It's times like these that I remember why it's imperative for me to update my rec page. All my saved links are a mess.

Title: Ordinary Wishes
Author: Nimori
Fandom: CJ Cherryh's Fortress Series
Length: Medium

Cherryh's a fairly well-known author in the fantasy/sci-fi world. In the Fortress series (four books and growing) she introduces Tristen, a man created by powerful magic from the spirit of an ancient ruler. The spell goes wrong and Tristen is brought forth as a complete innocent, to the chagrin of the wizard who planned the spell and the delight of the reader. The series chronicles court machinations, magical clashes, and various human relationships, but (for me, at least) the real pleasure comes from following it all through the eyes of our naive protagonist. Tristen is an innocent, but Tristen is magic; certain words with emotional impact "Unfold" to him, and he gets to experience their impact firsthand. In Nimori's story Tristen first becomes aware of lust in relation to his friend Crissand (the Earl of Meiden).

I've read this story numerous times, mainly because Nimori's style here is so close to Cherryh's own that it reads almost like a missing scene from the series. The series itself is so damn slashy it isn't even funny: the friendship between Tristen and Prince Cefwyn, the eventual ruler of one of the two most powerful kingdoms in the series, is full of flowery proclamations of deep friendship, "manly" hugs, and moving kissing (on the cheek), and Tristen's relationship with Crissand is akin to that, but set to 11. More than that, Nimori does a beautiful job of keeping Tristen naive yet intelligent throughout.

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Title: A Dangerous Man
Authors: Jane St. Clair and Te
Fandom: X-Men/Marvel Universe
Length: Long

Scott Summers aka Cyclops was always my least favorite X-Man (something about him being all goody-goody rubbed me the wrong way). Janete gets around this by using one of the more screwed up versions of Scott ("welcome to the Comicverse: we retcon and introduce alternate dimensions at will"), and introducing him to one of my favorite characters, Canada's Northstar aka Jean-Paul Beaubier (one of Marvel's first "out" characters). In this story the X-Men head due north for diplomatic pow-wows, and Scott and Northstar build a relationship. My favorite parts of "A Dangerous Man" are the dialogue between Scott and Jean-Paul (imo, the major strengths of Jane and Te's stories come from the way their dialogues simply flow; it can make a girl jealous). I finished wishing there was some sort of sequel or continuation in the 'verse.

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Title: Literacy
Author: The Hoyden
Fandom: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Length: Medium

In DS9, Julian Bashir is a brash intelligent genetically enhanced physician and Elim Garak is a brash intellectual tailor/former assassin for the Cardassian underworld. Their friendship was endlessly enjoyable for viewers and made for a ridiculous amount of slash fodder. In this fluffy story, Garak gets a humorously naive Bashir to read aloud to him a traditional Cardassian tale. Bashir, as befitting his super-intelligence, translates as he goes, but there's something lost in the word-for-word translation...and hidden in all the metaphors and similes of the Cardassian text is a little something more than the good Doctor is ready to make out. The reader figures out what's going on way before Bashir does, but that just makes the story that much more enjoyable.

It is so hard to decide! Here are some favorites from miscellaneous fandoms.

Title: Betty and the Bat.
Author: wrigleyfield
Fandom: Ugly Betty/Batman Begins (plus some DC characters).
Pairing: Gen so far, with light hints of Bruce/Selina Kyle and Betty/Daniel.
Summary: Set after the first season of "Ugly Betty" and the movie "Batman Begins". Finding herself out of a job after Daniel's accident, Betty starts to work for Bruce Wayne.
Link: Betty and the Bat.
(Link goes to the last part posted, where there are links to all previous chapters.

Review: First, a warning. This story is a work in progress (with 14 chapters so far) but it is posted regularly and only has two parts to go till the current arc is finished.
That being said, it is one of the most clever and well executed crossovers I've ever read. Everyone is in character, yet two different universes manage to merge beautifully. It makes sense for Bruce to have a secretary he can trust completely with all his secrets and there's no one that could fill that role better than Betty. To top it off, there are a number of fantastic guest appearances by some of DC's characters like Mercy (Lex Luthor's bodyguard) and Selina Kyle (Catwoman).

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Title: Human Interest and Two Crows Joy.
Author: madlori.
Fandom: Brokeback Mountain.
Pairing: Jack Twist/Ennis Del Mar.
Summary: "1983: A reporter visits the small town of Farmingdale, Vermont, and is intrigued to learn about two men who run a ranch together outside of town...but when she meets them, the story she hopes to write takes on new significance."
Link: humaninterest is the LJ community created for this AU, where you can find both stories. If you're there you might want to check the fantastic "Zero at The Bone" - an AU where Jack is a surgeon and Ennis (or "D") is the hitman hired to kill him after he witnesses a murder. There's only one chapter to go till it's finished).

