This book is hard to tag - it's basically cosmic horror, or horror scifi. It is also one of the creepiest and trippiest things I've read in a long time and maybe ever.
I kinda vaguely knew about SCP as a collaborative wiki project from the 2000s, with user-submitted descriptions of imaginary (and frequently extradimensional) objects. This book is based on it. It's about a group of characters who work for the Antimemetics Division of the SCP Foundation, a department most people don't know about (because it's impossible to remember it for more than a few minutes after finding out about it) that handles "antimemes," which are the opposite of memes - if memes are catchy and transmissible, antimemes are intentionally unmemorable, to an extent where you need to use extraordinary measures, such as memory-enhancing drugs, just to recognize that they exist at all. It's information that functions as anti-information. And it turns out there are living creatures with antimemetic properties, as well as weapons that use it ...
I'm doing some minor operational work tonight. It should be transparent, but there's always a chance that something goes wrong. The main thing I'm touching is testing a replacement for Apache2 (our web server software) in one area of the site.
I’ve got a new (old) short story out now! Well, technically yesterday, but gosh, this semester’s teaching schedule is brutal, and I have very little free time to do things like promo…
“An Exchange of Hearts” is fantasy-romance, a sort of spin on the princess-in-a-tower and glass-mountain fairytale motifs. Except the princess is also a magician, and the prince on the quest is less interesting than his brother, also a magician, who initially just came along to help…except there’s something intriguing about the person who could create such magic, and such a challenge… (I did do some rewriting to clearly have bisexual main characters and a queer-normative world; that was actually always the case in my head, but I made it more overt in this version.) I always liked the idea of them falling in love through magic first – being impressed by each other – and also the light subversion of whose quest it ends up being!
This story, as I mentioned, is both old and new – the oldest version was actually one of my very first pro story sales, maybe a decade ago! That speculative fiction magazine closed, and we got all our rights back and everything. So I figured I’d see if JMS would like it!
The new version is a couple thousand words longer (hey, it’s me: any editing will add more words…) and lightly edited (and retitled) to be a little closer to my current writing style, though the core of the story is the same.
I still like it – in fact, I’ve got a lot of affection for it! – and I hope you do too!
And look at the gorgeous cover! It never had a cover before, just being internal inside the magazine. JMS did a lovely job!
An Appointment to Keep (1400 wds, Biggles + Erich + An OC [Original Cat]) My recipient liked fluff and animals, so that is exactly what's in this! Set late in canon.
Draped in Glory (1300 wds, Algy/Ginger) And this was a treat for pinch hitter black_bentley, who it seemed only fair should have a gift too! This is basically an Algy/Ginger take on the Biggles/EvS "putting on jewelry" fic I wrote a couple of years ago; it always seemed to me that it should work for them equally well.
Under Glass (1900 wds, Biggles/EvS) Not exactly a Sleeping Beauty AU ... but also kind of a Sleeping Beauty AU! Set in canon, but Biggles is under a curse; only true love's kiss can wake him. This was a last-minute treat when the idea hit me out of the blue.
I haven't watched this movie in absolutely ages, and I've never written anything for it before, but it was what the prompt immediately made me think of.
Amperslash authors are revealed! I wrote two things, one assignment and one PH.
And Other Hidden Places (Murderbot, 7200 wds, mature-rated, creator chose not to use warnings)
So in true Amperslash fashion, this one was insanely difficult to tag. It's Gurathin/OC and sort of Murderbot/Gurathin, but also, Murderbot is definitely asexual and sex-repulsed in this, possibly aromantic but possibly also not. Basically Gurathin seeks out rough sex to self-harm; Murderbot finds out about it and tries to figure out what's going on. I had a ton of fun writing it, and I figured the recipient (whose tastes I know pretty well) would love it, but I would never have written this one for someone cold; it definitely skirts the edge of a number of areas that can be either super iddy or hard DNWs depending on personal taste.
I like this pairing in general concept and have read a little of it, but I've never tried my hand at writing it, so I decided to jump on the pinch hit, and really had fun with the period ambiance in this one! (Husband reminded me when I was idly musing about the whole deal with cars having cigarette lighters that old cars also used to have ashtrays, which was definitely a thing in the cars of my youth, but I had completely forgotten about! So that makes an appearance in this fic as well.)
I don't think I posted about Amperslash when it revealed, but I got a lovely gift!
The Ties that Bind Us (Biggles, slightly ambiguous Biggles/EvS) A very fun, sensual fic in which they are trying to squirm out of ropes tying them together, while also talking about Feelings.
And I got THREE gifts in Holiday Airdrop, the Biggles exchange I run! This time around, all are gen and Algy & EvS-focused.
Soft Landings, a wonderfully well realized, hurt/comforty AU in which Algy is the first person on the team to encounter Erich during Buries a Hatchet.
A Silver-Topped Cane is a lovely little post-Terai bit of comfort and bonding, in which Erich offers advice and maybe a little commiseration while Algy is healing.
Forge is deliciously iddy and visceral h/c in which EvS and Algy are handcuffed together in the desert.
Between the two exchanges, I wrote five fics, including some pairings I don't normally write! I'm looking forward to getting to 'fess up to them.
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