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Such a Nice Day (Billabong fanfic)

Hello internet, there’s a tragic lack of Billabong fic about, so here is a little. :) Posted at AO3 and set shortly before the War; it’s all very pre-Wally/Norah in the way all the books before BD are pre-Wally/Norah (lol, MGB, yes, we all noticed), and features what I like to think of as the most platonic not-really-a-date in the history of platonic not-really-dates. (Is that not a thing? IT IS NOW.)

Also featuring birthdays, because it’s me, and a truly shocking lack of hurt/comfort!

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I’m SO DELIGHTED at the thought that this could possibly be useful to anybody! (Can you take pity on me, though, and should you ever have cause to reblog this chart again--could you use the one currently on the original post? The fact that this version has BA occupying the same timeframe as BOB is deeply upsetting! Proofreading, gah!)

Chronology of the Billabong books along with ages of the major players, as calculated to the best of my ability. I don’t know why I felt compelled to do this, but compelled I did feel, and I think it’s pretty accurate?

For all three people in the world that might be interested in this (say hi if you feel like it!), I’ll be putting up an evidence post soonish. (Lookit, did any of you realise the age difference between Jim and Tommy was a whole five years?)

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Billabong chronology: part two

Second and final part, in which we explore less definite territory, but also discover that Wally and Norah weren’t actually as ridiculously young for marriage and parenthood as MGB would have us believe!

Part one is here.

BTB starts after the Armistice was declared in November 1918. Bob struggles through an unpleasant Victorian winter shortly after landing in Australia, so the crossing must have happened in the UK spring of 1919. Tommy is repeatedly aged at 19 at the start of the book, as it is a plot point that she can’t leave the guardianship of her father before she is 21. Furthermore, we get Bob’s age when he’s talking to Mr McClinton about getting Tommy away—he says that he’s over twenty-two.

Initially, I thought that BTB must take place in 1920, because I didn’t think there was enough time for Bob and the boys to be demobilised and on a ship to Australia by early 1919. But the maths checks out otherwise. Tommy reminisces that Bob was eighteen when War broke out, so for him to be 22 in BTB it has to be before mid-1919. Also, it’s repeatedly mentioned that the Billabong lot has been away from Australia for five years. (It’s actually more like four and two-thirds, but who’s counting?) Given that it’s 1919, Norah is or will be 21 that year, Jim is or will be 24 and Wally will be 23.

(Actually, it’s just occurred to me that Bob has to be born the same year as Wally if he was eighteen the year War broke out, so I’m going to fix the chart a second time. He would have turned 23 in 1919 too; he’s probably a couple of months at best older than Wally.)

We also know that Tommy’s birthday is early in the year, because she’s still got eighteen months until her 21st birthday by the time of settling in at Creek Cottage in late 1919 (they’re discussing suffragettism and Tommy says she doesn’t need to worry about it for eighteen months). So, yes, Tommy is just under two years younger than Norah, and five years younger than Jim!

Creek Cottage burns down on New Year’s Day 1920, and BTB closes in autumn of that year.

Billabong’s Daughter opens an even year later, the whole book taking place over the autumn of 1921. (There’s a big song and dance about how dry the autumn has been so far in the initial narrations, and then in the last couple of chapters it’s mentioned the autumn rain coming at last. Wally/Norah symbolism, guys. :D) It’s definitely a year later, because the Rainhams are said to have held their property for over a year, which fits with Bob having bought it late 1919. Wally is 24 (will be 25, but wouldn’t have had his birthday yet), and Norah is or will be 23. Which…actually is a very reasonable age for marriage, particularly in the early 20th century? MGB, you had no reason to be so obstructive about their relationship on grounds of ‘too young’!

