#it’s complete this time!

[yourghostwrotethis]

Fic Recs #4

Hello and welcome back to the fourth instalment of my fic rec posts! Check out #1 here, #2 here, and #3 here. All of these can also be found in my #fic rec tag!

This post (well, these fics) are brought to you thanks to the work of the wondrous mods over at @aziraphales-library! Check them out if you haven’t already, and give them a big thank you :)

Please do recommend stuff to me! (See at the end for what I like, and of course, I wouldn’t rec these if I hadn’t liked them, so they’re also an indicator of my tastes!)

This post has four long fics and two short fics, with varying tropes and styles!

The Ghost of Husbands Past (E)

by A_N_D (@madenthusiasms)

Az always knew that he’d be thrown out the moment his father found out he was gay. He hadn’t expected to be declared dead though - or for his husband to believe it!

But their marriage had been a foolish teenage impulse (not to mention invalid in America), so when Az moved to a small town far upstate New York to start his new life, he moved alone. The kindest thing he could do was let Crowley mourn and move on, not be shackled for life to a now disabled partner.

Tony Crowley never recovered from losing his best friend, his childhood sweetheart, his better half. He’d been drifting ever since; no plans, no hope, no money - and now, just before Thanksgiving, no job either. 

Given the stark choice of freezing to death or accepting his sister’s invitation to join her upstate, Tony reluctantly lives out the Hallmark cliche of Recently Unemployed Person Moves to Small Town for Christmas.

It’s a time of hope, love, and family.

It’s time for Az and Tony to find each other again.

Words: 94042 (Complete)

If you like fics that don’t hesitate before punching you in the gut, this is one of them. From the very first chapter, one is intrigued by the mystery of the whole story, and the events are so unpredictable that I can guarantee you’re in for an eventful ride.

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Talk about the weather (M)

by nightbloomingcereus (@moondawntreader)

Television meteorologist Aziraphale Fell and Youtube storm chaser A. J. Crowley have nothing in common aside from a purely professional interest in the weather and a mutually beneficial arrangement to lend a hand when needed. So what if they bicker and flirt more than your typical professional acquaintances, or if their arrangement inevitably veers into more personal territory? It's not as if they're in love or anything. Absolutely not.

Words: 81582 (Complete)

I binged this fic in one evening and it was wonderful. It’s very fluffy, and the whole thing feels like it falls into place naturally. The banter is wonderful, and I’d associate this fic with the word “happy” because that’s what I felt when I was reading it. It’s so nice, and I love human AUs and social media ones - this is a great mix of the two!

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The Plantom Menace (G)

by theinkwell33 (@splitting-infinities)

There is an urban legend well known in this area regarding The Plant Man. Footage exists, blurry and ill-lit, of the trespassing fiend, but it never provides a good look at his face. He exists only as a rumor; a giggled whisper in someone’s ear at the pub, an inside joke at uni, and a viral sensation. None of these things mean he is not real. That being said, the only person who can corroborate the truth about the Plant Man is the man himself. And unfortunately, Anthony J. Crowley has no idea that it’s him.

Words: 3608 (Complete)

Short, sweet, and hilariously funny, this fic is a lovely outsider POV one shot featuring mundane events in the ineffable pair’s lives. I’d already read this a long time ago and it cracked me up as much now as it did back then. Filled with funny meta jokes and real humour, this is golden.

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An Educator’s Guide to Latin and Lobsters (G)

by theinkwell33 (tagged above)

Aziraphale's been saddled with chaperone duty on a school field trip to the aquarium, even though he's a Latin professor who knows absolutely nothing about fish. One would think it'd be his downfall, but it turns out the only one it slays is one Anthony Crowley, marine biologist and harried aquarium employee.

Words: 3729 (Complete)

Another short story by the same author, with a delightfully harried Mr. Fell and just-socially-awkward-enough Crowley. If you know nothing about fish, like mermaids, or want to read a short and sweet meeting fic, this is for you (no one needs to know which).

