forestofglory

2024 was another mixed writing year. I continued to struggle with hand pain (it’s getting better but slowly) and various issues that made it hard to focus but I posted some things I’m proud of.

As well as contributing to various group posts I wrote two long piece for Lady Business:

On Cozy SFF

This started out as a passionate defense of cosy SFF but then I realized that I don’t actually like a lot of stuff that gets labeled cozy. But I still have a lot of thoughts about the subgenre. This piece had an amazing reception! The comments on the post are so good and thoughtful, plus it got linked to in several other places and even inspired a panel at a con!

Chinese History Starter Pack
https://ladybusiness.dreamwidth.org/370188.html

I wrote this for the people who ask me where to start reading more about Chinese history! This rec list includes both books and papers with a little bit about why each one is worth reading and why it could be a good starting place.

For the third year in a row I recced a thing every day in December. This has been such a fun tradition I'm glad started doing it. All my recs from this year and previous years can be found under my #DecRecs tag.

I'm super proud of my first posted translation for classical Chinese: Wei Furen! This is the culmination of years of study, and I learned so much working on it. Not only language skills but also a lot about historical Daoism. I’m hoping to post some more translations on foreststudio this year.

I also posted what turned out to be the longest fic I’ve written, and separate annotated bibliography – the end notes just got way too long


Harmonious Kinship (20935 words) by Forestofglory
Chapters: 5/5
Fandom: 长歌行 | The Long Ballad (TV)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Ashina Sun/Li Changge
Characters: Li Changge, Ashina Sun, Li Leyan, Ashina She'er, Mimi (Chang Ge Xing), Princess Yicheng of Sui
Additional Tags: Canon Divergent AU, Arranged Marriage
Series: Part 1 of Harmonious Kinship
Summary:

Changge goes along with her mother's plan and is sent out of Chang'an to safety. Soon after she returns to the city, the emperor arranges to marry her to Sun to satisfy his agreement with the Ashile. Changge goes along with this for her own reasons and soon finds herself embroiled in complex politics.

Annotated Bibliography for Harmonious Kinship (3022 words) by Forestofglory
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 长歌行 | The Long Ballad (TV)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Additional Tags: Meta, Research
Series: Part 2 of Harmonious Kinship
Summary:

An Annotated Bibliography for my fic Harmonious Kinship. I list the sources I used for research and talk a little bit about each one.

This doesn’t contain any spoilers for either The Long Ballad or my fic (unless you consider historical events to be spoilers) so it should be readable for people who are just curious about my research process.

Not sure what's next for me in writing I'm currently taking an indefinite break from writing fic, but I do have translation that I just need to read through one more time before I send it to beta, and I'm toying with some ideas for another long post for Lady Business.

21) It's the winter solstice here in the Northern hemisphere, so for #DecRecs I'm reccing: Sing for the Coming of the Longest Night by Katherine Fabian and Iona Datt Sharma

I reread this yesterday so I can say with confidence that its extremely good!

It’s a contemporary fantasy novella about two metamores who dislike each other but have to work together to save their mutual boyfriend. The writing is beautiful, the characters are great, and there's so many keenly observed details!


22)Today #DecRecs is also a solstice themed novella: Snowspelled by Stephanie Burgis!

I reread this yesterday and it is such a delight! Recency-ish fantasy, with house parties, elves and romance.

Cassandra Harwood is such a super smart disabled chaos muppet, but I love her so much! Her family is great too!


23) Recing a song for #DecRecs today

This is from the first season of Our Song and watching in never fails to cheer me up at least a bit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qoZTtE0sRQ&list=PLtRyFdw91Awx0WofApkwlzAfF7fbbcMBC&index=4

24) I think there's fair number of people here who enjoy both DWJ and MDZS/The Untamed but I'm not sure how many of you know about this Lives of Christopher Chat fusion: The Lives of Lan Wangji By azurewaxwing

It's so much fun, it's got a good DWJ-ish voice, but the characters feel very much themselves. Also an excellent terrible cat

https://archiveofourown.org/works/27525991

I'm trying out posting shorter and more frequent DecRecs roundups

6)Today's #DecRecs is Walkers Shortbread Scottie Dogs. The dog shapes are so charming and cute! (and yes they do taste better than the less cute version -- appearance matters!) These are a bit difficult to find where I live, which adds to their allure for me. R happened to pick up a box for me a few days ago and I've been eating them slowly

Today is the 7th day of #DecRecs and I want to rec the Qingming River Bot! (https://universeodon.com/@QingmingRiverBot)This bot posts details from the well known painting g “Along the River During the Qingming Festival” / 清明上河圖
I love seeing these little snippets of urban life in Song times on my feed! It's fun to see the boats and cows and horses and to imagine what all the people are up to!

