Rec Post #1: Wincest

[nickelmountain]

 First: Wincest is not my favorite thing. I'm not by any means opposed, but it's not what I look for in a fic. And when it does appear, I really like it to make sense.

The following three stories are all around awesome, and if anything is going to sell me on Sam/Dean, it's the h/c and the intimacy and the general hotness found in these three fics.

1) Last Outpost of All That Is, by eighth_horizon , read by rhea314 . Last Outpost is one of the first podfics I listened to, and it blew me away. It's an apocafic, influenced (if I understand correctly) by "The World Without Us." The story is quiet and claustrophobic, and the first incident of Wincest is so dead-on perfect, so believable and so exactly how it would happen, that it was surprisingly easy for the part of my brain that always says yeah, but they're brothers to just shut up for a little while. rhea314  gives a good read - her voice is clear, pitched low, and she reads with a calmness that serves this story so well.

Link to text: gekizetsu.net/sn/lastoutpost.htm    Link to audiofic: audiofic.jinjurly.com/last-outpost-of-all-that-is

2) Old Country, by astolat , read by pandarus . This one is a crossover with Harry Potter, and also among the first podfics I listened to. I had no idea that a crossover like this could work so well or be so much fun. Dean is perfect and hilarious as a Hufflepuff, and the portrayal of Hogwarts in the year following The Deathly Hallows is so good - all the students struggling to find their ground while mourning their losses and processing their grief. It was nice to spend some time among the Hufflepuffs, seeing the world from inside their House. And Sam the Slytherin, searching for a way to spring Dean from his deal...perfect. Fayjay reads with an animation and energy that brings all the characters immediately to life, and her musical selections are wonderful. As a podfic, Old Country still ranks high as among the most pure fun to listen to.

Link to text: intimations.org/fanfic/supernatural/Old%20Country.html Link to audiofic: audiofic.jinjurly.com/old-country-audiobook

3) Song of the Treadmill, by tabaqui , read by twasadark . Song of the Treadmill is AU in more ways than one - it breaks from canon, and Sam is moving between realities due to a deal with an angel. He finds himself in a post-apocalyptic world in which demons walk the earth in their true, terrifying forms, and that world's version of Sam was killed by the shtriga. The world-building in this story is excellent, and the relationship that develops between Sam and Dean is so beautiful and so sweet. I listened to this story the same week I was reading "Fan Fiction and Fan Communities in the Age of the Internet" - in particular, at the same time as I was reading the essays on One True Pairing and Intimatopia, by Catherine Driscoll and Elizabeth Woledge, respectively. It gave me a lot to think about. twasadark is one of my favorite readers - she has a good, clear reading voice, and her dialogue is always animated and engaging. Sam sounds like Sam and Dean sounds like Dean. Not an easy feat, but as usual, she nails it.

Link to text: tabaqui.livejournal.com/tag/treadmill    Link to audiofic: audiofic.jinjurly.com/song-of-the-treadmill-audiobook

Next up: Dean/Cas