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Across the Line (T)

by hope_in_the_dark (@hope-inthedark)

Ezra is a student in his final year at University College London, and he’s in love with a man he’s never spoken to. For months, Ezra has been tipping (and pining after) a musician named Crowley every time he sees him. He thinks that Crowley hasn’t noticed him, but Crowley has.  A love story that begins with, of all things, the saving and handing over of a book.  (Written for the Good Omens Mini Bang. Multi-chapter human AU - updates every week until completion!)

Words: 31006 (Complete)

This story is just… fluff. Pure fluff. Tooth-rotting fluff. No conflicts. It’s great! It’s a very cute story featuring a beautiful tale of falling in love, but with some stuff that makes it extra special. It feels real, in a way, unlike many of the stories told in fan fiction (this isn’t a problem, just a statement of fact), and there are small things that make it mean the world to me. Gender non-conforming Crowley, neurodivergent Aziraphale, plus some extra bonus tropes, AND it’s ace… this is sweet and lovely :)

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And to finish off this list…

Thieves of Mercy (T)

by Fyre (@amuseoffyre)

The Serpent has a reputation in the art world. A master thief who can wriggle into the tightest spots and extract the most well-protected paintings from the richest people in the world. He’s never even come close to being caught. Except just now. For a crime he didn’t commit. In a museum where he was scoping out his next job. Crowley’s not one to be petty but he’s not about to let anyone frame him, even if the person in question seems to be nothing more than an innocent, wide-eyed art restorer who works in the museum… _________________________________

When Good Omens meets art thievery and heist shenanigans

Words: 64168 (Complete)

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HEIST FIC! HEIST FIC!

This story is seriously amazing, and I love it to bits. It has art history, found family, snarky jokes, mistaken identity, and everything that comes with the pair being (thick as) thieves! I could rant about this for ages. Don’t test me. (Or please do.) It’s just amazing and unexpected and a nice breath of fresh air after reading so many tropes! (And I like those! But after staying cosy in bed for the whole day, you do have to let some fresh air in, and that’s exactly what this is!) There are twists and turns and plot turnarounds that will leave you dumbfounded, and things don’t necessarily turn out how you’d expect.

This also reminds me of wasteland, baby which I previously recced - it has the same basic atmosphere, but a very different structure!

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Please recommend fics! I’ll admit I haven’t had time to read many in a few months, but here are my tastes:

I am a VERY BIG FAN of AUs (usually human ones). Give me them!! Coffee shop, fake relationships, social media, soulmates, anything! Of course I like other stuff - and I do have some particular soft spots, notably for the Bentley - so please do recommend anything that you liked, it doesn’t matter whether it’s short and complete, or long and ongoing, or any combination! I’m always on the lookout for recommendations of any sort, so I’ll take most anything (and if you have a doubt, rec it anyway!)

You can also check out my Good Omens bookmarks here on AO3 :)

#Me #fic rec #fic #fr4 #it’s complete this time!

[fairycosmos]

i hate working i hate dating i hate tasks. what about pillow and blanky time

#i cant buold a life i need pillow and blanky time. #im completely serious

[corvid-khaos]

fionna and cake but simon drops increasingly wild anecdotes about his life

#fionna not knowing anything about him is so damn funny bc she will say shit like ‘relax i’ve played a lot of post apocalyptic RPGs’ #COMPLETELY unaware #boring my ass this man is 1058 years old lived thru a nuclear apocalypse was a crazy ice wizard for a while was almost digested by cthulhu #he’s anything BUT boring #he just doesn’t say shit lmao #fionna and cake #adventure time #atimers #fionna and cake fanart #adventure time fanart #fionna campbell #simon petrikov #princess bubblegum #cake the cat

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

the fact that shakespeare was a playwright is sometimes so funny to me. just the concept of the "greatest writer of the English language" being a random 450-year-old entertainer, a 16th cent pop cultural sensation (thanks in large part to puns & dirty jokes & verbiage & a long-running appeal to commoners). and his work was made to be watched not read, but in the classroom teachers just hand us his scripts and say "that's literature"

just...imagine it's 2450 A.D. and English Lit students are regularly going into 100k debt writing postdoc theses on The Simpsons screenplays. the original animation hasn't even been preserved, it's literally just scripts and the occasional SDH subtitles.txt. they've been republished more times than the Bible

