Unconventional Courtship

[thisbluespirit]

I was, btw, definitely not signing up for unconventionalcourtship myself this time, oh no. I'd only try and write inappropriate Public Eye fanfic for it, if I could even manage anything.

I looked through the summaries (and mostly boggled, and thought WHY? and questioned characters' life choices) and then I wrote most of this in rough by early this afternoon:

78) Between Strangers – Linda Conrad
Rescuing a stranded mother and baby from a raging blizzard hasn’t been part of Frank Marker’s plans. Yet he couldn’t abandon Helen Mortimer. And ended up getting snowed in with her, tasting those fiery kisses. She was all wrong for him, so why did she feel so right in his arms?

Needless to say, there will not be any fiery kisses in my Public Eye fic, even if it is set 20 years pre-canon in the hard winter of 1947 when Our Heroes were 18 and 24 respectively (or thereabouts) and - if you follow Timeline #1 - Helen was, in canon, a single mother with a baby. (Denis Mortimer did marry her, but only four years later when it was convenient for him, of course.) (My working draft summary is something like this: Frank Marker’s trying to sell encyclopedias in the middle of the worst winter of the century, which probably wasn’t the best idea to start with. And now he’s wound up trying to rescue a single mother and her baby who’ve been abandoned at a bus stop, and all he’s got to hand is a car that won’t go, and a dozen copies of the A-Z of Everything... )

Please send help. Things the world does not need: Public Eye fanfiction. I mean, really. Even aside from nobody watching it but me, it works by showing, not telling, and cleverness, and Alfred Burke's face. I have none of those things; I have a Mills & Boon summary and a due date of May 2nd... /o\

Anyway. It's a fun ficathon - you get the prompt on a plate, full freedom to be as unromantic and trope subverting as you like or the reverse, for those who aren't me and will write fiery kisses for characters they ship. (Mind, I think this one might qualify as more romantic than last time when Silver and Steel got stuck in a romance novel, or, to put it more honestly, I cheated outrageously by use of the nature of S&S.)

Comments

[spikesgirl58.livejournal.com]

I do love this challenge as it does give you so much freedom. You are right, though. I read some of those synopsis and just shake my head. And people are being paid for this stuff...

[thisbluespirit]

Each to their own, but they're just not something I can take seriously without my brain falling out of my head in the process. :-)

And, yes, it is a fun challenge, and I'm very grateful that it isn't prescriptive about how you use the summaries, or I'd never be able to play!

[spikesgirl58.livejournal.com]

I agree. When I worked in a bookstore, there were women who would line up for the new shipment. We wouldn't even put them on the shelves. We'd line them up on the floor. These ladies were focused and very loyal.

Exactly! There are some challenges where they strip all the fun out of it being piling on rule after rule. This one is freeing.

[swordznsorcery.livejournal.com]

You're definitely not the only Public Eye fan. It's quite popular over at the Mausoleum Club.

I'm loving all the mock-up Mills & Boon covers, and the ficathon does seem like fun. Dear god, those plot synopses though. Reading through them, I can feel my brain cease to function. Even allowing for my romance allergy, they're terrible. Far be it for me to knock other people's reading choices, but argh. But! Frank Marker is clearly what Mills & Boon has been crying out for all these years. You'll make it all better with his horrible weather, his A-Zs and (descriptions of) his face. Good luck!

[thisbluespirit]

Yes, I know. I shouldn't exaggerate for comic effect, but I will do it. There's even a fan website with a forum, but I'm scared of places like that. I haven't explored this one, but they do have a tendency to be Terribly Serious and be Wrong About Everything (obv.). I also suspect other PE fans would rightly horrified at the idea of anyone writing Frank/Helen M&B summary fanfic. I'll just hope I continue to go under the radar here... *looks guilty*

It is a fun ficathon! And, yes, each to their own, and I doubt anybody takes the things seriously, but... the summaries do have a tendency to make my brains fall out of my ears as I look at them. They are, however, much improved by inserting random character names and laughing at the results. I found a couple of nice possible Tarrant/Dayna ones. (Oddly, both regency ones, but I forgot to note the numbers down.) Thanks!