Review: This is such a delightful story. It asks what might have happened if Ennis had not turned Jack away after his divorce. Fifteen years later they run a ranch in Vermont. Life is not always perfect - there's tragedy and prejudice out in the world, but there's also love, friendship and support. Lori manages to make her original characters interesting and believable and bring the ones we know to life.
"Human Interest" is complete with 24 chapters. "Two Crows Joy" has 32 chapters so far, but only a couple more to go (the author says they'll probably be posted in the next few months).

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Title: Being Out.
Author: tanzi.
Fandom: Love Mode.
Pairing: Sakashita Izumi/Takamiya Katsura.
Summary: "As the days of their slowly developing relationship turn into weeks, months and finally years, Izumi's constant protestations about Takamiya's advances slowly start to fall away."
Link: Being Out.

Review: Most "Love Mode" stories that involve Takamiya and Izumi tend to follow the tone set up by the manga: Takamiya hilariously pursuing while Izumi tries to fend him off. Tanzi goes in a different direction - she shows us a glimpse of the future, where a much more mature Izumi finally comes to accept his feelings (though he still doesn't want to shout about them from rooftops). The story is short, but sweet and beautiful.

Unfortunately, I know too little about small fandoms. It's so much easier to find larger-fandom fics, you know? However, I think I can take a stab at this by way of a few obscure crossovers.

Electron Bonding by Amireal is a Buffy/CSI crossover (Grissom/Greg), which I would call a small fandom crossover of two larger fandoms. One of the first stories I ever read by Ami, it's quite cool as a face-off of the oh-so-scientific CSI crew with the Scoobies, led by Willow. It's especially cool with Greg and Grissom serving as the bridges between, due to Greg's family connection to Andrew and to Grissom's ever-practical 'show me proof' attitude.

Ryan of Green Gables by skoosiepants is a bandom fusion with Anne of Green Gables. As with all skoosie's works, it's kinda crazy but she makes it work soo well. The link provided is to the tag for all the RoGG entries, with the top entry containing links to the previous bits. The story is more of a series of vignettes, but any Anne fan will recognize them and love Skoozie's spin on them even if, like me, you have no idea who these bands are or what they sound like.

My favorite fanfic, ever, is A Very Long Summer by Calathea. http://calathea.mediawood.net/stories/AVLS.html

It's a slashy continuation of Gordon Korman's book, 'I Want To Go Home!'. But it's not necessary to have read the book to read the fic. I hadn't the first time I read it. Rudy and Mike first met at camp as kids. They spent the entire book trying to escape it, now as 18 year olds, they've been forced to work as counselors at the same camp for the summer. It's a long, dare I say epic, love story about two best friends, that's also incredibly funny. When you've read AVLS, go to Calathea's site http://calathea.mediawood.net and read all the rest of her Korman slash. If you don't know Mike and Rudy, you might be more familiar with Bruno and Boots...

Another awesome book fandom is the small but very good Vorkosigan fandom. Based on the Vorkosigan books by Lois Mcmaster Bujold, A Deeper Season by E.E Beck and Stacy is a true slash epic. You find it and it's sequels at http://lookingglass.thelightgetsin.com/

It's not exactly a small fandom but it's incredibly hard to find good, long, adult fiction in this fandom. The best I've found is

Title: Diplomatic Relations
Author: maldoror
Fandom: Naruto
Length: Very Long

If you've ever stumbled across the cartoons, mangas, games, and/or fiction, you know Naruto is the adventures of a young boy trying to become the best ninja in his village while working with, against, and beside dozens of fellow ninja students. The universe is vast, containing a dozen countries, ninja villages, characters and twisted plotlines - most of which don't exactly play toward a child's audience. Canon includes murder, rape, child abuse - mental & physical, pornography, genderswitching, perverts (one of Naruto's teachers' is actually nicknamed Pervy Sage), obsession, magic, bestiality, and demon posession, to name a few. Naruto & his fellow students are ages 12-13 to start. Since we are ten plus years into the manga, they are ages 14-15 present day. (smirk)

Diplomatic Relations is the story of Rock Lee, one of Naruto's school mate/rival, being sent to the Sono (Sand) Village to hold a diplomatic post in the future. There, he gets to know Gaara, his once bitter enemy, and they strike up an 'unusual' friendship. Both characters are over 18 here although the involved flashbacks go as young as 2 to 'present' day.

