This is assuming that y'all have already seen the fistful of stories that are getting recced everywhere: if you haven't, they can be found here. I'm sure there's more that I'm forgetting.

Polly and the Pirates

The Prize, by Fiercelydreamed — If you have ever read Ted Naifeh's Polly and the Pirates, I assume you loved it and wanted more. Here is your more. It is the story of Polly's parents, how they met and loved each other, and it is everything you wanted it to be.

Futurama

Be My Brussel Sprouts, by Xparrot — Pretty much exactly like the show, if the show made jokes about handjobs, which mostly they don't. For bonus points, look at the comments and see how many people give a response that is basically “This is hilarious! Poor Kif!” which, again I say, exactly like the show.

Iddie Izzard

Delicious, by newredshoes — Okay, this one has been recced everywhere, I just wanted to talk about it a little. This story is partly interesting as… well, what is it? Is it RPF? Is it even a story? It's a comic monologue that never happened. I admit to a vast curiosity as to the prompt that produced this story. (OH WAIT. I COULD LOOK IT UP. Hrmm, it's totally open-ended, so that's no help.) Also, it has made a running gag of Churchill, Manitoba, a city which has probably never had that honour, outside of Manitoba. (For your edification, Churchill, MB.)

Jennifer Crusie: Dempseys

And to All a Goodnight, by freneticfloetry — I have to give it points just for making me forgive the title. I think Welcome to Temptation and especially Faking It are two of Crusie's best works, so it could be pretty easy for stories in this 'verse to be a let-down, but this very much gets Crusie's tone and technique nearly perfect. It's perhaps slightly less frantic, and maybe a shade warmer, but manages the same hysterically funny, non-stop, character comedy and structure. Also, it's novella-length.

Making It, by Emeraldwoman — I betad this, so no point pretending I'm not biased, but I do adore it. Brings together Nadine Goodnight and Simon (er, whatsisface), gives sexy, funny banter, and a happy ending.

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haha whoops accidentally formated /home *facepalm*

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I see that Yuletide stories have been unveiled, so I can confess I pinch-hat Chocolate and Chile and Cloves, a Leverage OT3 fic, which is perhaps cheating. Leverage is the large sort of small fandom, and I was a bit surprised it was eligible.

Now to go see who wrote the stories I bookmarked! (Aaahaha David, I should have known that was you!) I will ETA this post with a bit more reactions when I grab a moment.

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Wheee, alphabetizing!

Yesterday, I was alphabetizing my shelves, as I am prone to do under stress. (Family holidays can be stressful.) Generally, new or unshelved books are placed horizontally on the shelf in the general region of the alphabet where they belong until the strategy becomes untenable and mass alphabetization ensues.

I had a minor existential crises when I discovered my McKinley and McKillip books had become inter-shelved (inter-leaved? inter-booked?) and I spent five minutes trying to decide if I was okay being a person who alphabetizes to five places of accuracy. (It turns out, I am. Five is a totally arbitrary number, but they are quite objectively different people.)

Anyway, give me your thoughts on Alphabetization! Mc before Ma? St. as Saint? Van der Post under V or P? Does series override the importance of Alphabetical by Title within Author?

GEEK HARD OR GO HOME.

(how do I not have a "books!" icon?)

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This year I didn't sign up for Yuletide, but I did pinch one hit (hit one pinch?). And for the first time, I'm relatively certain that if anyone read it, they could easily spot it as mine, since I realized after it went live that one line in it is copied verbatim from something I've already posted. (I didn't recycle it, I just, apparently, have verbal tics.)

So, I'm screening comments, but a drabble or a limerick to anyone who guesses it! I reserve the right to unscreen non-guess comments.

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Let's talk about books!

(Oh man, you guys, Yuletide!)

Has anyone ever encountered a book that was unreadable because of the font? Or, maybe just a book that was bizarrely difficult to read because of the font? I remember checking a John Barnes out of the library (possibly Mother of Storms? I remember something about islands.) which, due to some sort of printer's error, had strangely heavy letters. You could still identify the letters easily, but somehow the effect was unreadable, and I never got past the first chapter.

Then there's Magic to the Bone which has chapters from a mystery POV entirely in a sans typeface, while the rest of the book was in a serif font. The sans typeface gave the impression of being much smaller than the serif font, and it was so jarring I skipped those chapters.

And now I'm trying to read Staying Dead, and the font, which Identifont thinks is Generis Slab, (it isn't, but it's close) Is the most distracting damn thing.

I'm really not even a font snob, but sometimes this stuff turns out to kind of matter!

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