Hi all. Sorry for my long unannounced hiatus. I hit a reccing dry-spell, and super busyness in RL. I'm back after revisiting some beloved fandoms, and hopefully can hit my reccing stride again.

Title: Dear Soong
Fandom: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Pairing: gen, with background Juliana Tainer/Noonian Soong & OFC/OMC
Categories: AU, Canon Fix-it, Drama, Family Relationships, Fluff, Epistolary
Length: Short (1,379 words)
Warnings: n/a except spoilers for practically every Data-centric TNG episode (especially 3x16 The Offspring and 7x10 Inheritance)

Author on LJ: unknown
Author Website: KiranInBlue (at AO3)

Summary:
In which Dr. Soong chooses a friendlier colony on which to finish his work - and Lore is given the chance to live, and never develops a psychotic streak in order to survive. Lore never kills Dr. Soong, and Dr. Soong is there to help guide Data in building Lal. And Juliana gets the daughter she always wanted.

Review:
This is the canon fix-it I always wanted for Data and his family, particularly after the events of The Offspring, the episode in which Data creates (and looses) a daughter. I love the sweetness of the family interactions via letter. The Soong family was never broken apart by tragedy or Lore's mental illness, and instead are living happy lives in the Federation 'verse. The sheer amount of worldbuilding the author sneaks in in so few words is boggling, and I wish they'd been inspired to write an epic about the family's continued adventures. Though that was not to be, the idea of Lore working as an artificial intelligence rights lawyer, Noonian's antics with the Daystrom Institute, hints at Spot's future appearance, and the addition of Data and Lore's sister Memory are so much fun.

Dear Soong

Title: Going Native
Fandom: Battlestar Galactica (2004), Star Trek: The Next Generation (with references to Star Trek: The Original Series)
Pairing: gen, with Felix Gaeta/Anastasia "Dee" Dualla (and background/slight Lee Adama/OFC, Reginald Barclay/Racetrack, Saul Tigh/Lwaxana Troi)
Categories: AU, Crossover, Drama
Length: Super Epic (156,591 words)
Warnings: n/a

Author on LJ: rap541
Author Website: Rap541 (on FF.net)

Summary:
What do you do when you're a lost Starfleet officer in the Beta Quadrant? You blend in and hope for the best.

Review:
It's been ages since I visited either the The Next Generation or Battlestar Galactica fandoms, and the fic totally hits my id for both fandoms and for crossovers. The author fuses the two canons together cleverly, and includes elements of the Star Trek: Original Series episode "Who Mourns for Adonais?" to help reconcile the otherwise conflicting canons and their mythologies. I must admit to spotty familiarity with later seasons of BSG, but it seems to be a post-Season 3 AU.

Felix Gaeta, a member of Star Fleet, was transported via a freak wormhole (a la Farscape's John Crichton) to the Twelve Colonies a decade ago, and blended in to the society there for survival and to avoid breaking the Prime Directive. Deeply undercover, he'd given up on returning home when the events of the early seasons of Battlestar Galactica occur. Eventually, the fleet make it to Federation space, and Gaeta's varied loyalties and history are revealed.

What ensues is a long, engrossing tale focused primarily on Gaeta, but that also deals with the complexities of the Twelve Colonies survivors first contact with the Federation (through it's flagship, the Enterprise and her personnel), the culture clashes between them, and the stress and PTSD of the refugees, and bonus Romulans! Gaeta, in particular, is put through the wringer; the stress and guilt from canon events combined with his conflicting loyalties and years of living in fear of discovery all taking a toll, and the first contact situation requiring his continued input despite the need for a break. He also gets to see his (original character) family members for the first time in a decade, which is both joyful and stressful. Gaeta may be over-woobiefied and perhaps overpowered, but it worked for me within the parameters of the fic's fusion of canons and within the context of the plot.

Most everyone gets great character moments, with sections that show both crews perspectives of each other; I particularly liked Picard and Bill Adama's POV sections, which really gave great perspectives of the clash of cultures and on the other characters around them. My favorite character interactions of all may have been between Bill Adama and Worf, and Barclay and Kara Thrace. Many character are given a chance to shine, including Barclay and Lwaxana Troi, Dee, Lee, Bill Adama and President Laura Roslin, and Gaius Baltar. Complex interpersonal issues with the BSG characters are resolved, and the author took me from a place of complete frustration with Kara Thrace to really enjoying her character again. The Cylons, too, appear later in the fic, and some aspects of their culture and existence are resolved in a way that totally works for me (more so than in canon).

The various romances, though not central to the plot, were fun and sweet, especially between Gaeta and Dee and I got a real kick out of Ambassador Lwaxana Troi and Tigh as well.

I did have a hard time getting into the story in the first chapter or two since it starts in medias res; the author did add the earlier scenes of the initial meeting of the crews as a sort of epilogue, so if you prefer to start at the chronological beginning you can skip to Chapter 65 and read through to Chapter 67, and then go back the Chapter 1.

( Click here to read an excerpt. )

Going Native

[Note: there's also a pretty awesome sequel Going Forward that is sadly a WIP, last updated November 2011. Check it out if you like the Going Native'verse and don't mind reading unfinished fic, but the first story can stand on it's own. The fic is strongly rooted in Trek'verse events--the Dominion War--shown in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.]

[ETA: to fix ~many~ spelling errors and add in a few forgotten details, such as a mention of the Cylons]