Year-End Fic Recs 2022 - part 1
Every year, my fellow fanfic writers blow me away with their talent, their creativity, and their heart. I’m compiling a list to share a few of the fics I read (or reread) this year and would recommend -- by no means an exhaustive list of the many talented writers and wonderful stories, and not exclusively stories that came out or updated this year, but a place to start. Because I have a lot to say, I’ll be sharing these in multiple posts.
Fic Recs Part I: Leia Organa Has Become Unstuck in Time
One of my favorite tropes, I’m learning, is “Leia travels to the past -- either on purpose or by accident -- and tries her damnedest to fix things, while the people she meets inevitably fall in love with her and try to get her to let others take care of her for a change / make her take care of herself for at least ten minutes. With varying amounts of success.”
Of Queens, Knights, and Pawns by @chancecraz: TFA-era Leia Organa goes to sleep the night of Han’s death and wakes up in her 19-year-old body, just as 19-year-old Leia is being transported to the Death Star from the Tantive IV. *Stefon voice* This fic has everything: time travel, angst, humor, romance, Force shenanigans, unlikely friendships and surprising allies, scary parents, political intrigue, BAMF Leia Organa, ride-or-die Han Solo falling in love with Leia all over again, Bail and Breha Organa being awesome (and alive!), Luke educating others on Tatooine culture, Leia and Obi-Wan getting drunk together, dreamscape discussions between Leia and Vader, discussions of the clones and the Jedi, considerations of the fall of the Republic and the neglect of the Outer Rim, droids that make me cry, and just beautiful, complex writing throughout. It is a bit of a commitment (each chapter is often novella length or longer), has a fair amount of angst, and does include a timeline in which at least the TFA part of the sequels happened, but it’s well worth it.
The Don’t Look Back series (Like Fire in Our Bones, Blood of Our Father, and Duty Bound are the primary stories) by @this-acuteneurosis: Not long after ROTJ, Leia is grieving, having just lost Han, Luke, Chewie, and the droids while they were on a mission for the New Republic. Anakin Skywalker’s Force Ghost offers Leia a chance to go back in time to the person who could help her fix it all: a pre-AOTC Shmi Skywalker. When Leia and Shmi reconnect with Padmé on their way to Coruscant, they become part of refugee resettlement, political intrigue, Jedi business, clone rights, and much more. Includes some wonderful relationship-building with Obi-Wan and Anakin, Leia learning to deal with her power in the Force, Leia dealing with grief (or refusing to deal with grief, as the case may be), Leia trying to wend her way past Palpatine’s machinations, Threepio being important to the plot, some surprise help from Force Ghosts, Anakin getting some much-needed support, and Leia sassing a Sith Lord. Oh, and at some point you may find yourself shipping Leia and Obi-Wan (the OWK series is not canon in this story, just FYI). If you love Shmi or Padmé and the handmaidens, you will especially enjoy this series. The most recent fic, Duty Bound, is currently updating on a regular basis, but you should start from the beginning.
Shifting Sands by @chancecraz: TFA-era Leia is exploring a Force cave with Luke and ends up thrown back into TPM-era Mos Espa, where she meets Anakin and Shmi Skywalker prior to Padmé and Qui-Gon’s arrival. Told from different characters’ points of view, we see how Leia’s intervention with the two people she calls Old Man and Grandmother alters the prequel timeline and begins to change the Jedi’s approach to Anakin, their approach to the reemergence of the Sith, and Leia’s relationship with her own Force powers. Features wonderful characterization and perspectives from Mace Windu, Padmé Amidala, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and (coming up in the next chapter) Shmi Skywalker herself.
Fox and Leia’s Holiday Special by @yellowocaballero: This is a Tumblr-only fic that plays off another time-travel story by this author, Twilight on Owl Creek Bridge (which involves Clone Commander Fox and Leia connecting across time as Leia tries to avert her future and appears as a ghost in Fox’s present; also, Fox keeps waking up in the fountains in the Jedi Temple). In the Holiday Special, Leia is in prequel times and has managed to free Fox’s mind from Palpatine’s Dark Side programming and enlist him in her plot to assassinate his boss and prevent the rise of the Empire and the slaughter of the Jedi. But the recent changes in Fox -- including the fact that he is regularly seen willingly and happily interacting with a natborn Senator -- have not gone unnoticed by his clone brothers, who jump to some conclusions about his and Leia’s relationship. I love this little fic; it’s funny, tender, and has some wonderful things to say about how important a deep, platonic relationship can be, and how it can transform someone’s life. Also the power of office gossip to really throw things off.
