First up, Laura Shapiro! Multitalented. Don't you just hate her? She's got lots
of wonderful stuff on her site, but my favorite remains "The
Twilight's Last Gleaming"

A *goodgawd* rec if ever there was one. Joyce/Giles, y'all, and
unspeakably hot. I've had a crush on Joyce for ages, and hate her far-
too-often two-dimensional Mom-ness on the show with a passion that goes
beyond mere language. That's not the Joyce *I* know.

This is. She's still a mother, an art dealer, and a semi-fretter, but she
is also one *hell* of a woman.

And Giles... well. Yes.

*

James Kythe Walkswithwind. All those fandoms, strange little stories
that stick around forever and ever. You should've seen me dance when
s/he? I don't know. Anyway, dance of joy upon hir arrival in glorious
Sunnydale. And *this* story, "Dream of the Devil"

This story... the very beginning didn't rock my world, but the rest...
oh, I wanted to weep. Straight out of Morpheus' punishment to Crowley's
son, Xander-style.

*

Let's go visit Hth again, shall we? Giles/Oz. Pairing of... complicated
souls with bland casings? Pairing of music and philosophy? Meeting of
the like minds? I dunno, it's not really my drug of choice. There needs
to be a Xander in there somewhere, or an Ethan. Or a Faith. Or...

Well, you get the idea.

But this story, this "Gonzo Sunset"

Reminds me of why I never say never anymore. A good author can make
everything right. A great author, like Hth, can make it seem positively
inevitable.

And you know, while you're there, check out this *goodgawd* story in
"Buzzed," because there just aren't enough Gilesonnabottom stories.

*

And oooh, it's been at least three seconds since I've recced the
Spike. Which is just *shameful*.

Where to begin? Where oh where?

Oh. Buffy.

Mrrrrrrr.

And the story that made me *CENSORED* in my *CENSORED*:

"Four Dicks"

It's angsty, it's angry, it's painful, and mother*fuck* it's hot.
Just... Jesus fucking Christ. Post Yoko Factor, Xander's got
some issues to work out and Giles is very much there.

Screams out loud for a sequel, if only because it's just too
damned good to leave alone. Story is complete in itself, though.

*

And then there's Jennifer Stoy, Jennifer-Oksana, and the way
she can make me read a story fast and unblinking, whether I agree
with the thing or not.

Story of choice of-the-moment: "Touch Me Fall"

She has a site of her own somewhere, but at present I can't find
the thing.

Oh, it's another Who Are You/This Year's Girl story, and if you
don't know what that means, you're unlucky. Essentially, it's
about knowing, and wanting, and having -- one way or another. It's
scary and hot and wonderfully written. Mrr. Mrrrr.

Have I or anyone else recced wax jism yet? She's multifandom, highly
talented, and even has a neat site right here:

http://www.almightyinc.com/wax.jism/

Buffy, X-Files, Due South, etc. The Due South/Homicide was about the only
stuff on the page I didn't care for, but YMMV. My lord, the woman even made
me like Willow/Oz smut, the idea of which, in general, tends to make me yawn.

Special rec for her XF/Buffy crossover. Intriguing plot, good character
voices, and just *emotion*. I love stuff that makes me feel, and wax's counts.

*

"Echoes," by Sapphic Femme.

Spoilers for This Year's Girl and Who Are You? One of those delightful
Buffy/Faith stories that take advantage of the unique circumstances of those
two eps. Watch Te dance as she tries not to spoil people! This one had a
Faith voice I could hear, and a lingering presence perfectly attuned to the title.

*

"And They Called It Puppy Love," and "Fade," both by Debchan. Located here.

Debchan has a deft touch for humor and dialogue, as her XF pieces clearly show.
She also, however, has one *fuck* of a sexy dark side. The kind of dark side that
pours itself into vinyl and talks with one of those whiskey and smoke voices and
always smells like something exotic and deeply, deeply necessary.

These stories address Spike's fourth season dilemma, and the steps he might
have taken to cope with it. It's dark, it's sexy, and there's plenty of lovely,
original Xanderangst for those of you who, like me, can't get enough of the stuff.

Sexy and dark and sad and very, very believable.

*

H. Nonny Nonny's "Empty Graves," and it's sequels "Absent Friends I, II, & III":

http://www.dymphna.net/ucsl/archive/g-h.html (Just scroll down to her name)

Joss gave us a lovely AU in the Wishverse, and Nonny takes most delicious
advantage. Get to know Dead Gay Larry! Fight vampires! Fall in love by dusty
attic sunlight! Starts with an intensely warm and giving What If story and
follows the universe into some excitingly plotted ways. I'm desperate for the
next installment, but don't worry -- Nonny doesn't leave it on a cliffhanger.

