Fandom: VERONICA MARS
Pairing: Aaron Echolls
Author on LJ: always_winter's journal seems to have been deleted.
Author Website: unknown.
Why this must be read:

Fic about Aaron Echolls seems to just call for creepy characterization, for good reason. This story just touches at the underlying scary in the man, and does so perfectly. It's an almost mundane look at his life (well, a part of it, anyway) in prison. Sadly, this is the one rec so far for which I do not have an appropriate icon. ;)

But his character in Hair Trigger strangled a man with an electrical cord and slashed another’s throat, and Aaron doesn’t see how anyone could watch it and believe he was a man incapable of violence.

Five Pieces of Mail

Fandom: STARGATE ATLANTIS
Pairing: none
Author on LJ: miss_porcupine
Author Website: the DMZ
Why this must be read:


This story is tightly written, action-packed and thoughtful. It has some truly lovely character insights, a real sympathy for who the characters are, both their strengths and flaws, and a depth of emotion that is palpable without being histrionic or melodramatic. What's really, really cool is we get to see something of Atlantis as a whole community, and we get to understand what the risks and dangers mean to all of them, not just our intrepid lead characters. There's a crisis, there's fear, there's a real cost and we are left with this feeling that the workings of the SGA universe and Atlantis are more real, more textured and more human than we'd ever really grasped before.

And Lorne has a great opening line.

The Jenny Code

Fandom: The OC
Pairing: N/A
Author on LJ: serialkarma
Author Website: None; though all her fic is memorized and tagged at her LJ.
Why this must be read:

This is a lovely story. A little bit of Sandy and Kirsten's life, earlier and later. No spoilers, written in season one.

During the early years of their marriage, long after the mail truck, but not long at all after Seth, Sandy would come home in the evenings and find strange things lying about their tiny house in Berkeley. A lamp without a shade here, a pile of three mismatched suitcases there. Found objects, strays that somehow made their way to his home, that Kirsten would fuss over as though they were animals, or children. Sanding, painting, refinishing—Kirsten had a knack for making each piece look as though it had always belonged right there and nowhere else.


Doors

Fandom: HIGHLANDER
Pairing: Duncan/Methos
Author on LJ: tryfanstone
Author Website: terra incognita

Why this must be read:
A wonderful new story filled with stunning imagery and richly detailed descriptions. The almost formal prose adds to the sense of old customs embraced and made new again.

While this is a Christmas story, I didn't want to wait until next Christmas to share. Thanks to tryfanstone and beta unovis_lj for getting it finished and added to the web site in time for me to rec this month.

Misrule

Fandom: AFFLECTION
Pairing: Matt Damon/Ben Affleck/Jennifer Garner
Author on LJ: amatia
Author Website: acherontia.org
Why this must be read: In this wonderful story amatia not only gives us a touching threesome, but depicts Jen as a warm, open, accepting person, which is all too rare. Mmmm. Threesome.

Love Throw a Line

Fandom: HARRY POTTER
Pairing: GEN: Dorcas Meadowes
Author on LJ: ignipes
Author Website: see her livejournal
Why this must be read: This is a very powerful piece. It takes a relatively obscure character and looks into her, just a little bit. It's about war and death and the people we know, and just how things fall in the end.

"...That's Dorcas Meadowes, Voldemort killed her personally..." -- OotP, page 174

( snippet )

Much As She Had Lived

I hope I won't get into too much trouble for posting late, but I wasn't able to get to a computer last night.

There are many excellent Sentinel crossovers. It seems to mesh well with other fandoms. When I first started looking through my collection of Sentinel stories for ones I wanted to rec on Crack Van it seemed like almost every one that caught my eye was a crossover. So it wasn't easy to pick one and I more or less ended up throwing darts :-)


Title: You Watch the Hippy, I'll take Goldilocks, by Gil Hale
Pairing: none
Author on LJ: unknown
Author Website: Gil Hale's Literary Leaflets
Why this must be read:

How could anyone resist a story with a title like 'You Watch the Hippy, I'll take Goldilocks'?

In this AU crossover Jim Ellison, detective, and Bodie, visiting English CI5 operative, have been assigned to work together to find escapees from the Cascade Guide Facility, but they are more interested in working the drug case Jim was ordered to abandon. To their surprise, the two cases prove to be related and they are forced to reevaluate their own prejudices regarding Guides and their capabilities.

Gil Hale writes lively, witty stories with real plots and emotional resonance. As an extra treat, this one has two sequels. I'm not familiar with The Professionals, but that didn't prevent me from enjoying these stories.

( Read an Excerpt )

You Watch the Hippy, I'll take Goldilocks
Rogues
Fear