8) It's the 8th day of #DecRecs and I haven't recced any fanfic yet. Let fix that!
on a long journey by twigofwillow is long time favorite of mine. It's post cannon Lan Sizhui story so themes of family living on with complicated pasts. The emotional stuff is very complex and nuanced as it should be.
I also love how its structured in a non-linear way , and features storytelling and and letters!
It's just a very beautiful fic!
https://archiveofourown.org/works/29819775/chapters/73366473

2023 was a mixed year for my writing. I posted more at ladybusiness than ever before! But I didn’t post much fic. I struggled a lot with hand pain and was sick for a long time, both of which had a negative impact on my ability to write. Here’s an overview of what I did write!

At the start of the year I organized a group post at ladybusiness of our favorite short fiction of 2022

In 2023 I set a goal of writing a rec list every month. And I mostly succeeded, missing one month due to illness and one month just cause. I rounded up all those rec lists here. For December instead of writing a rec list I posted a rec a day for DecRecs, which you can find at my #DecRecs tag

I also wrote a little bit of fic in 2023, posting a total of 3,238 words on ao3 over three fics, one co-written.

While it wasn’t a productive year in terms of word count, each fic was part of a new thing I tried this year: an exchange, co-writing and writing a drabble. Here are the three fics:

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In 2024 I want to be better at contributing to group posts at ladybusiness so I'm making it a goal to contribute at least once a month.

I'm also setting myself a goal of finishing and posting at least one fic over 1k.
And my stretch goal is to write something for a fandom event.

Hopefully a few small goals will help motivate me, but not be overwhelming

#DecRecs is reccing fest that happens in December. People rec things (where things can be anything) they want to rec and share them with the hashtag #DecRecs. This year like last year I'm reccing a thing every day for the month!

Here's everything I've posted for #DecRecs so far this year:

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Just popping quickly to say that I have new post on Lady Businnes "Those Who Came Before: a Rec List of Fic About the Older Generations of Women in the Untamed This the first in what I hope will be a series of rec lists about the women of CQL/mdzs. It's also the sixth rec list I've posted this year as part of my rec list a month project. (I skipped June due to illness)

Last week one of my friends decided to run a Women of MDZS Flash Exchange. I'd never done an exchange before but I decided to sign up. This was good first exchange for me because it was low stakes, a bunch of my friends where taking part, and it was theme near and dear to my heart.

I was nervous about writing to a deadline, but I was able to come up with story idea and write it in the time allowed.

Here's the story I wrote:
福食; Lucky Meal (842 words) by Forestofglory
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 陈情令 | The Untamed (TV)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Bàoshān Sànrén/Lán Yì
Characters: Ā-Qìng (Módào Zǔshī), Bàoshān Sǎnrén, Lán Yì (Módào Zǔshī)
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, accidental auntie acquisition
Summary:

One day at the market A-Qing runs into a new stall run by two mysterious women

And I got this awesome story featuring textiles!

Fabric (958 words) by Cinnamon Seadragon
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 陈情令 | The Untamed (TV)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Jiāng Chéng | Jiāng Wǎnyín & Jiāng Yànlí & Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn, Jiāng Yànlí/Jīn Zǐxuān
Characters: Jiāng Yànlí
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies, Friendship, Memories
Summary:

Jiang Yanli's wardrobe is full of memories

I haven't finished reading through the collection but there's lots good things there!

This was fun. I might do another exchange someday

I've recently switched form "I'm not inspired to write any fic and thats fine" to "It would be nice if I felt inspired to write some fic" which is probably a positive sign for my mental health, if a bit frustrating.

I've got lots things that would be fun to put into a story floating around in my head. For example I'd like to describe some gardens, and I think it could be fun to write detailed fight scene, and I've been trying for ages to figure out how to make something story shaped about the labor of preindustrial textile production. But none of this has any story attached to it yet. I guess I'll just let thinks float around some more.

Meanwhile my write rec list every month plan is going well so far. I've drafted one I want to post next week. I've been doing a ton of reading and rereading for my epistolary/artifact fiction rec list that I'm working on next. That's been fun!

I ended up rereading a bunch of older post canon wangxian get togethers, and then I was thinking about how those where different form more recent fics like that. So I read some non-epistolary older get togethers to see if my observations held up and they did (so far). The older fics tend to have wangxian having more awareness of each other's feelings, and they are more likely to show traveling being healing for WWX. Also they more often directly reference the final scene in the show. So that's been a fun to think about.

Happy New Year everyone! I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed by year in review/goals stuff. I'll try to at least post my December goals wrap up latter today or tomorrow. In the meantime here are the last of the recs form my #DecRecs rec a thing everyday in December project.

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This was a fun project that helped me get through a time of year that I find stressful! It's nice to think about things I love and share them with other people. And it was great that many people also decided to take part and rec things in December. I think I'll do it again next December (I've put a reminder in my calendar)

Here's what I've been reccing for my rec a day project in the last ten days!

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