Yuletide Recs, Part I

[rachelmanija]

I am having an absolutely wonderful Yuletide, and I hope you are too. At last, there is a 2020 landmark I will remember with fondness and delight.

Here are a few stories I've enjoyed so far:

Don't need to know canon:

The Repair Shop (UK TV) & The Chronicles of Narnia & The Portrait of Dorian Gray & Harry Potter. This week on the Repair Shop: a Time Turner, a Victorian Portrait, and an antique wardrobe.

Lucia turns her talents to a lost Victorian masterpiece. Will’s abilities will be tested by a special wardrobe, and Steve has an extremely unusual timepiece.

If you have even a vague familiarity with the crossover canons, all you need to know to enjoy this delightful story is that The Repair Shop is a show about repairing people's battered but prized possessions.

The Christmas Cottage, by Thomas Kinkade. The Only Place That's Real.

Every so often someone would come through the village, looking for the cottage. This time it was a man in a fine silk suit and a faraway look in his eyes.

This story is based on a pair of paintings which are linked at the beginning, and that's all you need to know. It's a chilling piece of old-school horror: no gore or violence, just finely crafted eeriness.

Should know canon:

And Then There Were None - 2015 TV adaptation of Agatha Christie novel. Never Be Drowned.

Vera Claythorne is trapped in a time loop.

The adaptation was extremely faithful so if you've only read the book, this story will still work perfectly. It's a chilling, chilly, beautifully written portrait of Vera Claythorne, Philip Lombard, and Judge Wargrave.

Crossroad (a Star Trek novel), by Barbara Hambly. Name and Nest.

It is no small thing to no longer be alone.

One of my two gifts, and it's ambitious and amazing, with a beautifully executed alien POV and packing a whole lot of plot and worldbuilding into a short length. The year's most heartwarming story about eldritch space horrors.

Dragaera, by Steven Brust & Gashlycrumb Tinies, by Edward Gorey. Gashleycrumb Dragaerans.

A is for Aliera, soul mislaid by mistake
B is for Baritt who crossed the wrong snake

Yuletide was made for this.

Terminator: Dark Fate. Respite.

After a couple of months, Grace wakes up.

One of my two gifts, this is the fix-it fic we all need, a sweet, funny, cozy, and comforting story of three tough women getting a bit of much-needed rest and hope and comfort.

The Tillerman Cycle, by Cynthia Voigt. Cherry Stone.

Four people Maybeth Tillerman learned from (and one she taught).

I always wished Voigt had written a book about Maybeth, who was one of my favorite characters. This story is beautifully written and heartfelt, with so many perfectly characterized and illuminating cameos by the rest of the cast that it really feels like that missing book, even though it's only 4500 words.

Comments

[primeideal]

Thanks for the info on the "don't need to know canon" disclaimer! I enjoyed the Repair Shop. :)

[karanguni]

/adds the And Then There Were None one to my reading list

[cahn]

I'm so happy you recced my Tillerman fic, it is SO GOOD and I am just over the moon that it was written for me :DDDDD

[asakiyume]

The Only Place That's Real was excellent! It does a LOT in a few words. In addition to the things you said about it, I liked that it was written from the perspective of the Thomas Kincaide landscape-ees, so to speak. What is it like to do the work that creates those images? Well, you have to have warm boots and be laying down salt. They're the reality behind the illusion. But what the lonely travelers want is always only the illusion. The line about friends--to me that felt like the way a traveler to a place can have a feeling he's met all these friends, because they figure so large in his own internal drama, showing him the way and all, but he in fact knows nothing about who they really are. We know more about Meredith and Hank than the rapidly fading man does.

From another angle, it felt like such a metaphysical story! They're still grounded in being alive--hence Meredith would never go into that house--but he wants a home he's never been to, some eternal, perfect home.

Super cool.

[rachelmanija]

Yes, that's a great analysis. I think you're right about the friends.

Copy and paste this comment as a comment on the story! It will make the author's day.

[asakiyume]

Good idea--I'll do that!

[brownbetty]

Oh boy, I feel like... I *might* have read that Hambley novel, when I was fourteen, and regularly visited the library with all the Star Trek novels. Gosh. I don't think I remember it well enough, though.