nothing certain except . . .

[kindkit]

I just spent about two hours doing one set of state taxes (I still have to do another one, and my printer is running out of ink, and woe is me). So I thought I'd do the "my ten most popular stories on AO3" meme.



1) Midwinter (1451 hits; Discworld, Drumknott/Vetinari, adult, 16445 words)

It surprised me to find this one in the lead, although I realized a while back that I get a disproportionately large number of comments on it, especially for a not-recent story about a not-popular pairing. I think its popularity demonstrates a couple of things: that the fic-reading side of Discworld fandom is much larger than its small and inactive fic-writing side, and that (perhaps as a consequence) people are more willing to try fic that's not about their favorite characters. Also, people like long fic.

I do think "Midwinter" is among the best stories I've written, but there are other fics I think that about that aren't anywhere near the top ten.


2) The Home Front (1084 hits; Maurice, Scudder, all ages, 2289 words)

This was a Yuletide story in a fandom that, although small, is widely known, so I'm not surprised it's high on the list.


3) Waiting For the Weird (1030 hits; due South, Kowalski/Fraser, all ages, 1898 words)

Among the weaker of my due South stories, I think, but it's fairly angst-free and fun, and has been recced here and there.


4) Dwarfs Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus (691 hits; Discworld, Carrot/Angua, teen, 612 words)

I'd have expected the level of meta to put more people off (then again, who knows how many of the hits are people who read the story all the way through, or liked it if they did?). But it's Discworld, and it's a popular pairing.


5) Observer Effect (678 hits; Discworld, Vetinari/Drumknott, all ages, 100 words)

The first drabble in the list. Discworld again, and this was a Yuletide stocking stuffer.


6) Advice for the Love-Lorn (582 hits; Lewis, Lewis/Hathaway, teen, 1474 words)

Another surprising-ish one; Lewis is a fandom I think of as almost completely inactive, but like Discworld, it may just have far more readers than writers.


7) Five Ways Sam Vimes Discovered What He Didn't Want to Know (536 hits; Discworld, Sam Vimes and Vetinari/Drumknott, teen, 800 words)

And the Discworld effect continues.


8) Suspension (427 hits; Discworld, Vimes/Vetinari, teen, 200 words)

And continues. Vimes/Vetinari is perhaps the most popular Discworld slash pairing.


9) Until Dawn (401 hits; Discworld, Vetinari/Drumknott, teen, 100 words)

I'm somewhat ashamed to find this bit of fluff, an inferior little addendum to "Midwinter," in the top ten. It's not terrible, exactly, but I wrote it in the weird emotional aftermath of obsessing over "Midwinter" for two months and not being entirely delighted with the responses I got after posting (which, especially at first, were sometimes skeptical of the pairing).


10) (Let's Play) Master and Servant (389 hits; Discworld, Vetinari/Drumknott, adult, 1279 words)

I wrote this as a kind of porny metacommentary on power; most people, I think, just read it as porn. It's the only fic I've ever written, or am ever likely to write, that features a formalized dominant/submissive relationship. That's far outside my fanfic comfort zone, but I was fascinated by the way the Discworld books talk about Vetinari and power, and also responding against people who claimed that Vetinari having a sexual relationship with his secretary Drumknott would necessarily be an abuse of power.


For more evidence of the "Discworld effect," I cite the fact that out of my next five most popular stories on AO3, three of them are also Discworld. Almost every Discworld fic I've ever written is in the top 15. Go figure.

Comments

[lilacsigil]

I always wondered if Americans who moved from one state to another (or lived in one and worked in another) had to do an extra set of taxes! Now I know!

[kindkit]

Oh yes. And for each state you have to show which bits of income you earned when you lived there. Sometimes this involves math. Seriously, for one set of taxes I had to divide my total income by my income earned in that state and provide the result to five decimal places. This can get even more complicated if, as happened to me a few years ago, you move in August but continue to receive pay from your old job, in your previous state, through the end of September. I think I ended up with that income getting taxed by both states, oh joy.

When you move to another state you also have to re-register your car and get a new driver's license for that state.

Do Australians have to do similar things or is your level of state self-government less ridiculous?

[lilacsigil]

Our state self-government is less ridiculous! Basically, unless your tax affairs are very complicated, you do one tax return and the Federal Government sorts out what goes where (it's slightly more complicated for people from Mount Gambier or Albury-Wodonga, say, who work in one state and claim a child-care rebate across the border, or partners who work in different states, but not much more). And they want everything to NO decimal places. You have to re-register your car and renew your license with your new state when the old ones run out, but until then you can drive around in a NSW car on a NSW licence (with your new Victorian address on it) while living in Victoria. Direct state taxes are mostly on large single-charge things like "buying a house," "buying insurance" or "registering your car". Otherwise, the Federal government collects your income tax and sales tax and gives a lot back to the states in a much-argued formula. There are other problems, but the user interface is not too bad.

[lemposoi]

I should read your Discworld fic sometimes!

Huh, I don't have a single fic with over 1,000 views. The most-viewed one is still one of the first I ever posted. Oh well.