I can’t pin Billabong Adventurers perfectly, but I suspect it’s around spring-summer 1921. It starts with the Billabong shearing, and traditional wisdom is springtime for shearing, although some places do an autumn shear. However, considering that Norah and Wally go camping for their honeymoon, it would make a lot more sense if they were heading into the warmer months, because camping in Victoria and NSW in winter would be deeply uncomfortable. They must be travelling over Christmas and New Year, however, because Wally makes a comment that he’d been in QLD ‘last year’ about halfway into their honeymoon, so they must have clocked into a new year by then. (BOB notes that they had a three month honeymoon, so this is eminently possible.) It would be quite possible for the whole thing to happen in spring 1922 (which would push forward the entire rest of the timeline by another year), but this would require Norah and Wally to wait well over a year between engagement and marriage, which I don’t quite see. (“When you are quite better”, anyone?) It’s admittedly pretty close timing for Wally’s leg to totally heal from autumn to spring/summer of the same year, however, so this one could go either way. It’s really only that I don’t think Norah and Wally would wait longer than they have to to get married that places this towards the end of 1921 rather than late 1922. (This is probably why the chart was incorrect re the BA date to start with, because I couldn’t make up my mind. :p)

I’m going off memory for BOB and BL as I don’t actually have my copies handy for those two at the moment, so feel free to say something if I get them wrong! The timeframe between BA and BOB is again a bit on the murky side, but Norah and Wally’s marriage still seems to be relatively novel (“Never mind, Brownie, I have a wife to clean them now!”—or something like that), so I wouldn’t place it further than a year along. I think BOB happens in spring/summer? At any rate, it’s warm enough for camping for a child, so given that this is Victoria it probably has to be between November-February. (You couldn’t pay me to camp in the Victorian outback outside those months. :p) We’ll call it late 1922, and Bill has his tenth birthday in this book, which places his birthyear in 1912.

BL, WAB, BG all happen within a very few months of each other, again in the spring/summer (judging by the fact that there is shearing in WAB). Bill is 12 in these books, and Davie has had time to be born and be eighteen months by the time of BL, so it’s late 1924 and probably crosses into 1925 without it being mentioned. Davie was born early-ish 1923, so Norah was likely early-stage pregnant in the latter part of BOB (she was probably quite lucky not to miscarry when she spent all that time stressing and searching for Bill when he went missing). At Davie’s birth, Norah would have been 25, and Wally 26-turning-27 (which is, again, not actually ‘absurdly young’ to be parents like you kept on insisting, MGB. :p).

Davie is ‘not yet three’ in SOB, so it’s sometime in 1925 after his birthday. The weather sounds very clement, and Norah picked roses for Jim and Tommy’s wedding, so probably spring, although autumn is a possibility. Spring seems more likely, however, because a lot of stress is put on the ‘months’ that it took to get the trial underway. Jim would have been 30 at the time of his marriage and Tommy 25.

Which brings us to BR (which I enjoyed about fifty times more this time I read it than ever before, incidentally), which happens in ‘early spring’. Brownie says that Davie is four, so this is spring 1927. At last count, Norah is 29, Jim 32, Wally 31 and Tommy 27. (It is my dearest hope that Tommy had a baby ASAP after BR, because they would be too wonderful at parenting and Davie needs a friend! ^^ Although, if you're keen to depress yourself, Davie will be 18 in 1941, which means Norah will have to send another boy she loves away to fight a world war. Jim and Tommy's theoretical children won't be old enough, though.)

Birthdates ahoy:

Norah: 1898 (~May-July)

Jim: 1895 (~May-July)

Wally: 1896 (~September)

Tommy: 1900 (very early)

Bob: 1896 (mid-year)

Bill: 1912 (late)

Davie: 1923 (early)

And that’s it! Commentary, as always, welcome. :D

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Billabong chronology: part one

As promised, here is Part One of my evidence and rambles post on the Billabong chronology I just posted. (On that note, I initially posted an incorrect chart--Billabong Adventurers takes place in Spring 1921, not Spring 1922, so check the original post, not necessarily any early reblogs.) This probably will be heavier on rambles than evidence, but dig around a bit and hopefully you’ll see that the reasoning is legit even if I don’t sound like I know what I’m talking about!

(Did you ever want to know when Wally’s birthday is? I can give you pretty good idea!)

The first useful thing to know that becomes quickly apparent when doing a timeline of the Billabong books is that ALBM is not to be trusted when it comes to internal consistency. ALBM does not want you to get this right. ALBM deceives. ALBM would have you believe crazy talk like this:

The first time that Jim returned from school was for the Easter holidays. (ALBM, Ch. 3)

Why is this crazy talk? Okay, so first off you need to understand that the Australian academic year matches the calendar year. This means that first term begins sometime around the start of the year, with the first holiday break typically at Easter. This makes perfect sense so far, right, that the first time Jim would come back for holidays after leaving for school would be at Easter? So far, so good! ALBM also helpfully tells us that Jim is fifteen, Norah twelve and Wally fourteen, i.e. Jim is a year older than Wally and three years older than Norah.

