It has been a busy start to my winter break with the usual Christmas preparations, so I’m not posting a new chapter today. But, between the holidays and planning for 2025, I’ve been feeling a bit nostalgic and wanted to write a quick blog post before Christmas. It’s been a few years since I’ve written a story for the holidays, but if you find yourself with some downtime in the next few days, here are a handful of festive fics you can read right here on Dreamer’s Sanctuary!
The Pandaskunk Saga
This trilogy of novellas started out as a silly little story that I wrote right after the release of “It’s Christmas Time Again” in an attempt to explain the strange music video for that song. If the first part reads like a fever dream, it’s because I wrote it while I was literally home sick with the flu for two days. Apparently, cold medicine makes me more creative! It began as a simple Rudolph parody that became so much more, spawning two 35,000+ word sequels that spoof all sorts of things. I’ve always specialized in writing drama and don’t do a lot of comedy, but this series is seriously one of my favorite things I’ve ever written. Be warned that the third story, written in 2019, does feature a pretty unflattering portrayal of Aaron Carter that was based on his real-life antics at the time. That probably hasn’t aged well, given everything that has happened since, but Melissa’s character will always make me laugh.
How That Bitch Stole Backstreet Christmas
Speaking of That Bitch… This is a Grinch parody I rage-wrote in 2022, when we were all reeling from the cancellation of the Backstreet Christmas special and most of their other promotional appearances and endorsements. Two years later, I’m still salty about it. This poem may be more mean-spirited than kind-hearted, but, much like the story it was based on, it does have a happy ending. Hopefully, Nick’s ongoing legal drama will, too.
A 00Carter Christmas
This one will make more sense if you’ve read the rest of 00Carter, but it was originally intended to be a standalone, special episode within the 00Carter universe. It spoofs several different Christmas movies and specials, but I’m most proud of the Home Alone and Grinch parodies I wrote for it. Howie’s character, the supervillain Dr. Rough, will always be one of my all-time favorite characters to write!
If…
Moving away from the funny fics, this one-shot is more serious. It was written as a companion piece to my novel Curtain Call and came out of the desire for Cary, one of the main characters of that story, to hear Nick’s new (at the time) solo album, All American, which included two tracks that reminded me of her and that I knew she would absolutely love. It’s a poignant “What if?” kind of story that takes place at Christmas time and explores an alternate version of events from the original novel, which I would highly recommend that you read first if you aren’t familiar with it.
The Road to Bethlehem
The only novel on this list (albeit a short one by my usual standards), The Road to Bethlehem actually takes place in June. But, since the premise revolves around the Boys retreating to a remote cabin to record a Christmas album during the pandemic (before they actually did), it still has a lot of Christmas references. Plus, it also has an entertaining blend of bromance, humor, action, suspense, and drama. So much drama! This was my big quarantine project back in 2020, and I’m quite proud of how it turned out.
Nick’s Zombie Nightmare Before Christmas
This is just a random little “Night Before Christmas” parody poem that I co-wrote with my friend Rose late one night at the height of our zombie obsession during the Song for the Undead era. As the title suggests, it’s about Nick battling zombies on Christmas Eve!
Home for Christmas
And, finally, for a fun little throwback from the Dreamer’s Sanctuary archive, here is the first Christmas fanfic I ever wrote back in 2000, when I was 15. It’s a Brian one-shot, but, for some reason, I wrote it from Leighanne’s perspective. In hindsight, it would have been better with Brian’s perspective, too, but I was clearly still figuring out the whole “show, not tell” thing back then. I’m only posting a link to it because it’s kind of fun to look back on the writing I did at the beginning of my fanfiction journey and see how my writing style has evolved since then.
Dreamer’s Sanctuary will celebrate its twenty-fifth anniversary in April, so I want to do more retrospective blogs in the new year, sort of like I did back in 2020. I’m also planning to update once more before the end of 2024 to post the next chapter of The World Will Be Waiting. In the meantime, I wish all who celebrate a very merry Christmas!