Recs and general Saturday nonsense

[birdsofshore]

REC FOR HARRY/DRACO:
Title: Magic Tricks
Author: anonymous
Summary: When Draco agreed to accompany his flatmate to a Muggle magic show, he did not expect Harry Potter to be the magician onstage. Since then, nothing has gone according to plan.
Rating: PG-13
Pairing(s): Harry/Draco
Word Count: 5665

This was a delicious little thing. I defy you not to want to find out what happens next, when it begins like this:

*

When Draco left his flat this evening, he did not have any idea that he would end up in Harry Potter’s flat, on Harry Potter’s bed, snogging Harry Potter rather desperately. He did not anticipate being in a position to fuck the saviour of the Wizarding world. Even now, he isn’t entirely sure how he got here. He meant to blackmail Potter, not dry hump him.

“Please fuck me, Andrew,” Harry Potter begs.

No, Draco thinks, swallowing hard; this was not the plan at all.

*

It's a clever fic that also has a lot of heart, and there are a number of lovely little moments and phrases that still have me grinning. Draco's voice is a delight, cluelessness always hits my sweet spot, and the last two paragraphs are a joy all by themselves.

NEW FEST:
I am completely intrigued by hp_silencio.



Entries will be between 1,000 and 5,000 words, and contain no dialogue.

That's right, NO DIALOGUE WHATSOEVER. Excuse me while my head falls off. I am probably being completely stupid, but I cannot begin to fathom how I would write a story without dialogue. I am sure there must be hundreds of classic stories without dialogue, but can I think of one? I can not. Can anyone help me out here, please? Link me to wonderful fics without dialogue. Are there novels without dialogue?

I am just so fascinated and alarmed by this. And, of course, I want to sign up and accept the challenge. NO MORE FESTS FOR YOU, BIRDS. Not until I have at least ticked something off my list, at least.


GENERAL NONSENSE:
I had a very entertaining half hour, well, maybe more like an hour, reading about the Swimming Anime fandom on tumblr. Did you know about this? Here's the background (via the daily dot). Basically, an anime studio released a 30 second clip showcasing their skills, featuring an imaginary new anime about 4 cute male swimmers. Tumblr went insane at the sight of pretty, wet boys and within 48 hours had created backstories, fanfic, gifs and RPG and cosplay for the non-existent anime. Here is a great example of the type of thing that's been teased out from the 30 sec clip.

The best bit is, an actual series is now being made, or, as themarysue.com put it, "Tumblr has successfully willed their fan-created Swimming Anime into existence as a real show". You could see this as an extremely cynical move by the studio, or an equal opportunity triumph for yaoi fans (the anime studio previously made shows geared towards male viewers, featuring cute teen girls), but either way, I like the whole story a lot, as a fascinating example of the rather ouroboros-like nature of fandom.


I have more things to post about, but it will have to wait. Please expect more general nonsense later, or tomorrow.

Comments

[nathalieweasley.livejournal.com]

I might have just spent a half hour browsing swimming anime gifs on tumblr...

And in terms of lack of dialogue, my mind immediately went to a couple of French authors - Albert Camus and Abdellah Taïa. I looked through my copies of their books and there is some (in the two books I went through) but you actually have to search for the dialogue. Maybe they did write one without any. I will check.

[birdsofshore]

LOL, sorry about the Swimming Anime thing. It is strangely compelling.

Your ideas about dialogue-light novels are excellent. I haven't read Camus for years and I don't know the other writer. I'll be interested to hear if you find any with even less dialogue in.

[nathalieweasley.livejournal.com]

It really is, haha.

Taïa is a Moroccan writer who writes in French. His books are mostly autobiographical so he can get away with lack of dialogue since he is primarily speaking to the reader. Now that I think about it, a lot of autobiographies could accomplish the lack of dialogue without it being a specific goal. Camus, on the other hand, appears to really represent this "lack of dialogue" (in my opinion at least) in that he does not try to get around the lack through other means (which an autobiography can potentially be seen as).

There is an interesting discussion here: http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=632654 on book without dialogue though I feel like a lot of the books listed are more epistolary novels or the like (which goes back to this whole "cheating" thing).

[birdsofshore]

I have got to dig out Camus. That discussion thread is very interesting, but not sure they discovered any 'true' dialogueless novels. I don't think epistolary or reported speech 'counts'.

[nathalieweasley.livejournal.com]

RL prevented prompt response...

But, yes, I completely agree. Epistolary/reported speech doesn't count as "lack" of dialogue.