5 Classic Longfics

[snickfic]

1. Shadow Thought It Be, by penwiper26. Giles/OFC.
In which one Elisabeth, itinerant academic and BtVS fan, stumbles into Sunnydale and can't figure out how to leave. Elisabeth is so fully realized a character, so rich in flaws and quirks, that I can't be bothered to care that according to the author this is technically a self-insert fic. The writing is intelligent and hilarious and wonderful, Elisabeth's frequent metafictional observations are great fun, and her gradual relationship with Giles totally worked for me. This is very much a fic that doesn't sound like it ought to work but really, really does.

2. Lilac City, by nwhepcat. Xander/Faith.
Alex Harris is a recovering alcoholic and night manager at a Spokane grocery until vampires encroach on his territory and remind him of all his old life. Then the real plot begins. This is a glorious long love-letter to the Inland NW; as a one-time resident, I can confirm that Hepcat has all her details right. Xander's journey towards reinventing himself - again - is gradual and very nicely done, as is his relationship with Faith.

3. Culture Vultures, by Yahtzee. Willow/Oz.
In which Willow, Oz, Faith, and an OC spend a night in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, putting down literal demons and facing metaphorical ones. The voices here are wonderful, especially Faith's, and I very enjoyed Willow and Oz's slow negotiations towards some kind of post-series relationship. Great fun.

4. Courting Sin, by leni_ba. Buffy/Angelus
A dark, disturbing fic of how things might have gone instead during BtVS S2. Claustrophobic and brooding, with a narrative style that skates on the edge of experimental; a really impressive example of the sort of thing it is.

5. After the Fall, by Elena B.
A wonderful ensemble fic of the long sad summer after "The Gift," this fic goes AU pretty fast while experimenting with POV to great success and doing some very nice character work indeed. The Xander, Spike, and Dawn segments are my favorites, but they are all worth reading (although beware some pretty, ah, bracing Willow characterization).

Comments

[petzipellepingo.livejournal.com]

Excellent choice of authors, thanks for posting.

[yourlibrarian]

Nice mix of longfic stories here, thanks. And some of those have downloads available, yay!

[snickfic]

Hurrah for AO3. :)

[antennapedia.livejournal.com]

Yay! It's great to see Penwiper get some props. And I'll be reading "After the Fall", though it'll probably hurt.

[snickfic]

*nod* Shadow Though It Be was one of the very first BtVS fics I ever read, and remains one of my favorites. It needs more fannish love, I think.

After the Fall is indeed painful, but very interesting.

[molly_may]

It's been quite some time since I last read it, but I remember "After the Fall" as been excellent as well as very unique.

[snickfic]

It's quite an interesting experiment, and very well done, I think. Plus I'm a sucker for fics set in that time period. ;)

[ever-neutral.livejournal.com]

3. I AM READING THIS AS WE SPEAK. It's fabulous.
5. Ah, I remember this one. Really heavy, but brilliant.

[snickfic]

And the thing about 3. is that last I checked, it isn't in her main website listing. I'm not sure if she wanted to disown it or what, but I hope not, because it's so much fun!

[draconin.livejournal.com]

I've read just the first half dozen chapters of Shadow Though It Be and already I can see that it's going to go into my collection of recs. Superb writing and a very strong and unusual OC. I notice that it's actually part of a series that seems quite extensive!

[snickfic]

Isn't it wonderful? I feel like no one ever mentions it, at least not in my corner of fandom (which, I admit, is not hugely Giles-centric). And yes, she does have quite the series, with a number of off-shoots and such.

[kirylyn.livejournal.com]

have to admit that I *love* the fact that both Twisting the Hellmouth and Archive of our Own allows me to save the entire fic in Kindle format. (which is good as I haven't figured out how to run calibre in command line yet)

yeah!! more stuff to read!

[snickfic]

Isn't it wonderful? Very useful.

[lusciousxander.livejournal.com]

The last one sounds very interesting. Thank you so much for sharing!

[snickfic]

I expect you'll like it, too - it has a lot of Spike-Xander action in it, and I read it as pre-slash.

[rebcake.livejournal.com]

¡Yay! I don't think I've read all of any of these, though I've seen bits of leni_ba's 'verse at open_on_sunday. I just read the last one, and it's fabulous, if very AU. (I'd have warned for that, rather than the Willow stuff, which I didn't think was even as surprising as the Tara POV. *shrug*) Yahtzee and nwhepcat can always be depended on to bring the good stuff, so I'm positive those will be wonderful, and I look forward to reading them all!

[snickfic]

It had not even crossed my mind to warn for the AU stuff. I might go back and change that, actually. I wasn't worried about the Tara POV, because although it's dark, I can't imagine it coming across as character-bashing, whereas I think the Willow characterization could.

Enjoy! These are all very, very good.

[elenabtvs.livejournal.com]

First off - thank you! It's been a long time since anyone commented on After the Fall. What a great thing to find when your husband dares you to google your fic.

You can find all of my fic here - http://bifictionalbedlam.slashcity.net/guests/elena.html - sorry, I've forgotten how to link pretty.

Pre-slash for Xander and Spike? Yeah. That can't help but sneak in. Those boys had chemistry.

Willow bashing? Maybe. I hold some fairly controversial opinions about Willow.

Ah, the summer after season 5. We were all so young then...