[swordznsorcery.livejournal.com]

'Serious' fans do tend to look down on fanfic. Which is sad, as it's a great creative outlet, and a nice way of getting more from a long gone show. It's a shame that there's so much dreadful stuff out there, as it's given the whole movement a bad name.

I don't think I want to even consider Tarrant & Dayna M&B! Their brand of romance mostly involves insulting each other, and blowing stuff up. Poor Dayna would be greatly insulted if she found herself in a typical romance heroine's shoes. Although I suppose there would be plenty of opportunity for subversion of expectations. And blowing stuff up.

[thisbluespirit]

The ones I found had a housekeeper who was secretly a smuggler causing a strait-laced Captain some headaches, and in the other a highwayman who was secretly a girl, so, yep, definitely options for at least violence and primitive weapons if not necessarily explosions. And you don't have to pay any attention to the genders the summary goes for, either. :-D

Well, as to fanfic, the internet is like that - anybody can post anything, it's the joy and the curse of it. And since that relates to just about any content on it, it's rather silly to automatically despise fanfic if you don't also despise the whole internet for the same reason.

[john_amend_all]

That smuggling housekeeper caught my eye too, but it wasn't Dayna Mellanby I thought of, oh no.

Still, at the moment I'm fully occupied with "I'm Anne Elliot, fly me" [working title ;-p ]

[thisbluespirit]

*thinks* Um... Mary Dove and the Inspector?

:lol: The world needs more Persuasion AUs! Good work! ;-)

[john_amend_all]

You might very well think that, but I could not possibly comment.

[swordznsorcery.livejournal.com]

That's so true. Certainly the internet is full of awfulness, but it's also full of wonderfulness (which may or may not be a word, I don't care). And if we love it for the one, we may as well love it for the other too.

And I've found a prompt I like. Oh dear. Happily, I can't think of a couple to apply it to, and I know from experience that I can't write romance. Which does actually suggest I should give it a go for the challenge, but... probably not. :)

[thisbluespirit]

Happily, I can't think of a couple to apply it to, and I know from experience that I can't write romance.

You sound perfectly qualified to me, then! ;-p (If this fest required actual romance, I would be disqualified. Last time I wrote Silver and Steel stuck in a romance novel narrative and being put out about it until they solved the problem by sort of drowning each other. Silver still thought it was terribly romantic, but you know what Silver's like. This time.. I don't know. We'll see. Might even get a brief kiss in there, who knows?)

[swordznsorcery.livejournal.com]

Aha, but I can't think of a couple, so I'm safe.

Poor Steel. You're mean to maroon him with Silver! :D

[john_amend_all]

I suppose there might be fiery kisses if it was an AU where all the characters are dragons. Or Balrogs.

[thisbluespirit]

Good point.

1)THE VIRGIN'S SEDUCTION by ANNE MATHER

Smaug’s life might be quiet, and lived in a secluded [mountain] village, but that’s essential if he’s to put his turbulent past behind him. However, his new-found stability is threatened with the arrival of a Balrog...

The Balrog is tall, dark and...dangerous – and he wants virginal Smaug. His touch leaves Smaug aching for more, but he knows he’d be playing with fire. And there are just some things that he can’t tell him without opening a can of worms.

But how long can he resist the Balrog’s brand of searing, exotic seduction...?

(SORRY.)

[john_amend_all]

LOL!

Write it! I daaaare you.

[swordznsorcery.livejournal.com]

So do I. ;)

[thisbluespirit]

*has always happily ignored dares*

(Well, unless I wanted not to, obviously. Someone should probably write it, though. I don't know whether the perfect summary just happened to be #1, or if I should worry that I could easily adapt the first summary I saw to Dragon/Balrog romance.)