Beautiful. Couldn’t be more lucid.

Then MAB comes along and tells us:

Of course, there was Jim—the big brother who was seventeen now […]. (MAB, Ch. 2)

(All right, we say comfortably, okay, got it; two years have passed. Until—)

Jim loved Billabong, too; but it was only to be expected that six years of school in Melbourne would make something of a difference. (MAB, Ch. 7)

Hoooold on. Six years? Jim’s been at school for six years (i.e. since he was eleven), and the first holidays he had at home during that time was when he was fifteen—four years after he started?

…resubmit, please.

There are a couple of other odd things about ALBM’s chronology. Jim switches from being slightly younger than Harry (as mentioned in Harry’s introduction) to being the ‘eldest of the youngsters’ later on in the book. Norah’s mother died ‘nearly eleven’ or ‘nearly twelve’ years ago depending on which edition you’re reading—so the whole must-have-died-in-childbirth thing is not actually as straightforward as it looks. FBTL makes a passing reference to Wally having been friends with Jim for five years, which doesn’t add up into the ALBM timeline either (unless we accept that it is possible for Jim to have taken two whole years of friendship before inviting Wally to holidays at Billabong. That’s almost as silly as Jim not coming home for holidays for four years).

Now, it’s not like it’s odd for long book series to have minor chronological inconsistencies. But the rest of the Billabong books are so tightly consistent with each other that ALBM’s missteps are worth noting, if only to explain why I’m not taking overmuch notice of it.

Okay, moving on. The next few books are fairly straightforward. MAB happens over the Christmas period, we get Norah’s age (14), Jim’s (17) and Wally’s (16) explicitly mentioned in-text. It’s additionally mentioned that Norah has been tutored for ‘two years’ by Mrs Stephenson since the end of ALBM. NOB also happens over a Christmas period, although only Norah’s age (15) is mentioned.

Then FBTL happens, and this is where I start getting impressed with Mary Grant Bruce’s ability to keep her internal chronology straight.

It’s a major plot point in the early stages of FBTL that Wally is 17, because this means he’s too young to enlist in the Australian Imperial Forces (Australian men had to be 21 to enlist during WWI, or 18 with guardian permission). Jim is 19 (Ch. 2: you’re only nineteen, Jim, lad), and Norah 16 (Ch.2: Now, for the first time in sixteen years, the parting of ways must come). This is the only time that Wally’s age is two less than Jim’s and only one more than Norah’s…which means that Jim and Norah have already had their birthdays this year and Wally hasn’t yet! Given that FBTL opens shortly after the German invasion of Belgium in August 1914, this means that Wally’s birthday is sometime from September-November (since he clocks over by the Christmas holidays)! Is it really sad that I got super excited about this? Birthdays are my life blood! (We can actually narrow it down much more than that, but you’ll have to wait a couple more books.)

But wait, ALBM suddenly became much more useful, because it gives us a vague idea of Jim and Norah’s birthdays too! Since they’re all the standard age gaps apart in ALBM, and we now know that Wally couldn’t have had his birthday yet in ALBM because it was only Easter and his birthday is late, it therefore follows that none of them could have had their birthdays yet in ALBM. Easter 1911 happened on April 16, so Jim and Norah’s birthdays must be sometime between April and August.

Well! :D

(It also therefore follows that Wally in all likelihood had his birthday on the crossing to England. Somebody write the drabble, or I will.)

JAW opens in ‘spring’, which means March-May as we’re now in the Northern Hemisphere. The narration specifies a couple of times that it’s only been a month or two since they left London for the Front—so we’re in 1915—and the ages we’re given at the start (Norah 16, Jim 19, Wally 18) bears this out. Again, we’re the standard age gaps apart, and, again, none of them have had their birthdays yet. I’m once again deeply impressed with MGB. I think it’s probable that Norah and/or Jim celebrated their birthdays in Ireland. :)

CJ opens very closely on the heels of JAW i.e. still in 1915, and is the last time (to my knowledge) that any of the ages of the main three are mentioned explicitly. This is Wally, in the first chapter, who endeavours ‘to look more than nineteen’, so he’s had his birthday. Combine this with the opening sentence of CJ which says that it’s September and our previous knowledge, and we’ve pretty much established Wally as a September baby. :)

At this point, I think it would probably be useful to give birth years and dates as accurately as we know them to be:

Norah: 1898 (~May-July)

Jim: 1895 (~May-July)

Wally 1896 (September)

CJ spans a considerably longer timeframe than any other Billabong book, apart from possibly BTB, finishing up on Christmas 1916. At its close, Norah would be 18, Jim 21, Wally 20.

