Though each work was posted on both Dreamwidth and LJ, I'm linking to the LJ posts as they automatically have links to the corresponding Dth entry in their footers :)

( Read more... )


This was so much fun. I think I spoke enough about the kind of stuff I wanted to play with in my initial post about the project, and can happily say that I achieved that. On reflection, though, I got a lot more out of it than I anticipated - I suppose I had thought of the project as something to showcase ideas, but what it did more than anything was develop and create new ideas and realisations for *me*, about these characters, about storytelling, about what cliche is and how it works.

Also, I totally realised that I can *do* this, I can still produce fic, I can still produce *good* fic, and I can do it to a deadline. And prolifically. Over 20,000 words in 12 days. I am feeling inspired again! I have added more to my WIPs, too!

It also shifted the focus for me on what's important about writing and publishing fic. So much of the value in that for me in 2009 was having something to be passionate about, a touchstone I could rely on for happy feelings. It was also about connecting with other people, having a community. In being blocked for months after being prolific for months, I think I lost a lot of that, and it had been dragging me down a lot. But this project has taught me a couple of things: 1) cupidsbow and I are an awesome team and can enable and cheerlead each other until the cows come home, and 2) the reward of releasing an idea out into the wild has started to outweigh the reward of other people acknowledging that I've had an idea.

So. Here's to 2010, and having many brilliant ideas, and exploring them thoroughly, and continuing the glee! I hope everyone who has been following us along for the past 12 days have enjoyed themselves as much as we have :D

SADFACE. This is the final day, and final piece, of 12 Days of Cliche.

I can't think of a better note to end on than this, really. Cathy's made a beautiful vid that talks about one of the most recapitulated (but rarely extrapolated) tropes of the fandom: Jack's immortality. It's gorgeous and I love it, and watched it several billion times as I was writing yesterday's story.

Title: Wake
Vidder: cupidsbow / cupidsbow
Fandom: Torchwood
Pairing: No Pairing
Rating: PG-13
Music: 'Juliet' by Russ Nixon, and The Tempest IV.1 read by Joseph Fiennes (from When Love Speaks)
Summary: We are such stuff as dreams are made on...

Watch the vid: On Dreamwidth or Livejournal.



Will be posting a roundup of the whole 12 days tonight or tomorrow, once I've got my thoughts in order.

Title: Golden Ratio
Author: Hope (angstslashhope, hope)
Fandom: Torchwood (crossed with Doctor Who)
Wordcount: ~11,000
Genre: fixit, futurefic, crossover.
Rating: Mature
Characters(s): Jack/Ianto, the Doctor
Notes: My final work for 12 Days of Cliché. Thank you to cupidsbow for cheerleading and beta!

Summary: Some things are constants. (A canon-compliant fixit, spanning several centuries.)

Read on the AO3.

My contribution for 12 Days of Cliche today is just a wee complement to cupidsbow's work, Time Management, a fixit fic that excites me a lot. Cathy has drawn in various threads from what we know and what we can construe from the canonical universe, and has woven something brilliant from it. I cannot wait to see more in this 'verse.

Here's the art:

Title: Time Management
Artist: Hope (hope/angstslashhope)
Fandom: Torchwood
Medium: Photoshop
Genre: Cover art for a work of fanfiction.
Rating: G
Notes/Summary: For 12 Days of Cliché. This is cover art for cupidsbow’s most excellent story, Time Management (on Dth or LJ), and its associated universe.

( Read more... )

cupidsbow's day again today, a vid that is part of a bigger universe; a teaser for tomorrow's story :D I cannot wait, I have been watching Cathy work on this for months. And, all right, egging her on constantly.

Here's the vid:

Title: Tango
Author: cupidsbow/cupidsbow
Fandom: Torchwood
Pairing: Jack/Ianto, Ianto/Lisa, Jack/John, Ianto/John
Rating: PG-13
Music: "El Tango de Roxanne" by Ewan McGregor and Jose Feliciano, from Moulin Rouge
Summary: Time to change your partners!

Watch the vid: On Dreamwith - On Livejournal

This is terribly late today because I had planned on posting a different story, only then that one got ridiculously long (as they tend to), and I am about to fall asleep without even having finished it. Luckily, I had this one loitering in the wings.


Title: On the Mend
Author: Hope (angstslashhope, hope)
Fandom: Torchwood
Wordcount: ~500
Rating: PG-13
Characters(s): Jack/Ianto
Notes: For 12 Days of Cliché. Thanks to cupidsbow for readthrough duties and titlage!

Summary: Hurt/comfort of a different sort.

Read on the AO3.

Whee! cupidsbow has posted her story for today, and lo, it is adorable and lovely.

Title: Five Times Torchwood Has a Close Encounter with a Sweet Young Thing
Author: cupidsbow/cupidsbow
Fandom: Torchwood
Pairing: Jack/Ianto
Rating: PG-13
Summary: "I see," said Ianto, who, sadly, was beginning to see, and was rather wishing he was still too drunk for rational thought. "You don't pay me enough for this."

