fleurlb | Dear Chocolate Box Writer... (Reply)

I'm delighted that we share some fannish interests (and possibly loves) and hope that you enjoy the creation process and have a good time this Chocolate Box Season. If prompts and extra information helps you, you've come to the right place. But if Optional Details are Optional is the way you roll, that's cool too.

My hard-and-fast DNWs list is fairly short. I do not want incest, non-con, porn without plot, child death or grievous injury (unless it's canon and even then, no need to dwell on the details), animal cruelty or abuse, scat/watersports/extreme kink, or first-person narration. Yeah, I know that last one is maybe a little weird, but I find first-person difficult to warm up to and it takes me out of the story.

In general, I love fan fiction. I love the way it lets me spend time with beloved characters. I love the way it opens up new adventures and possibilities. I love the way it lets me rethink and reimagine known worlds.

I'll give you the fandom-specifics first, and then a whole laundry list of general loves that you can mix and match or use for inspiration. The universe of things I like is pretty wide.

The Mandalorian

Cara Dune & Baby Yoda

Cara Dune & The Mandalorian & Baby Yoda

Cara Dune & The Mandalorian

Cara Dune/The Mandalorian

I love Cara Dune – I love her toughness especially. How does being around Baby Yoda change her and how does she feel about those changes? I'd love any kind of silly caper involving Baby Yoda and/or The Mandalorian. Also, that revelation about where Cara Dune is from in the last episode – holy cow, that opens up so much potential for character growth and backstory. I'd love to see a conversation between Cara and Mando where they talk about the destruction – complete in Cara's case – of their childhood homes.

Atypical

Casey Gardner & Coach Crowley

Casey Gardner/Izzie & Evan Chapin

Coach Crowley/Professor Judd

Casey Gardner/Izzie

I love the characters. I love their messy relationships and their imperfect but intense love for each other. I would appreciate a story that centers Casey and her feelings about everything, especially she and Izzie running into Evan for the first time since becoming a couple. Or, alternatively, it's my head canon that Coach Crowley and Professor Judd are a couple – so I'd like to see an evening in their life and maybe they discuss their interesting students.

Last Tango in Halifax

Kate McKenzie/Caroline McKenzie-Dawson

Last Tango in Halifax – This show is still my emotional home place. I return to it whenever I feel on the edge of depression because it makes me feel so many things. I ship Kate and Caroline like whoa and would love fix-it fic/AU where the senseless death does not happen. Basically, I love the people on this show and just want more of them interacting and being messy but loving and just trying to figure out life.

Star Wars OT

Leia Organa/Han Solo

These movies are my first fannish obsession, and Princess Leia was always one of my favorites. I love the way she and Han spark off each other, in both good and bad ways. Han has some preconceptions about princesses – I'd love to see Leia prove him wrong. And uh, not for nothing, but I bet Han and Leia are really good at fighting and then having angry make-up sex. Just saying.

Star Wars ST

Ben Solo | Kylo Ren & Leia Organa

Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren

I would love to see anything with Ben and his mother – his mother trying to understand him, how he felt about being sent away vs how Leia felt about it, his mother actually had a connection with him the whole time he was Kylo and was trying to help him even when he was furthest away from her.

For Rey, I would like a fix-it fic or even better, Rey trying to start her new life on Tatoine with Force-Ghost-Ben “haunting” her the whole time.

Succession

Gerri Kellman/Roman Roy

I am so here for anything that continues the amazing adventures of Rockstar and Molewoman. I love their relationship so much. It's weird and a little wrong and sweet and tender but still prickly and somewhat maternal. It's unlike anything I've seen before and it makes a weird kind of sense. I am obsessed by this show because I do not understand why anyone stays in that messed up world, especially when all they need to do is cash out a fraction of their stock and walk away. No amount of wealth seems worth it to me for the stress and mental abuse they all have to put up with. I would love to see Gerri and Roman make the decision to walk away. Or maybe make plans to walk away and then have to struggle with following through.

I love, love, love so many tropes. (And I also love stories that subvert tropes.) In no particularly order, I absolutely love the following tropes:

Fake dating

Using dating/relationships as a cover for a mission/con/job/plan

Secret weddings/marriages

Elopement, and accidental marriages

Unexpected tenderness

Hurt/comfort

Cooking comfort foods

Grand romantic gestures

Repressed feelings

Found families

Slow burning love that develops slowly through mundane activities

Starting a new life

Ghost stories

Spooky settings

Haunted houses

Stupid dares

Camping

Accidental demon summoning

Disasters – natural or manmade

Post-apocalytpic fights to survive

Man vs wilderness

Angst

Unresolved sexual tension

Zombies

Roads not taken in canon

Wacky roadtrips

That's quite a grab bag to choose from, but I would like anything from it. Here are a few starting points for a gift in any fandom:

A natural or manmade disaster strikes and characters must work together to save themselves and others

AU - The Zombie Apocalypse strikes - what is life like and how do the characters manage?

Character backstories - I love a good backstory!

The road not taken...what happens when a character makes a different decision than in canon. How does the story (and more importantly, the character) change as a result of the decision?

First times - first kisses, first loves, first day of school/prison/the army/whatever

5+1 (As in Five times X happened and 1 time it didn't) is a tried and true format - I'd eat any 5+1 with a spoon. (And it doesn't have to be 5 +1, it could be 3 or 7 or whatever works for you.)

Song fic - I don't even need to know the song. (But if you're a fan of The National, you literally cannot go wrong with any of their songs.)

Crossovers - I love crossovers like Whoa! They are seriously my favourite fandom genre. I would be delighted to see crossovers between any of my requests or with any of these fandoms: Friday Night Lights, Supernatural, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, The Good Place, The Big C, Stranger Things, Sons of Anarchy, or Leverage.