We approach murkier waters ahead. Stay tuned for Rainham revelations.

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I'm in the process of writing a way-too-detailed explanation of all of the above! I was surprised too!

Also, the date for Billabong Adventurers is incorrect; it should be Spring 1921, it's fixed on the original post now. 😊

Chronology of the Billabong books along with ages of the major players, as calculated to the best of my ability. I don’t know why I felt compelled to do this, but compelled I did feel, and I think it’s pretty accurate?

For all three people in the world that might be interested in this (say hi if you feel like it!), I’ll be putting up an evidence post soonish. (Lookit, did any of you realise the age difference between Jim and Tommy was a whole five years?)

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Chronology of the Billabong books along with ages of the major players, as calculated to the best of my ability. I don’t know why I felt compelled to do this, but compelled I did feel, and I think it’s pretty accurate?

(Edited: The first version of this chart had the wrong date for Billabong Adventurers, and I have also since revised Bob’s age. This is the most recent version of the chronology!)

For all three people in the world that might be interested in this (say hi if you feel like it!), I’ll be putting up an evidence post soonish. (Lookit, did any of you realise the age difference between Jim and Tommy was a whole five years?)

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This is great. This is really great. :) :) :) I have a hard time articulating why I love the prequels and TFA when the way I love them is so different? But this. This is it. :D

Star Wars rambling...

The more I think about it, the more I believe that the prequel trilogy and The Force Awakens have problems that are the opposites of each other: the prequels have a compelling underlying plot but suffer from poor execution, while TFA is marvelously executed but its plot is lackluster and derivative. As much as I adore the prequels (they were my gateway to the series, after all!), the acting is generally iffy, the romantic dialogue in Episode II especially is totally cringeworthy, and some of the characterization is a little off. But the story beneath all that- a crumbling Republic, a faltering Jedi Order faced with the resurgence of its ancient enemy, a tremendously powerful young Jedi besieged by inner demons, the man who trains him but is heartbreakingly incapable of halting his descent into the darkness, the idealistic young stateswoman he is forbidden to love, and a prophecy that promises so much more from him than the evil he’s delivering - the story is golden. It’s genius. It just got a little bogged down in the process of coming to life is all. 

TFA, on the other hand, shines in all the details that the prequels fumble on. The dialogue is snappy. The acting is, for the most part, first-rate; probably the best Star Wars has ever seen. The relationships between the characters are well-rendered and totally believable. As a whole, it’s executed so well that it’s only when you start to really think about the plot that you begin to realize that it has serious flaws. Like, for instance, the fact that the bare bones of its story are essentially stolen from the body of A New Hope. That’s troublesome in its own right (especially in the context of Star Wars’ historic ability to deliver something fantastically new), but it’s when the consequences of this blatant copying start interfering with the arcs of original trilogy characters that it becomes a serious issue. In order to carry on the “fallen family member in need of redemption” plotline, TFA splits up Han and Leia (though it does it in the best possible way, admittedly. Execution at its finest, people) and sends Luke running away from it all (???)- all this after Return of the Jedi establishes Han and Leia in a fire-forged relationship and Luke demonstrates his dogged persistence in personally restoring his fallen loved one to the Light. Seriously, what gives?

At any rate, I love both the prequels and TFA with my whole heart. Padmé is still my hero, even if her romantic scenes with Anakin give me a secondhand embarrassment so acute that I literally have to shield my face from the screen every time they pop up. And Obi-Wan’s “You were my brother, Anakin! I loved you!” is a knife in my heart EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. (I still have never cried so much at a movie as I did at my first viewing of Revenge of the Sith) The (probably infamous, now) bridge scene is one of my favorite scenes in the entirety of TFA, although the thought of Han and Leia being permanently separated after ever enduring a separation in their marriage makes me want to scream. (Insert gif of brand new Darth Vader bellowing “NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!” here) And Finn and Rey’s friendship is currently my favorite thing (seconded by Finn in general). Basically, I have a lot of critical analysis thoughts about Star Wars and a lot of deep feels about it, too, and I’m really glad that the two can exist without ruining each other. Guess that’s hardcore fandom for you. ^ ^    

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The Force Awakens

Friend: So when did you start crying?

