counting. This is listed as fic for Arabian Nights but you don't need to know the source to appreciate the story, which is a collection of connected vignettes about Muslim women in different parts of the world.

I'd seen Deepa's name around some different places, including as the mod of eid_fic, before I read her fic last week. And then just last night I read this amazing essay she posted a few days ago about her experience as an Indian woman reading and writing fantasy, I Didn’t Dream of Dragons. She also did a great follow-up post with advice for white writers, here.