Life! (not immortality)

For the month of January, in my corners of social journaling, here are the Forever Knight items that I happened to see:

Ficathons, fests & communities that welcome FK

• waybackexchange is an exchange game for canons that ended 10+ years ago. Nominations run 2/13-2/20, and sign-ups 2/23-3/02, with works due on 3/10.
• halfamoon, the annual 2-week fest celebrating female characters, is in progress.
• fandom_stocking revealed. See its AO3 collection or FK tags.
• whatif_au is a themed challenge community for AUs.
• recsrainbow is a "noticeboard community for reccers," which has migrated from LJ.
• fluffbingo is a new bingo-style challenge community "on the softer side."
• sunshine_challenge will be a July equivalent of January's snowflake_challenge. They're seeking ideas.
• vid_bingo is a new bingo-style challenge community for fanvids.
• unusual_bearings is an exchange game for pregnancy stories.
• 4 multifandom writing communities with weekly challenges: semidrabbles (50 words), sesquidrabbles (150 words), doubledrabbles (200 words), tripledrabbles (300 words).

FK fanfiction & other fanworks
Archive of our Own (AO3) Summary: 11 of the 966 FK works on the AO3 show a posting date in this period.

• "Filling the Void" by PJ1228 (R, m/f, ~13K words)
• "Twins" by Merfilly (G, m/f, 100 words)
• "Arabian Knight" by MacFran2018 (WIP) (PG, gen, ~7K words)
• "An Instrument of Change" by dlyt (G, gen, 440 words)
• "Holiday Festivities" by Wendymypooh (unrated, gen, 352 words)
• "A Woman's Wisdom" by PJ1228 (PG, gen, 996 words)
• "Blue Eyes" by PJ1228 (G, m/f, 633 words)
• "Stranded" by PJ1228 (G, m/f, ~3K words)
• "Moving Forward by Purselover2 (PG, m/f, 741 words)
• "The Penalty" by Nicholas_Lucien (#7 in a series) (PG-13, gen, ~2K words)
• "Not Lost to Me" by Merfilly (G, m/m, 100 words)

FK news & conversation

• 2/10: sharpest_asp listed 16 Fandom Stocking drabbles, including 1 FK. Read more.
• 2/03: pj1228 shared that Nigel Bennett currently has recurring roles in 2 TV series. Read more.
• 2/01: nicholas_lucien relayed John Kapelos's announcement that he'll be performing his album live in California in March. Read more.
• 1/20: pj1228 listed Fandom Stocking gifts given and received, including FK icons and 5 FK stories. Read more.
• 1/09: pj1228 listed 7 FK stories written in 2018, plus thoughts on future projects. Read more.
• 1/05: nicholas_lucien reflected on 8 FK stories written and received across 2018, and also thoughts for the new year. Read more.

Those of you who enjoy bingo-style challenges, might you tell me a little about what you enjoy (and don't) about them? Do you feel community engagement through the game? Do you feel quite independent? Do you read other stories written for the game? Do other players read your stories? What does the bingo-style do for you...?

I'm thinking mainly as a fanwriter who would like to write more and better herself!

I'm also thinking about ways to make FKFicFest work better, easier, more smoothly, more fun for more people. We've always done exchange-style, in a manner that was customary a decade ago. Things have since changed in fandom practice and expectation. And with only 8 players last year, the logistics of matching are both easier and impossibly harder, under the old model's expectations. (I'm entertaining as many notions as I can gather, but am really thinking more of a "use any 2 of these 3 prompts" challenge than a bingo card.)

Thanks!

All 20 works in this year's hlh_shortcuts are now revealed! All are still anonymous, pending this fest's traditional author guessing game. (I haven't yet read 6, including the 25K-words one. Sorry!)

May I commend to you the story written for my prompt/match?
"Paris, 1978" (gen, G, 2K words)

The story begins with a pleasantly cheeky little preface in which young Tessa crosses paths with several immortals we know, in various ways, without effect. The story then moves into an encounter with effect: between young Tessa, bursting with inspiration, determination, and energy, and an original character who is weary, without inspiration, perhaps without purpose. Each gives the other something needed from her or his plenty.

I like it very well! And if it's not just happy coincidence, the author put some generous thought into carefully including story elements I enjoy, not just the character and tone, but things like reasons to live and things to learn.

I see no FK, BSG78, YB, or even D&DC in Yuletide this year. Also nothing for books by George Eliot or Walter Scott. I'll take that as a pointed reminder to make time to write what I want to read.

However, there are 2 stories for The Age of Adelaide, 2 for Dead Poet's Society, 2 for The Lion in Winter, and 1 for The Princess Bride.

You can find your favorite fandoms in this year's Yuletide. Very good luck to all!

hlh_shortcuts 2018 has released 6 stories so far: see them on the AO3.

I was mistaken about the release schedule! It's 3 per day from the start, not 3 for the first 3 days. So far, it looks like lots of Amanda and Methos, followed by Duncan, Richie, and Joe, for most tagging instances fest-wide.