Me:

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WHAT A GREAT TIME TO BE A STAR WARS FAN. (I have certain reservations about certain elements which are spoilery and which will no doubt be discussed to death and back to life again several times by everybody in the next two years, but for now The Force Awakens DID NOT DISAPPOINT, and I AM SO EXCITED FOR THIS TRILOGY.)

(Obligatory shoutout to the prequels, which are probably about to experience a new degree of detraction in comparison with this movie and can use all the positive vibes going their way. I will always love and defend you, kids!)

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Cold Hands, Warm Heart (Newsies shortfic)

Fandom/Genre/Rating: Newsies, gen/friendship, G Characters/Word Count: Jack & David, 650 Summary: Jack wins a bet and loses his ability to regulate his thermal homeostasis. [It’s cold where I live right now.]

“How many times have I told you that he bet me I wouldn’t is not a good enough reason to do something anyway? Haven’t you grown out of this? You’re lucky you didn’t have a heart attack the second you hit the water. Did you miss that there are chunks of ice in the Hudson this time of year?”

Jack shakes his head, although it’s sort of hard to tell when he’s shivering all over. David finds the shivers reassuring, though: they mean that Jack is warming up. When he’d shown up, he’d been in a truly alarming state of slow, soaked dullness, hardly able to mutter more than a few words of the story out.

“You didn’t notice?”

“I did notice,” Jack corrects, each word punctuated by the click of chattering teeth. He looks very unhappy. “Wouldn’t’ve been much of a bet otherwise.”

David tries very hard not to roll his eyes. He gives up after a few moments. Jack catches the expression and buries himself a little deeper in his cocoon of blankets. Something like “stop telling me off” mumbles its way through layers of cloth.

“Sure,” David says, unmoved. “Just as soon as you stop doing stupid things.”

Jack sends him a look that tries to be baleful but only really manages miserable. It makes David feel just a little sorry. He might sound—and be—irritated with Jack, but Jack never oversells feeling ill. Toughing things out is a point of pride amongst anybody who’s lived on the streets. He must be feeling pretty awful to show this much vulnerability. “How are you doing now?” David asks, by way of peace-offering.

“Hands starting to hurt,” Jack mumbles, wincing as he clenches and unclenches them beneath the blankets.

“Yes,” David says, tone somewhat less unfeeling than his words. “That’s your body’s way of telling you that you’ve done something really dumb. No, don’t put them nearer the fire, warming them up in a hurry will only make it worse.”

“Hands hurt,” Jack repeats unhappily, blowing on them and wincing afterwards. “A lot.”

“You’ve just got to ride it out,” David said, a little more sympathetically. “Let them warm up gradually. Try rubbing them together. Try—what are you doing?”

“Hands hurt,” Jack insists, tightening his sudden grip around David’s own hand like it’s the only possible solution. The touch is utterly frigid. “Be helpful.”

“I am helpful,” David protests, shaking Jack’s freezing fingers off. “The reason you are wearing dry clothes and are sitting in front of a fire and haven’t died is because I am helpful. Don’t you tell me to be helpful.”

“Please,” Jack says plaintively, and maybe it’s the chattering teeth, maybe it’s how he looks like he’s a puppy that’s been kicked, or maybe it’s three years of friendship, but David only holds out a moment or two longer. He sits down next to Jack, takes one of his freezing hands between both of his, and rubs. Jack’s expression instantly changes to one of grateful relief.  

“This stays here,” David orders in a long-suffering voice. Jack doesn’t argue.

Silence falls for a little, the only sounds the crackle of fire, the quiet vibrations of Jack’s residual shivers against David’s shoulder, and the chafing of warm hand on cold hand. Part of David wonders if this is what fatherhood feels like. Equal parts fondness and frustration. Something like that.

“S’good,” Jack mumbles at last, voice thick with fatigue. “You can stop.”

David lets him go and gets up. Jack slumps sideways into the space he vacated, lips and cheeks now their ordinary color, shivers nearly entirely gone. David covers him up with another blanket and stokes up the fire a little more. Jack is practically asleep by the time he’s done.

