You're Tender and You're Tired, by Yasmin M.

[darthfox.livejournal.com]

Title: You're Tender and You're Tired
Author: Yasmin M.
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Q/O
Warnings: The author's warning states "I am not a nice romantic. Consider yourself warned." (my kind of writer. [g]) Character death, yes indeed. Character euthanasia, in fact.
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Author's e-mail, web site and/or LJ id: dude, i can't believe i found her. mad props to the MA site for the link-list. e-mail: the_jentayu @ hotmail . com ; website: http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Cavern/4888/fiction.html
Link to story: http://www.masterapprentice.com/archive/y/youre_tender.html
Reasons for recommending: Second-person present-tense narration that works. 'Nuff said? No? (Really, though, doesn't that go a long way?) This vignette is lovely and spare: watercolors, rather than oil painting. If this were a film, it would be filmed in black and white but you'd have a sense of what the colors were anyway. This is the kind of economy of language and deftness of description that I envy with everything I've got. How I would love to be able to write like this -- a mood piece of fewer than a gazillion words? A mood piece in which something happens?! is that even allowed?

Quote from story: Carefully, you tear the letter into tiny pieces and scatter them into the wind. The storm picks up again, driving rain to splash against your face and drip from your beard.

You whisper to the Force, what must I do?

The Force's answer is soft and full of tears, singing to you what you already know.

Comments

[green-key.livejournal.com]

After this story posted I could never say I hate all second person stories again. Nope. This story chewed me up and spit me out and I LOVE it.

You chose the perfect story quote, too.

[gloriana.livejournal.com]

Gods, I remember feeling absolutely devastated by this story when it first came out, and I've never lost track of it since.

Rereading yet again, I'm not one hundred percent sure of the second-person narrative. In places it is a clumsy vehicle (specifically, when the subject of the story breaks down and yells) where I think it lacks the intimacy of either first or third person. But otherwise I completely agree with you, especially about the economy of language; and, I would also add, how original a piece it was and still is, perverting both canon (Leia going with Obi-Wan) and fanon expectations.

[emila-wan.livejournal.com]

This story had a huge impact on it when I read it, and ultimately ended up being one of the main inspirations behind my own little story, Ready (http://www.jediphiles.com/~emila/ready.htm), although in a negative way: I wanted to twist it into something with, if not precisely a *happy* ending, at least a less devastating one.

As for the second person -- I wonder if it was an experiment? What would prompt a writer to choose it, knowing its pitfalls and difficulties. Yes, this is one example of a second-person story that works, but I think it would have worked just as well in third person. I'd love to know more about why the author made this choice.

[glasshouses.livejournal.com]

2nd person POV gets a bad rap in fanfic because of all those ABHs. *shiver*

I was gonna rec this one until you beat me to it - it made me fall in love with deathfic.

Every word has its place and is just perfect.