#due to the Great Data Decay academics write viciously argumentative articles on which episodes aired in what order #at conferences professors have known to engage in physically violent altercations whilst debating the air date number of household viewers #90% of the couch gags have been lost and there is a billion dollar trade in counterfeit “lost copies” #serious note: i'll be honest i always assumed it was english imperialism that made shakespeare so inescapable in the 19th/20th cent #like his writing should have become obscure at the same level of his contemporaries #but british imperialists needed an ENGLISH LANGUAGE (and BRITISH) writer to venerate #and shakespeare wrote so many damn things that there was a humongous body of work just sitting there waiting to be culturally exploited... #i know it didn't happen like this but i imagine a English Parliament House Committee Member For The Education Of The Masses or something #cartoonishly stumbling over a dusty cobwebbed crate labelled the Complete Works of Shakespeare #and going 'Eureka! this shall make excellent propoganda for fabricating a national identity in a time of great social unrest. #it will be a cornerstone of our elitist educational institutions for centuries to come! long live our decaying empire!' #'what good fortune that this used to be accessible and entertaining to mainstream illiterate audience members... #..but now we can strip that away and make it a difficult & alienating foundation of a Classical Education! just like the latin language :)' #anyway maybe there's no such thing as the 'greatest writer of x language' in ANY language? #maybe there are just different styles and yes levels of expertise and skill but also a high degree of subjectivity #and variance in the way that we as individuals and members of different cultures/time periods experience any work of media #and that's okay! and should be acknowledged!!! and allow us to give ourselves permission to broaden our horizons #and explore the stories of marginalized/underappreciated creators #instead of worshiping the List of Top 10 Best (aka Most Famous) Whatevers Of All Time/A Certain Time Period #anyways things are famous for a reason and that reason has little to do with innate “value” #and much more to do with how it plays into the interests of powerful institutions motivated to influence our shared cultural narratives #so i'm not saying 'stop teaching shakespeare'. but like...maybe classrooms should stop using it as busy work that (by accident or designs) #happens to alienate a large number of students who could otherwise be engaging critically with works that feel more relevant to their world #(by merit of not being 4 centuries old or lacking necessary historical context or requiring untaught translation skills) #and yeah...MAYBE our educational institutions could spend less time/money on shakespeare critical analysis and more on... #...any of thousands of underfunded areas of literary research i literally (pun!) don't know where to begin #oh and p.s. the modern publishing world is in shambles and it would be neat if schoolwork could include modern works? #beautiful complicated socially relevant works of literature are published every year. it's not just the 'classics' that have value #and actually modern publications are probably an easier way for students to learn the basics. since lesson plans don't have to include the #important historical/cultural context many teens need for 20+ year old media (which is older than their entire lived experience fyi)

[elbiotipo]

I still think we should celebrate Kissinger's death even if he didn't face justice and lived a confortable life, just so that everybody knows what a piece of shit he was, just so that when some Great Stateman like I don't fucking know Biden tries to eulogize him he is flooded with insults and mockery y quede bien para el culo, so that nobody can even PRETEND he had any worth, millions should celebrate he's fucking dead and this is how he will be remembered, as an imperialist criminal hated all over the world with no redeeming qualities, none should be able to even pretend he was some some great man except for the magnitude of his crimes

#I used to be the 'don't celebrate deaths' kind of guy #but guess what this time is completely justified #cosas mias #henry kissinger #also George W. Bush will be remembered the same you can't paint your way out of hell George

[mumblesplash]

i say if you’re gonna have the mysterious entities speak in rhyme you might as well commit (EDIT: part 2!)