“Tomorrow,” he promises, even though Jack is almost certainly not paying attention, “we are having that talk about making bad choices again.”

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The More Foolish (Newsies/Star Wars shortfic)

Characters/Genre: Jack, David, gen & er, scifi, I guess? Rating/Word Count: G, ~650 Summary: Jack and David are Jedi AU. That's it, that's the fic. Will this tick anybody else's boxes besides my own? PROBABLY NOT, aha, but that's okay! :D But it's actually totally kind of fun playing around in Star Wars while we don't know anything for sure about post-ROTJ yet and there aren't like a billion books to keep track of any more. :D

“Pretty sure it's them,” David says, keeping his macrobinoculars trained, trying to sharpen the focus.

"Another day, another Sith," Jack murmurs.

"They're not Sith Sith," David corrects while he adjusts the aperture. "They're just Dark Side users--it's a philosophical thing--and, okay, it probably doesn't really matter," he concedes as Jack sends him an incredulous look. "Well, it does matter, because that was the whole point of--but...fine, I'm done. I'm just saying. It's a good thing we left Les back at the ship."

Jack, after blinking at David slowly for several seconds, looks away over the edge of the crag again. “He’ll be complaining for days about being left out of this."

Which is true enough, but that's something that David is able to live with. He wonders if he ought to feel bad, because Jack is Les' Master, not David,and he knows perfectly well that Jack probably would have let Les come along ifit had been up to him. 

(Then again, Jack let Les play with a real lightsaber instead of a training one three days after Les began combat lessons, so David feels like he should be forgiven if he's still a little leery about letting Jack take full responsibility for his little brother.)

“But," Jack goes on, "I guess if I’d let him come you’d be complaining for days. It's just a matter of pickin' your poison."

“You got it,” David agrees. He gets a good view of both faces beneath the hoods, snaps a screenshot and sends it to his datapad. The facial recognition program pings a pair of matches in a matter of seconds. “Confirmed,” he says, flipping the pad around to show Jack, who gives it only a cursory glance between returning his attention to his own binoculars. “You want to call in backup or take them down now?” He pauses. “Is that a stupid question?”  

“No question is a stupid question, David,” Jack says, in a very passable imitation of Luke Skywalker, except that Luke is able to say things like that and sound absolutely sincere. Probably because he actually is. It answers David’s question, anyway.

“Fine,” David says, not really in the least surprised or annoyed, and unhooks his lightsaber from his belt. It's unlikely that the pair down there are going to put up much of a fight anyway; none of this cult of Dark Side users have been so far anything but rudimentarily trained. "But if I get killed, I'm Force-haunting you into an early grave."

"Fine with me." Jack stows the macrobinoculars and readies his own lightsaber. “Wouldn't have it any other way, actually. Okay, now listen...”

His voice changes as he goes on to describe their plan of attack, takes on a serious edge the way it does whenever he means business. Ordinarily it’s David who makes the plans and Jack’s the one who puts them into action, but when it comes to combat, David takes the back seat. Jack is by far the better swordsman, which is a commentary on both how naturally good Jack is and how David, in the the golden days of the Order, would probably have been much better suited to a Consular role. But Jedi don’t have the luxury of choice these days. It’s not altogether a bad thing. David doubts his combat work would be any good to anybody at all if he didn't have a reason to constantly practise it.

Jack winds down and asks, “You got all that?”

David nods, thumb itching as he rubs the ignition button on his lightsaber. Maybe he's better at diplomacy and mediation, but there's a part in every Jedi that sings for battle. The Force courses through him, settling him into tingling readiness. “Call it.”

Jack grins at him, the expression rather feral, and shucks his cloak. Their lightsabers blaze alive, David's green a moment after Jack's blue. “Now."

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Star Wars: The Force Awakens has completed principal photography.

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I love Sorting characters into Hogwarts Houses. It’s pretty much the most fun way to do a meta character analysis. It’s also fraught with danger, because everybody has strong opinions about which House so-and-so belongs in, and that’s very...

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This is an excellent, excellent response and thank you so much for it!

House Sorting based one what the character values is a really popular way to look at things, and I agree with it, but I do think that you have to consider the way they go about protecting what they value, too. I think that both Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs are highly family/friends-motivated, they just differ in the way they express this motivation. Hufflepuffs want to be there for their friends (e.g. give them support and hugs, make them tea, band together in general to deal with problems), but Gryffindors want to defend theirs.

