(TBH I am not current with AO3, so this is a tragically short list, anyone is welcome to reblog/comment with more suggestions, preferably from AO3 bc that site protects its ficwriters. FF.net and Wattpad suggestions are also welcome.)
– Of course I have to start the list off with the collab I did with Rebness/@wicked-felina, Coffeeshop AU. Slow-burn longfic ;D
The Last Drop is technically a few scenes that didn’t fit into the main story, but could be read on their own as stand-alone AU if you’re looking for smtg shorter.
Interview with the Frat Boy the_corinthian – This is a WILD ride, a college AU. It’s silly and unashamed about it’s silliness. A few of its tags say it all: #No Homo #Yes homo #Heavy Drinking #Drunk!Louis #General douchebaggery #several different and uniquely poor kinds of childcare
Interview with a Cannibal or Appointment with a Vampire by (?) – was a Hannibal/VC crossover, so not really an AU, but I can’t find it to link you. Might have been taken down ;A; REMEMBER TO DOWNLOAD AND SAVE FANWORKS U LIKE!!
The Hostile Takeover by StellaMachiavelli (@stellamachiavelliici) – is a legendary fic. “Lestat de Lioncourt is a high-flying businessman out for revenge on ruthless boss Santino, with the help of his best friend David Talbot. There’s just one complication: on Santino’s side is Lestat’s ex, Louis de Pointe du Lac.”
To Die as Lovers May by @goth-mabel inspired this fanart by @13bels, and I haven’t read this series of cis-swapped fics, but @13bels describes it: “very thoughtfully written, drama-filled as our vampires are known to be, and an engaging read, if it’s your cup of tea! Although, it does contain triggering content, so please proceed with caution and read the tags if you haven’t read it and would like to. I enjoyed it especially! I love seeing this trope be experimented with <3″
Absolutely everything had been typical up to the point of Louis arriving at the predetermined rendezvous point, but well bred nerves danced about his shoulders anyway in the familiar icy electricity that had kept him alive and relatively unharmed during every paid tryst he’d attempted. These were the same nerves that saved ancestors walking down muddy colonial streets on a dark night. The same that shivered in the woods when the fire was in sight but the warmth too far away. Well bred nerves.
But now they had been short circuited, as the client who greeted him at the suite looked like nothing to fear at all. Not at first. Doors opened on beguilingly large eyes, a small face he had to tilt his chin down to look at, and someone who looked decided unlike any client he’d had before. At once he leaned back and doubled checked the number but-
“You’re in the right place, come in.”
Louis didn’t lean forward and instead turned his head away, looking down the hall and then side ways at the young man in the door before glancing past him and into the suite for any sign of a set up.
“Louis, come in.”
The man at the door grabbed him by the wrist and when their gazes met those big brown eyes went wide, like he’d only just caught sight of him. Usually Louis would wrench his hand away if grabbed like that before any ground rules had been stated, but those nerves of his were still dazed and he failed to do anything except stand and stare.
“There we are, come in it won’t take long.” The young man pulled him through the door into the hotel suite and nothing was out of place except for the duvet and a game system thrown atop the mussed sheets. A pizza box was open and picked over, MarioKart’s title screen trilled from the television, outside the window he could see the part of the Venetian across the street, glittering in the night as Las Vegas hotels were wont to do. Louis was stunned still and began quickly wondering just what all he was going to get busted for in this very obvious sting.
The young man let him go and then stood back, gesturing at himself. He was dressed nicely, black suit, as if he really were going out and needing a companion for the evening as his messages had stated. However, his tie was undone and he gestured at this. “Tie this for me, would you?”
Louis obligaged and the entire time he was looking between his shaking fingers and the unfettered stare of the young, very young, man who was watching him work with perfect concentration. When tied up properly he tucked the tie into his vest and then buttoned the second button on his three button suit. He turned and looked into the mirror in the suite’s foyer.
“Excellent, thank you.” He fished into his pants pocket and dropped a wad of 20’s into Louis’ hand without looking back from the mirror. “You’re dismissed.” Louis wasn’t sure what to make of anything and his brow knit in the middle with a severe case of the elevens.
The man, ‘Armand’ if Louis went off the names he signed his messages with, pursed his lips and looked at his call boy’s reflection in the mirror.