Another Xander to fall utterly and hopelessly in love with.

*

"Rumble Thy Bellyfull" by Hth AW.

Spoilers for Wild at Heart and This Year's Girl in story.

Sex and death, Faith and Veruca. Personally, her Veruca is a little different from
how I saw her, but it didn't stop me from gobbling this up with a big spoon.
Powerful imagery, deep green and indigo tones of dread and desire, and so much
*hunger*.

I want to play with this pairing myself someday, but Hth does a damned good job
if y'all don't want to wait for me. <g>
 

While you're there, check out her Albums page. [Ed. note: Hth has a site here
with a design that could drive the most patient woman in the world to serial
murder. Her Albums page may or may not be in there somewhere with this
story. I don't know. I'm not killing myself to look for it.]

In which the terrible busy Hth shares a whole passel of mostly brilliant short-
shorts. My favorites are the Faith/Kathryn crossover stories, which spoil the
Angel episode Sanctuary and the movie Crue Intentions.

Wait, here's a bit that I loved, from the story "FAQ":

(Says Kathryn) << "Why do you like me?"

It wasn't like Faith couldn't think of any answers. *Your Victoria's Secret
collection. You read the business section at breakfast. You biting your nails.
Me biting your ears. Your charm-school posture. You cheat at poker and win
at volleyball if you have to put someone in the infirmary to do it. Your on-again,
off-again eating disorders. Your French name. The things you know about car
engines. The things you don't know about vampires. Why does anybody like
 anybody? Because it feels good.* "Because you look just like the prettiest
 girl I know."

"Wouldn't that *make* me the prettiest girl you know?"

Faith smirked down at her just a little. "No." >>

*

I rec Katie Vieceli all the time, and you know what? I'm doing it *again*. This is
the woman who made me say: "Oh, *that's* how you write f/f smut."

http://www.dymphna.net/ucsl/archive/katiev.html

She has a site here: http://www.dymphna.net/ucsl/archive/katiev.html

However, not all of her fiction is archived there for some reason. Silly girl.

"Every Boy's Fantasy," and "Strong Enough For A Man" are two fabulously lovely
Buffy/Faith PWPs, in which our heroines do fabulously lovely things to each other.
My main comment: *hrrrngh*

*

"Swirl," by Katy Zapatka.

In which he discover the reasons behind Oz's hair dyeing. Spoils the episode
New Moon Rising.

This story... I skipped over it the first time, because there's a surprising
amount of boring fiction about hair in this fandom. The Spike yanked me back by
the scruff of the neck, and I'm intensely glad she did so. It's about the things
we do to cope, and the importance of ritual in daily life. It's sad, it's good, and
it's very much Oz. This chica, IMO, is One To Watch.
 
 

God, I'm a great big cheeseball. But I stand proud just the same! Cheese
for all!

And, for those of you kind enough to drop by every now and again, really
good fic. I'm reasonably sure none of it involves cheese, save glancingly,
like in RozK's answer to the Buffy season finale Restless, "Bed of
Bones."

This story blew me away, y'all. I did the whole no-blink, catching flies
routine because it answered *everything* for me. Well, not everything
everything, but enough of everything that I was walking around all
satisfied for a while. Like a good fuck. Sure, you'll need another at
some point, but for just a little while, all is right with the world.

This story tells us so much about the First Slayer that I wanted
to weep. I want RozK to go back and tell us more, and screw everything
in current canon. Which was actually my *one* problem with this story --
it ties in to the Buffy/Faith arc, and, personally, I felt it weakened the
tale -- though not through any fault of the writing.

I think this would've worked best as a pure look at the First Slayer,
but I'm most assuredly not the author, and I understand why she did it
the way she did, besides. Read.

*

Oh, and Kita's making me all conflicted again. Look, there's no doubt she's
a great (and improving) writer, she just has this habit of *disagreeing*
with me. About things I really care about.

Like Wesley.

Oh, she's not one of those hateful and insipid character bashers, it's
just... well, read "VI."

It's so profoundly right that it made me want to *beat* her. I had to
wait and calm down before sending feedback that I fear remained
less than gracious. <hangs head> The basic deal is this: There's a
certain love, and certain lovers, and it's just not enough. Not ever.
It felt like something Joss would do if he was being mean -- no
loopholes to be found.

No room for comfort. I loved it.

Oh and hey, I forgot about this one: "I'm Not One"

is songfic with a kick. Right in the gut and maybe, yeah, a little
twinge lower. Boy does Kita know from doom.

*

And James Walkswithwind. Yes. Gotta love. Because there's a big ol'
series called _Sands of Time_ written with Wolfling and I'm hooked on it.
Hooked *bad* on it.