(I hear what you're saying about how Jack steps in and is brave for his friends, but look at Harry himself. Harry couldn’t care less about the glory and fame either; all he really wants is his parents back and his friends to be safe and to go and live a quiet life where nobody will talk to him about being the Chosen One again. But he’s called to be his friends’ hero, not their support group, and that he’s able and willing to rise to the call [as well as having a bad case of daredeviltry] is why he’s a Gryffindor.)  

You make a really good point (like, a super-duper good point) about how Jack ditches all defiance when he turns scab and that that’s really uncharacteristic of a Gryffindor, but rather than this being a natural course of action for him, I actually see it as being a huge character development moment, because Jack’s already lost one friend to the Refuge this movie already, and being defiant (let’s soak them for Crutchy!) did jack-all (excuse the pun :p) to protect him. So Jack’s trialing another approach now—one that comes less naturally to him.

Jack: I don’t understand either, but just get out of here!

Right there, I think Jack is really struggling with the decision he just made to roll over and give up, because prior to this he would absolutely have pushed back and he still really, really wants to.

In the end, though, I think it’s Jack’s natural leadership that pushes me right over at Gryffindor, because I really don't think any other House leads like a Gryffindor leads.

(But thanks again heaps and heaps for your response, I understand so much better where the Hufflepuff!Jack people are coming from now, and I have got to say that if we don’t act together then we’re nothing, if we don’t stick together, we’re nothing; and if we can’t even trust each other, then we’re nothing! is an exceedingly Hufflepuffy creed. So…he could go both ways equally easily? :) And also, okay, but a Slytherin and Hufflepuff dream team, all right, you’ve sold me there, that’s miles better than Slytherin and Gryffindor. :D)

Sorting Jack Kelly

I love Sorting characters into Hogwarts Houses. It’s pretty much the most fun way to do a meta character analysis. It’s also fraught with danger, because everybody has strong opinions about which House so-and-so belongs in, and that’s very understandable because where you Sort people depends a lot on how your interpret the character (which of their traits you think are most important, which appeal to you most), and depending on how complex the character is, it’s quite possible to come up with four different Houses with equally compelling reasoning behind it.

So I’m going to rock the boat a bit, because I happen to be one of those people who had mentally Sorted Jack Kelly into Gryffindor, when apparently the fan-favourite House for Jack is Hufflepuff. I’ve given the thing a lot more thought since then and kept my mind wide open, but I’m sticking to my guns, and here is why. You ready? :D

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[evienneb]

Sorting other Newsies characters

jackcowboyhero replied to your post “jackcowboyhero replied to your post “Sorting Jack Kelly” I never...”

So: thoughts on Sorting any other characters?

Thanks for the question! :D Sorry it took a little while.

I’m going to be disappointing, maybe, because honestly I don’t feel like there’s enough canon-based characterisation on many of the characters for me to have a definitive opinion about them (although maybe more data wouldn’t help, seeing that I can’t definitively Sort even David :p). Even though I’ve probably got lots of personal opinions about the boys, when it comes to Sorting I like to stick pretty thoroughly with canon alone and not bring my own interpretations into play (though, tbh, that’s probably gonna happen however hard one tries, but one tries, okay). But if you’re really interested, here’s some meta for the characters we know a bit more thoroughly! :)

Les

Gryffindor. Gryffindors appreciate heroism, and are therefore most prone to hero-worship out of all the Houses (i.e. hero-worship like Les has for Jack). Besides, he’s a gutsy child—he yells out Strike first when everybody else is hesitating (granted, he’s probably got a pretty imperfect appreciation for what striking actually means financially for everybody), is the first to speak out when Jack is sentenced to prison, and seems to thoroughly thrive on all the strike excitement in general.

Racetrack

The most frustrating thing about Race is that we know he’s a gambler, but we have no idea what kindof gambler. I tend to write him as a good gambler—as in, he’s an absolute card shark and anybody who wants to hang onto their pennies should know better than to play poker against him, he knows all the rules and how to exploit them, etc (although obviously he does lose big sometimes)—but he equally well could be helplessly addicted to it and just be consistently losing money because he’s kind of hopeless at it.