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

I'd watch PE if I could afford to buy it.

Have fun with your ficathon.

[thisbluespirit]

Thank you! And, aw, I know I go on about things, but I know most people wouldn't want to watch them, not really! I don't know if this one'd be your thing at all. (If you like Enemy at the Door when you get round to it, maybe. If you don't go for that, probably not!)

♥

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

Well when I finally manage to sit down and watch Enemy, I'll let you know!

[oonaseckar.livejournal.com]

But why no kisses of fire? Waaaaaaaaaaaaah! What, not even the 'it was all a dream' type, with 'em waking up drooling over each other in the backseat of the snowed-in car (in the early morning gummy-eyed way, not the lusty desirous way.)

Poor Frank, you are enjoying giving him such a hard time right?

[thisbluespirit]

Because I die of embarrassment when trying to write any sort of smut? Also because I foolishly picked a summary that had a baby in it. I don't know what M&B people are on, but somehow I don't see the presence of a baby as likely to encourage fiery kissing as much as reluctant nappy changing.

Anyway, it's not finished yet. There could be a non-fiery kiss, you never know. ;-)

[liadt]

I will not send help;)I'm doing 'Bulman' which is only watched by me and Sweeney fans, who don't think it has enough action and would shoot fanficcers(!), but I've got Callan on my side and he's harder than Regan & Carter. People were requesting silent film fanfic on Yuletide so PE fic isn't so odd!

You never know the colour eps of PE might get a re-run and you will be worshipped as a Goddess.

There do seem to be a lot of meeting up with exes who they hated and falling in love with again. Eh? I bet it turns out it was all an evil uncle's fault. I enjoyed all the "her femininity couldn't resist his masculinity" summeries.

[thisbluespirit]

Fair enough. Shall I send you help instead? ;-)

You never know the colour eps of PE might get a re-run and you will be worshipped as a Goddess.

Somehow, I think, even if Public Eye has a sudden revival of interest, I will be hailstoned as the person who had the bad taste to write shippy fic for it, instead of attempting clever case fic with no romance whatsoever. But maybe somewhere in the multiverse there's a universe where that happened. :lol:

There do seem to be a lot of meeting up with exes who they hated and falling in love with again. Eh? I bet it turns out it was all an evil uncle's fault. I enjoyed all the "her femininity couldn't resist his masculinity" summeries.

I'm sorry; I'm unavailable to answer that because my brain just fell out of my head remembering the awfulness of the summaries again.

[liadt]

Yes! Although I passed the point of no return long ago;p

I think you'll be safe - your fic is tasteful, they can hardly object to that. I'll take a few snowballs for silly Avengers crossovers. I think it might be a good idea to start building a bunker to hide from vengeful fans who veto anything other than top 10 episode lists. I'll do the layout, you can do the soft furnishings.

I'm convinced M&B's are the feminine equivalent of having a Steven Seagal movie marathon.

[thisbluespirit]

Okay! yes! A bunker - we'll have plenty of cushions and blankets, lots of non-perishable foods handy, and a TV and DVD player, and we'll camp in and watch 1970s TV until they've all gone away. And then write fanfic for it. ♥

I'm convinced M&B's are the feminine equivalent of having a Steven Seagal movie marathon.

One of my library colleagues always used to call the Westerns Mills & Boon for men! Which I think is probably pretty apt. It ought to be an option in Unconventional Courtship...

[liadt]

They'll never get us alive! And then I can spend time building my getting-over-myself-room ;p

Lol. Yes, deffo;)

[honeynoir.livejournal.com]

unconventionalcourtship is probably my favourite ficathon. Just... so much potential! XD

That's a great summary! Encyclopedias!

[thisbluespirit]

Yes, it really is. Just playing with the summaries for the lols is pretty entertaining.

And thank you. :-)