(posting an unprecedented Part 1 of At Least 3 bc i actually have the entire script and most of the storyboarding for this done already)

#yknow. got an idea. had a breakdown. bon appetit #this was the creative impulse i was referring to on sunday #my art #secret life #secret life spoilers #slsmp #grian #geminitay #briefly #trafficblr #also #mostly bc i am proud of it and partly bc i want people to know it’s on purpose: #grian is not trying to rhyme at all in this part. he is being deliberately unhelpful #he lowkey tries to fuck it up on purpose in that second to last panel but the secret keepers just switch rhyme schemes #the one time he completes an end rhyme is because he lost his temper #anyway yeah this was motivated mostly by me wanting to see if i could do it

[casmick-consequences]

literally the king of oneliners

[part 2]

#it's about time people start appreciating my boy!!!! he's so FUNNY!!!! #no WONDER lucius wants him carnally #the key to a girl(gn)'s heart is through laughter #also matthew maher is completely and utterly fuckable but we're not ready for that convo #black pete #ofmd #our flag means death #ofmd s2 #ofmd season 2 #these are just the ones i could think of #PLS add onto this if you have more #matthew maher #ofmd s2 spoilers

[ronanlynchbf]

tshirt that says NO LIVE ORGANISM CAN CONTINUE FOR LONG TO EXIST SANELY UNDER CONDITIONS OF ABSOLUTE REALITY

#i literally JUST finished hill house a few days ago and i already want to reread. Badly. it's sooo so so soo sooooooooo good <33333!!!!! #also completely enamored by shirley jackson's writing style i NEED to read everything she has written ever like right now.. #opening lines of ALL TIME btw 👆❗❗❗ #r.txt #the haunting of hill house #ALSO i've seen commentary videos on the tv show they made of hill house but from what i remember of it it's SO different from the book??? #i think they were all siblings in the show which is??????? like why would you change that part?? i love sibling relationships as much as the #next guy but i feel like the fact that none of them knew each other was such an essential part of the story like why would u change it.... #also eleanor was like. an entirely different character who was also already dead in the show i believe??? and dr. montague doesn't exist?? #hill house could've been really good as a show idk why they changed it up like that...like was the original story not interesting enough for #you or something?? WHO decided to make that change i just wanna talk 🤨

[curioscurio]

I'm rewatching Steven Universe and I will never forgive Fandom for what it did to her

#also watching it at age 19-20 as it was released and experiencing the resulting clusterfuck online fandom response was a wild trip #im finally rewatching it again at 25 and really really feel lucky to have seen it at the age i did #i have completely different perspective on it now that i have 3 young nephews and a neice where before i was in college #the music is still as incredible as it was back then #and the animation #i cant beleive people got honestly and truly upset and violently aggressive about characters being off model sometimes #early stevens voice though kills me after awhile...... the yelling .... but his characters growth and development also being reflected in #his voice changing as he grows up #they also go crazy hard on some scenes #who am i kidding the show was a masterpiece and ahead of its time

[aarchimedes]

for context: I read the hobbit first over the course of two years when I was like 13, but I'm only now starting to read lotr. having a blast tho!

anyways, reblog if you feel like it 🙌🏻

#lord of the rings #the hobbit #lotr #hobbit #yeah guys idk i just feel like most people read it really young #but jolkein is really wordy and idk how y'all got through that at 8 yo #my attention span could neverrrrrr #obviously not as wordy as like. les mis. but you know what i mean. #lots and lots of context all the time. love that for his worldbuilding not so much for my hold on the plot #and yes i have watched the movies #i didn't completely miss the cultural zeitgeist #yay first time making a poll! if you vote or read my tags this far you are a gem 🫶🏻 #edit: i realize i spelled tolkien wrong. i feel like this proves my point #but also i feel like thats something you spell with your heart and not your mind

[seagiri]

the guy

#my art #dungeon meshi #dunmeshi #chilchuck tims #sorry for posting like 5 drawings with completely different art styles im insecure #i feel like ive drawn him naked way too many times he looks weird to me now

[hartro-owns-my-heart-ro]

”getting thicker skin” is great in theory but I think for some people “get better at handling your thin skin” is gonna be way more helpful advice. I have strong emotional reactions to criticism and they might never go away, but i can continue to try and handle each situation maturely and that’s the important part. Sometimes irrational feelings are chronic and living with them is better than trying to beat yourself up into not having them.