Because it's Xander and it's angst and it's friendship and UST and RST
and loooooooove. It's the way things *should* be among the Scoobs, dammit,
and it makes me go *siiiiiigh*.

Go read. It's all lovey and sweet and funny and making me tear up and lose
all trace of my grammar. My only complaint is that James can be a little
too circumspect in places, but then, we can't *all* earn our NC-17s the
dirty way.

And oh, Sheila. Getting better and better and better and should write
*more*. Especially if "more" turns out to be a lot like "Swim."

OK, so I just reread it again and all I can say is *guh*. I mean, it's
just... it's *Devon*. OK, minor character lurrve. Fuck you, it's *great*.
It's hot and real, a no-blink rhythm-centric *ride*, baybee.

Fuck *yeah*.

Oh, oh, and also "Kryptonite."

*siiiiigh*

There's something intensely sweet about Xander/Oz. They can feel
around each other, they can fill the empty spaces, even in ways that
aren't obscene. This story is more like a series of scenes, but it
works. Little snapshots of X/O goodness that make me smile.

*

How to describe Aurora Rowan? She of the lovely, unfolding name which
always makes me think of John Hurt's Caligula portraying 'rosy-fingered
dawn' and *snicker*.

Well, it *does*.

In any case, she's an old-school fan, certainly compared to janie-come-
all-over-herself-latelies like myself. But! She's writing again! And we
like that a lot.

Especially when she and Misha take the staid old heavy dialogue format and
make it work, work, work in "Monday Morning Going Down."

Spike and Xander, biting and snapping off each other and running
desperately away from what they both want only in the sense of stretching
a rubber band that, of course, snaps them right back into place.

Flashes of humor, darkness, lust, and a creeping inevitability.

Read this one twice, the layers will surprise you.

*

You all know by now that Debchan and Spike, are, to me, examples of how
good everyone should be. And I want to rec them and rec them and rec
them, because, you know, there's a lot of you out there reading this
and I want to keep y'all coming back anyway I know how...

Even if I just lure you here to send you away again. <g>

I find myself in something of a quandary, a pickle -- I, as Pinky once
said, am all a'tangle. Why?

Because *I* write with the ladies quite a lot, and I'm not quite shameless
enough to rec myself.

Yet.

So, I want to send you guys to the Webrain.

All the fic I write with Deb and Spike is there. But, um. Just read
*their* parts, OK?

*

More Juniper: Check out some Buffy fic, specifically "That Good
Night."

A story about a kiss, she calls it. Well. *I* say it's a story
about the night, and love, and grief, and everything that is
Xander, and regret, and the essence of Oz.

Just wow.

*

And Kita, Kita, Kita. I've been having a looping, rambling
conversation about Buffy fic with this lovely woman for a
while now, and she finally nudged me into reading
"Komodo," which I had been most assiduously avoiding.

What can I say? Rapefic isn't something I tend to
actively seek. But... this is more than that. More than the
vulturesque tendency to linger over the violence, and skips the
often smarmy and preachy recovery-fic aspects I also avoid. It is
what it is, and that's a look at just what To Shanshu In L.A. cost
Angel, and how he chooses to cope with it.

The formatting was a bit too complex in places, and the
narrative was occasionally confusing, but I'll be damned if this
story isn't staying with me.

Hell, it's moved in.

And I honestly don't know whether I *like* this story or not,
but I can say it feels very, very plausible for Angel.

And *that* is addictive.

Also?

Inheritances

Here we have a story about fathers and sons, the nature of
vampires, and the persistence of memory. It's a Giles story, taking a
good, long look at the events of Becoming. It's slash of several
varieties, less romance than a number of blows that seem glancing
until you realize bones are broken.

It's a Kita story, y'all, so be prepared.

I... this pissed me off *so* much. I hate it hate it hate it, mainly
because it's so *right*. I think of this as required reading -- Kita
can drive canon *home* even while dancing heedlessly past the
boundaries.

*

Jessica Walker: Sense Memory

Five perfect snapshots and a whole lot of pain... The author
says she was working to see if she could write anyone but Spike, Angel,
and Wesley, I believe, and she succeeds admirably. A relatively new
addition to the fanfic world, but an excruciatingly talented one.

She's on my list of Writers To Watch, and this contained series is
just one of my reasons why.

God, all I can say is that these stories make perfect sense, each for
each character. Surprising no one, I'd have to say the Xander one
is my favorite, but that's just because of character preference.
These stories transcend... *something*. I don't know, it's one of
those fan fiction things... so many authors work with conceits like
this one -- and I'm including myself here -- and work so hard to make
it fit they twist the character all out of recognition.

These little vigs go beyond entertaining to thought-provoking, almost
giving the feeling of well-researched essays on each character. It's
weird, and cool, and takes nothing away from the fun read factor.