Read it! on Dreamwidth or Livejournal.

I've made a 12 Days of Cliche masterlist, too. :D

In less exciting news, the internet died for a while today, and they said it would be 6 days before they fixed it. Then it magically worked again. But I don't know if that's permanent. So if I vanish (D:), that is why!

Title: Kiss the Boys Goodbye
Author: Hope (angstslashhope/hope)
Fandom: Torchwood/Doctor Who
Wordcount: ~500
Genre: AU
Rating: PG-13
Characters(s): Jack
Notes: This is a companion ficlet to cupidsbow's constructed reality vid, 1941: The Year That Never Was!

Summary: He is a glutton, and the 1940s on Earth are his feast of choice.

Read on the AO3.

Today for 12 Days of Cliche cupidsbow posted an absolutely fantastic vid. It's short and sharp, a constructed reality vid about Jack in 1941, set to a 'Sing, Sing, Sing' and using archival footage as well as Who and Torchwood visuals, of course.

It is AWESOME, and so clever and glee-making, and I'm totally blown away by the fact that Cathy made this in the horrible Windows Movie Maker. VID MASTER, I TELLS YOU.

Go and watch it. It's super-shiny.

Title: 1941: The Year That Never Was!
Vidder: cupidsbow
Fandom: Torchwood and Doctor Who
Pairing: Jack/Tosh, Jack/realJack, Jack/Tosh/realJack
Rating: PG-13
Music: "Sing, Sing, Sing" by Benny Goodman (1987 remaster)
Summary: What if Jack had never met the Doctor?

Watch the vid! Via Dreamwidth or Livejournal

Title: Proxy
Author: Hope (angstslashhope@LJ, hope@Dth)
Fandom: Torchwood
Wordcount: ~1,700
Genre: AU
Rating: PG-13
Characters(s): Lisa/Ianto, Lisa/Jack
Notes: Part of 12 Days of Cliché. Thank you to james for the beta.

Summary: Role reversal.

Read on the AO3.

Title: First Aid
Author: Hope (angstslashhope@LJ, hope@Dth)
Fandom: Torchwood
Wordcount: ~7,500
Genre: Hurt/Comfort
Rating: NC-17
Characters(s): Jack/Ianto
Notes: For 12 Days of Cliché. Thank you to alpha readers cupidsbow & rexluscus, and beta of awesome james.

Summary: First aid: the provision of initial care for an illness or injury, administered until professional medical help is available. (Set throughout Season 1; Small Worlds, Countrycide, Out of Time.)

Bonus: cupidsbow has made an accompanying vid of awesome for this piece.

Read on the AO3.

Woot! cupidsbow has just posted today's 12 Days of Cliche work, a rec set for Kidfic and Mpreg in the Torchwood fandom.

I am willing to stand up and be scorned (and secretly - or not so secretly - agreed with): I freaking love this premise in this fandom. There are some brilliantly clever, hilarious and moving stories based around these cliches, and Cathy has recced pretty much all of my favourites.

So, go and check them out!

Title: They Never Come Back; I, Robot; Shameless Game; The X-Machine
Artist: Hope
Fandom: Torchwood
Medium: Photoshop
Rating: G
Notes: For 12 Days of Cliche. Thank you rexluscus and cupidsbow for cheerleading!

Summary: Four Torchwood pulp fiction novel covers. Various characters.

( Read more... )

( Moar notes )

A few weeks ago, looking for ways to give my writer's block the boot, I had a brilliant idea. '5 things' sets always really stimulate my creativity, but you know what would be even cooler, given the season?

12 DAYS OF CLICHE.

And then I thought that 12 fics would be over-extending myself a bit, especially after a dry spell, so I roped cupidsbow into doing it with me.

So over the next 12 days, between December 26 and January 6, cupidsbow and I will be posting a bunch of Torchwood fanworks (hopefully 12, all told), related to the theme: Cliche.

I say "related to the theme" because though I started with "O RITE I'LL WRITE CLICHE STORIES", looking at what I've got, I can't say that's strictly the case. At least, not as I would have previously considered it. But what sticking with that cliche theme has done has made me think about what cliche means and is for, not just for readers/connoisseurs of culture, but for creators as well. The term "cliche" itself is about an awareness of storytelling, so when you're the writer/artist/vidder, cliche is about reflexivity. It's about painting with tropes and not just thinking about what the characters might think, but how to speak to the readers in the language of storytelling.

So anyway. The set we've ended up with is not only about those writ-big cliches that we all know and love (or roll our eyes at), but also about the particular cliches that writers and readers in this fandom of these characters might find familiar, and overall, about the art and process (and joy) of storytelling: what we've done, what RTD's done, what you've done.

Plus, we are having FUN. Even if I do freak out over the next 12 days because I haven't got everything done yet.

Posting will start tomorrow, here and at cupidsbow's (though I'll link to hers when she posts :D).

Woot!

Enjoy :D