#ive cried over completely minor critical discussions so many times this year that im starting to think it’ll just always be a thing #so now i wanna work on living with it #mental health #ok to reblog

[dkettchen]

cursed construction core hi vis bra that came to me in a dream

In the dream I saw it in the window display of a hardware/DIY/trade shop, implying it was meant to be a practical garment designed for actual female constructions workers in a Female Armour level missed-the-brief attempt at gender inclusion

The practical support from the visible underwire combined with the hi vis implying it’s not meant to be worn as an undergarment, I just-

I blame my binge-reading ND Stevenson’s gender comics talking abt masculinity and femininity incl the one abt Victoria’s Secret lingerie yesterday for this monstrosity x’D

#construction core #I am legitimately tempted to make this irl #just like as a commentary art piece on failed attempts at inclusion that completely missed the point #but alas I lack the booba these days to make it for myself so I'll need someone else to fit it to to enable my shenanigans #maybe someday #in the dream I met finnster in the next shop and was like dude you should go buy it for the meme lolll you could wear it on a stream #so uuuhhh- finn if you're reading this (I know you've seen my tumblr before we have video evidence) and you want this I'll make it for you #for manly man construction times #just let me know x'D #to the transmascs reading this: read the linked comics they're highly relatable #you can lose a whole morning to them #like me #have fun

[bigfatbreak]

Birds of a Feather previous / next

#my art #feralnette au #birds of a feather #long tags #sorry I went apeshit in the tags #LETS SAY IT ALL TOGETHER NOW #I - M - A - G - OOOOOOOOO #its fun drawing marinette's back to Alya and having her appear stout and unstoppable and totally logical #and then you see her face and she's like two seconds from completely snapping and is keeping it together by a thread #as a note just because mari feels very certainly abt smth doesnt mean she's right. feelings can be valid and also irrational #in the throes of grief she decided it was better to be alone than to lose someone again so she started pulling away #and lila made pulling away very very very easy to do #shes also vaguely aware she's being unfair in pinning this on alya which is why she started spinning the drain on cockmoth again #legitimately all the shit that's happened to her wouldn't have been so catastrophic if he was never in the picture and she knows it #but the bitterness of her bestie choosing a fantastic liar over her at the worst of times stiiiiiings #alya's personal timing was bad but lila really took advantage of the fact that marinette had been acting off and weird #she basically clocked marinette as being unstable from SOMETHING and made up a lie about her #knowing she wouldn't have the strength to defend herself #between her social life going tachy bc of lila and losing fu in a way that felt like personhood death marinette was really put on the spot #and alya doing her thing of busting in there and assuming her bias is correct was a terrible combo #essentially marinette is highly unstable and alya is just realizing that #busting in and giving her a lecture when she's slightly hysterical and definitely delirious from exhaustion is NOT the way #to show her she's self sabotaging #cuz thats just gonna make her double down on self sabotaging. bc marinette will not accept that she is also a CHIIIIILD

[senblades]

Distortions, and ways to see the world

#YALL this is 10 pages and it killed me #lmao just kidding I had a great time csp makes things a lot easier #persona 5 #goro akechi #ren amamiya #akira kurusu #shuake #akeshu #persona #classic jazz club convos #complete with existential dread #EDITED BECAUSE IM STUPID #there's a slightly scuffed version of this going around now whoops

[somnimagus]

out of the frying pan and into the fire and into another frying pan that's also on fire

[id in alt text]

#dungeon meshi #dungeon meshi spoilers #dunmeshi #this past year i decided to get into some of the manga i hear people really rave about #and dunmeshi was the first one i read and i adore it so much i don't have the words #gosh ryoko kui is such a huge inspiration.. i hope i can save up and get physical copies of the manga some day #ohh and daydream hour if it ever releases in english... #and sorry toshiro doesn't have his armor. i always remember him in his disheveled casual arc #fan art #my art #i think i've just completely stopped trying to do a clean flat style... i've just started painting over my sketches now #it looks a little messy but it's so much more fun #this was the first time in awhile i looked forward to continuing a drawing