Hi, we are mumblemutter, your drivers for July for Heroes. Get ready for a whole lot of incest, for we like the Petrelli brothers, and we like them lots.

Fandom: HEROES
Pairing: Nathan Petrelli/Peter Petrelli
Length: ~58,000 words
Author on LJ: 47_trek_47
Author Website: Unexpected Places
Why this must be read: The Petrelli brothers are twenty-six and thirty-eight when we meet them for the first time in Season One of Heroes. That means they have a lot of history behind them, one that doesn't include saving the cheerleader and being able to fly or teleport. This story, or rather collection of stories, traces back to the beginning of their lives onwards, with great care towards characterization of Nathan and Peter, both individually and in relation to each other. This is essentially about Nathan's life, but much like in canon you can't tell his story without also telling Peter's.

I love slow burn stories, where the relationship progression unfolds slowly and the characters change along with it, find their place in the world. Not gonna lie, okay: this story is pretty much our Petrellicest canon and our happy place, and we think you should read it. (And if you do, please heed the individual warnings for each part.) -cm

The Making of Nathan Petrelli

Fandom: THE BIG BANG THEORY
Pairing: Sheldon/Penny
Length: 10,557 words
Author on LJ: annakovsky
Author Website: Archive of Our Own
Why this must be read:

To quote The Sound of Music, "Let's start at the very beginning/ A very good place to start." In other words, this story was the first BBT fic I ever read and it was a very good place to start. This hilarious and gloriously in-character fic is probably the fandom's best known story and was a gateway drug for many of us in the fandom.

The fic follows a well-known trope in the fandom, where Penny and Sheldon have to pretend to be boyfriend and girlfriend, but it stands out from the rest with sparkling banter between Penny and Sheldon.

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The Failure of Einstein's Universe

Oh good. It's summertime, and someone foolishly gave me the keys to the van: ROAD TRIP! I'm planning to spend the month poking around in some interesting corners of MFU, and hope you'll have as much fun exploring as I will.

Fandom: MAN FROM UNCLE
Pairing: none
Length: 1776 words (that's NOT why I picked it for this weekend)
Author on LJ: akane42me
Author Website: Memories Section of akane42me's LJ
Why this must be read:

akane42me is not just a good writer, she's one of those writers whose original take on the world always manages to surprise; her stories are filled with wonderful details and a skewed sense of humor that bubbles out at the most unexpected moments.

OK, so the title Kitchen doesn't exactly make the heart go pitter-patter, but boy, the story will. It's a story about coming home tired after a mission, so tired that your conscious mind can't maintain the veneer of normalcy that gets you through the day; the reality of the dangerous, violent life you live starts to seep through. It begins on low heat, but pretty soon you're caught up in it like the frog in the boiling pot--just as Illya gets caught up in a nightmare in Napoleon's kitchen.

Wedged between the wall of the cupboard and the boxes of spare clips and bullets was a large book. The title, "The Joy of Cooking" was printed in dark letters on the shiny white spine. Illya pulled the cookbook out in disbelief. When he opened the book, the pristine dust jacket buckled stiffly and the binding cracked. Never used. No surprise there. However, there was quite a surprise to be found on the flyleaf.

Kitchen

Hi, I'm amyhit and I'll be driving the van this month. It's my first time at the wheel of anything bigger than a Hyundai so, um, do buckle up. I tend to prefer vignettes with a character driven focus, and when it comes to style, the KISS principle only goes so far with me. However I'm not averse to some hardcore plot either. Provided it's M/S or gen, you can expect me to rec just about anything. I'd like to try and dig up some recs that aren't completely ubiquitous, but in this well-read fandom? We shall see.


Fandom: THE X-FILES
Pairing: Mulder/Scully
Length: short casefile, maybe 60K or so?
Author on LJ: juliefortune
Author Website: Well, here is her old website. She has a newer, prettier, more comprehensive site, but I cannot for the life of me find it.
Why this must be read: This fic is everything that makes fanfic awesome. It's a short, sharp little stab of a casefile with a Mulder and Scully who, to my thinking, are just a bit more intense than I'm used to - a tiny bit darker, fiercer - but still complicated and gorgeous and very 'them'. From beginning to end, this fic feels like it unravels to completion, gaining momentum in a way that will literally draw you to the very edge of your seat, and then finishing up with a scene between Mulder and Scully that is so quietly vivid it's dizzying. Fortune's writing style has this flinty, take-no-prisoners edge, yet she is a mindful and extremely competent writer. She's hard on Mulder and Scully, but she never seems to write them irresponsibly. I know wendelah1 recced another of Julie's fics here recently, but as she said, Julie is massively under recced in this fandom. One more will hardly make up the deficit.


The Best Lies

Fandom: DOCTOR WHO
Characters: Third Doctor, Tenth Doctor, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, Harriet Jones.
Length: one-shot
Author on LJ: selenak 
Author Website: FF.net, DW Masterlist,  A03
Why this must be read:

There are great differences between different eras of Doctor Who, and between different incarnations of the Doctor.  But there are commonalities, too, themes and ideas, and underneath all the different faces and different quirks he is still recognizably the Doctor.  This fic highlights some of those commonalities.  The author describes it as "meta disguised as fanfiction" and while I don't think I'd go that far, there's a core of truth to it.  This is a very thoughtful piece, well-written, and enjoyable to read.  If you're an old-skool fan, you'll recognize the events referred to; if you've never seen any old-skool Doctor Who, the author gives you all you need to know.

Patterns

Hi! I'm posyvanilla, and I'll be driving the Star Trek: Reboot van for July. My main love is Kirk/Spock, but I read a wide variety of pairings and genres and I'll try to provide a diverse selection of recs.

Fandom: STAR TREK: REBOOT
Pairing: Kirk/Spock
Length: 4,421
Author on LJ: ningengirai
Author Website: LJ Fic Index
Why this must be read:

First time slightly angry wall sex, sweet second "first" time sex. The st_xi_kink meme has spawned a lot of great fics, but this is one of my favorites. This is porn, yes, but it's not plotless or contrived. ningengirai's dialogue is smart and snappy, and the whole story is sharp as a whipcrack. It's also hotter than hot.


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Wall