“Unless you still want to join me, and I’m not going to be offended if you do or don’t. I’m bringing along a stronger magnet this time,” he began with incoherent order and further confusing Louis. “Which should make collecting coins in the Bellagio fountain that much easier. An assistant to help me collect samples without drawing attention will be useful. You can distract as I extract.”
What would someone with wads of twenty dollar bills want with a couple of coins flicked into a fountain? Much less in a three piece suit and a tie he couldn’t even tie himself.
As Louis would discover with Armand on their many, many trips out, there was a lot of hypocrisy. Namely, that he paid for the attention of a man who found him charming enough to be around for free.
That thing you wrote that isn’t “good enough” to put up on the AO3. You can put it up there! The AO3 isn’t meant to be The World’s Classiest Showcase. It’s an archive. It exists because most other forms of hosting fannish work eventually degrade or disappear. Accounts get deleted. Websites shut down. The AO3 preserves those things. Ten years from now you’ll be like, “Shit, there was this really great tag essay, but the person changed their Tumblr URL and then Tumblr closed up shop…” (look, even Tumblr will die eventually) and your only hope of finding it will be if the page was cached, or if somebody uploaded it to the AO3.
The AO3 exists to preserve ephemera as much as substantial works. You know how valuable it is for archaeologists to be able to read the graffiti on the walls of Pompeii? The little things, the notes, the headcanons, the notfics, the meta, the back-and-forths, are all important too.
YES YES YES THIS.
Tumblr’s likely to die sooner than you expect, and suddenly – it’s owned by Yahoo. (Anyone remember
del.icio.us, later delicious.com?) Yahoo’s trying really really hard to squeeze money out of tumblr and it’s not working, for all the reasons discussed in synec’s post and because a huge portion of its userbase is 13-18 years old and HAVE NO DIGITAL MONEY so can’t buy things online even if they wanted to.
There is no “worthy to be on AO3.” None. The early fics were often really well-written; it was a high-standards archive – not because “it strove for high standards” but because the only people who knew it existed, who cared about a new multifandom archive, were the ones who’d been around watching archives disappear for years; they were veteran fic writers who wanted a permanent place to share their stories. It took a long time for AO3 to have enough server capacity to allow open invites; in the early days, it was friend-of-a-friend for invite codes. (They wanted more people; they couldn’t handle a flood. So they handed out a few codes at a time)
We even talked about it while setting up the original terms of service – knowing that by saying, our standards are less restrictive than ff.net, less restrictive than LJ, we were going to eventually have HUGE amounts of really bad fic. FF.net got the nickname “pit of voles,” and AO3 was going to outdo that… eventually.
And. We wanted it ALL. All the reader-insert Mary Sue “date with hot dude” fic; all the “quiz to find out which power ranger you would be” fic; all the “band came to my home town and their bus broke down in front of my house and they needed a coffee and…” fic. And later, all the meta: the thinky character analyses; the “who’d be best on a first date” discussions; the “why the new movie sucked rocks and should never have been made because they ruined my favorite sidekick” rants.
ALL. WE WANT IT ALL.
AO3 is not about “the best of fandom;” it’s about “the truth of fandom.” And the truth is, fandom is not comprised of 90% well-written tightly-plotted carefully proofread fic. Fandom is comprised of people who love their favorite shows and books and characters and want to share that love with others.
AO3 are not the fanfic standards police. We’re the ones cheering for the “GLOWING BLUE SKELETON DICKS” tags.
Someday, some fandom archaeologist (and yes, there will be fandom archaeologists, isn’t that awesome?) will sift through the badfic, the quick drabbles, the Mary Sues, and write articles for peer-reviewed journals chronicling the complete collected works of some of the 21st century’s greatest authors and how you can see in THIS self-indulgent Protagonist/OC clusterfuck the origin of those characterization tactics and flow of prose that make your subsequent masterworks truly shine as beloved classics, and THIS short character drabble gives THAT story arc in your well-known later story an exceptional poignancy and depth if one considers it backstory.
Also that fandom archaeologist’s teenage daughter will think the self-indulgent Protagonist/OC clusterfuck is the best thing she’s ever read.
I-want-my-IWTV 