Fanfiction

I can't get into books lately but I'm addicted to fanfiction.

The Legacy of Terabithia by Wordsmith
Great premise, Leslie Aaron - 10-year-old daughter of Jess Aaron, famous author of Bridge to Terabithia - is sent to Lark Creek for the summer. She befriends Jamie Byrne, an imaginative, geeky boy. This story is so well written (great characterization, great plot, great descriptions (i.e. "showing not telling") and dialogue that's both natural and funny.) Leslie and Jamie's friendship fits so well. Their tweenage romance is *squeals* SO cute, and sends butterflies through my stomach - makes me relive my ten-year-old crushes and first kiss all over again. I love this and I'm already rereading chapters three hours after I read it through for the first time!

Ancient History Comes with a Helmet, Right? by orchidvines
Persuasion isn't my favourite Austen book, but I love its modernizations. I don't know who copied who, but all over fandom Anne Elliot is the jobless college graduate who doesn't know what to do with her life, and gawd I can relate to that so completely. I know people who are just as passive and nice as Anne, and this version partly convinces me how realistic Persuasion is. This version has great (if, yes, mature) language, and the story flows. I don't usually like lighthearted romance novels, but the writing style is clever, humourous and relaxing. There's a lot of character - Mary, and the younger Musgrove sister, are much more well-drawn out than in JA's version, and I love the personality she gave Sophie Croft. Karen Harville is a sweetie and just the friend Anne needs, and I would love to hang out on a beach with this crowd - bashing Danielle Steele and observing Fred / Anne tension, etc.

TOMORROW
I read rubygillis's TOMORROW in one sitting - all 50 odd chapters. It is so perfect a sequel to Gone With the Wind. She captured the spirit, the dialogue and atmosphere, and the southern belle dilemma perfectly. The pairings are perfectly satisfying for the demands of a fanfiction fan. And the plot is original and gripping, fresh, inspired, complex. She is an excellent plot-artist.

Snape Split
Completely original, and simply hilarious. This author's White Out and its sequel are also easily the best HP fanfiction I've read. Her writing style is impeccable, characters spot-on, and there's depth and thought in the plot.

Survival, Margaret Atwood

This book depressed me in its beginning- like the narrator, I was embarrassed by her trip and the shallow lives of the company she kept. As the story progressed I saw themes common to all Margaret Atwood's books. But the daring and controversial plot was absent, this was only rural Quebec and the maudlin problems of two couples.

Fasut, Goethe

What a fantastic world I have been thrown into in this play - all the tiers of hells, all the mythological creatures. I should love to see it performed.

Mansfield Park, Jane Austen

I have been reading Mansfield Park and it is so delightful. It has given me more pleasure than anything else in my past weeks. Fanny Price is the character I should have written for my Dora - half caricature, but so well developed and so convincing in her emotions that I do not know if I want her feelings, or Edmund's, to prevail. She is the only Austen heroine we meet as a child, and it is easier to form an attachment to a younger heroine. I can hear her, as I can hear Mary Crawford's banter off the pages - though I do wonder at how the people of the Regency amused themselves, pacing idly about drawing rooms hours on end, and how Jane Austen is so decided in her judgement of characters as "ill" or "selfish." Is there no room for redemption, do people never change?

I finished it in a sitting, thrilled that every time I turned the page the story had not ended yet. My only regret is that the denouement happened too quickly. I would like to know "just when, and not a week earlier or later" Edmund finally made his professions of love to Fanny.