If you have seen any of Naruto, then you know how interesting Gaara is. This is the best Gaara fic out there. Long and involved, it takes a couple characters never seen enough, expanses their personalities/history, and gives the reader an incredibly complex, fun, smart read without drowning us in too much info. I re-read this every few months just to find the wonderful little extras the author snuck in Naruto for obsessed fans. (cough) But it's even a great trip for people who are only vaguely aware of the series. It does an wonderful job of showing the other side of ninja life - paperwork, practice, waiting - besides the missions. Amd uou get a view of life outside of Lee and Naruto's Konoha (Leaf) Village, where most of the series normally starts.

This story would actually qualify as epic if you include all the other stories the author has written in the series. If you love anime love, give it a try.

I don't know if I would really recommend this anyone who hasn't seen an episode or two. The language - chuunin, hokage, sensei - is a bit of a stumbling block if you don't have some idea who or what some of these people are or doing. But Cartoon Network shows new episodes on Sat. night and repeats are plentiful. However, if you are a regular reader of fantasy/scifi and are used to an author dropping you in a world you don't know, give this a try. You would be surprised at how complex and involving Diplomatic Relations is without even knowing a soul. Enjoy!

I wanted to thank everyone for the recs, this theme has been excellent for giving me new fics to put on my reading list! ::hearts::

In appreciation, here’s a rec from my new favorite small fandom: Mac PC. Yes, you read that right, Mac/PC, you know, those two guys from those Mac ads.

It’s a fandom that slashes two rivals (although…hmm…PC does seem to be jealous that Mac spends all that time networking with That Digital Camera from Japan…and Mac does give PC a photo album of the good times the two of them have had together for x-mas…hmm) that are personifications of modern technology. So, you can imagine that most of the writers are very creative and the fic I’ve read has also been funny, cute, at times surprisingly hot, and mostly short.

Below is a fic of decent length that I enjoyed reading very much (I love geeky characters in love and I love awkward high school fic, nuff said).

Titles: “Think about You Day and Night” and “Imagine How the World Could Be”
Author: theguardingdark
Rating: PG-13
Length: Medium-ish
Warning: The author says this is an on-going series, but don’t consider it a WIP b/c the last chapter has a solid ending to the second story arc.

He scowled at his reflection while he combed his hair. The dreams had haunted his memory day and night for weeks, taking up enough energy to occasionally freeze him at inopportune moments, such as mid shower or at the dinner table. He had always hated Mac. But now he hated that he couldn't hate him, and what he hated most of all was that the pudgy loser in the khakis and sweater vest couldn't sleep at night for fantasizing about the popular, artistic kid. It was so typical, and so irritating. He'd once prided himself on his ability to avoid the drama and stupidity of high school life. So much for that now.

ch.1 ch.2 ch.3 ch.4 ch.5 ch.6

I've just been recced Air Force One fanfic. Seriously. And not just a short piece but what appears to be a really, really long one.

http://users.frii.com/wanderer/fanfic/mouse.html

I haven't read it yet, so obviously I don't know for sure that I'll like it, but the mere fact that it exists is making me jump up and down with excitement.

It's made me wonder if there's any good Jack Ryan fanfic out there (the Harrison Ford connection). I'd love to read more about Ryan as President...

Title:Made Men by fourteencandles
Fandom: Entourage
Pairing: Vince/Eric
Length: 39,000
Rating: NC17
Summary: At Sundance, Vince and Eric decide they should do Tapping the Source with Harvey Weinstein instead of take a risk on Aquaman. How does their life(second half of Season 2 onwards) change because of this decision?
Part 1-- Part 2--Part 3--Part 4--Part 5--Part 6

I stumbled upon the Entourage fandom by accident, and got hooked by this author. fourteencandles has some really nice long fics. I selected this story because it was the last one that I read.

PS-Sorry! wrote this up for rare pairings week, and realized this isn't rare for the fandom. Actually, the pairing is the main for Entourage fics. Instead of deleting the post, I decided to put it in the right category.

Fandom: Final Fantasy VII
Title: Temporary
Author: cicegi
Pairing: Cloud/Zack
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: 8,315
Summary: Optimist vs. Realist


Fandom: Good Omens
Title: Living Arrangements
Author: bravecows
Pairing: Aziraphale/Crowley
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Everyone is more or less human, even when they aren't.


Fandom: Hikaru no Go
Title: Inertia
Author: rageprufrock
Pairing: Akira/Hikaru, Akira/Other, Hikaru/Other
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Touya has always been a quiet, mature child.


Fandom: xxxHOLiC
Title: Eat Your Heart Out
Author: rageprufrock
Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki
Rating: PG
Summary: On Wednesday, Doumeki had a bento box with flowers on it.