Race isn’t unintelligent, though—he thinks very rationally about the strike (are ya outta your mind? and maybe we oughta ease off a little), so I think there’s an argument to made for him being of the former breed. So, in that case, let’s call him Slytherin, because inveterate calculated gambling points to a personality that habitually tries to improve its situation at the expense of others’.

Mush

Mush, bless him, is the Hufflepuffiest Hufflepuff to ever Huffle. <333 I don’t have to explain this, do I?

Blink

…which means that Blink has to be Hufflepuff as well because I refuse to put them in different Houses.

Spot

Here’s a trickier one. Okay, process of elimination. He’s not Gryffindor or Hufflepuff, because both those types would have agreed to join the strike from the get-go, although for different reasons—Gryffindors because that’s just the sort of high-stakes risk they enjoy engaging in, and Hufflepuffs because they’re hardwired to respond to a call-to-arms and help out their buddies. I feel like I’m taking the obvious route here, but probably Slytherin for Spot—he’s responsive to flattery when David starts to butter him up, and there’s no way that somebody with Spot’s build got where he is in a neighbourhood like Brooklyn without a whole lot of ambition and shrewd planning to back it up.

Miscellaneous

I feel that Crutchy and Sarah’s characterisations are built mainly on reactions to Jack rather than on their own merits, and I honestly don’t have a fantastic feel for them. Crutchy’s either Hufflepuff or Gryffindor (probably Gryffindor, given his stubbornness about not wanting to be carried out of the Refuge), but Sarah could really be anything.

I’m going to say Ravenclaw for Denton, mostly because Ravenclaws are pretty sadly underrepresented here (which was probably always going to happen in a fandom where education is sacrificed in favour of, you know, stuff like feeding yourself), but also because a Gryffindor and a Hufflepuff probably would have stuck with the strike no matter what, a Slytherin might have needed a bit more of a personal incentive to return, and it's conceivable that the intellectual satisfaction of writing a mind-blowingly awesome article was at least part of what enticed him back in the end.

  …and that’s it! Comments welcome! :)

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Top five Billabong books? :D (AND WHY, if you have time, because there isn't enough on the internetz about them.)

I (literally) thought no one would ever ask! Ahhhh! Thank you, thank you for this opportunity to rave about Billabong!

I really think Mates at Billabong is the best of the lot. In every Billabong book there’s a series of minor, pleasant adventures followed by one major catastrophic incident. Mates at Billabong goes further - is the horse thief the major incident? No! Is it evil cousin Cecil and poor Bobs?! No! I also love, love, love Norah trying to be nice to Cecil through thick and thin and (of course) ‘if you arranged to clean out a pigsty, Wally would probably regard it as a gigantic picnic, and enjoy his day hugely’. 

It’s really hard to pick one for second place. Probably a tie between Jim and Wally and Captain Jim? The Jim/Wally bromance breaks me into teeny tiny pieces in every book, but WWI buddies looking after each other? AUGH. my babies. I adore how Jim and Wally seamlessly transitions from a ‘travel Ireland’ brochure to something straight out of The Adventurous Four. (Discovering secret German submarine bases a whole World War ahead of you, Enid Blytonites!)  PLUS. CAPTAIN JIM. My little sister has only read so far as Norah of Billabong and to tease her into reading the rest I read aloud the telegram scene from Captain Jim. Jim’s her favourite character. (I made her cry.)

Norah of Billabong is pushed out of second place because I am forever haunted by that poor Aboriginal woman at Ben Athol and all the unspoken ‘stolen generation’ implications. BUT the book has a special place in my heart because of the chapter in which Wally gets bitten by a snake. (I thoroughly enjoy watching my best-beloved fictional characters suffer. There’s probably something deeply wrong with me.)

Billabong’s Daughter is on this list, predictably, because WALLY GOOD GOLLY, HOW ABOUT YOU DON’T RUIN ALL OTHER MEN FOR ME FOREVER?! Seriously, though. When I read Little Women (spoiler alert) and Laurie responded badly to Jo’s rejection all my teeny pre-adolescent brain could think was ‘BAH. MY FAVE WOULD NEVER.’

Billabong Adventurers and Son of Billabong tie for fifth place. I’m too emotionally exhausted to give them my full attention in this enormously long message, but you can probably figure out why they’re here :)

[evienneb]

NO it's too perfect and sad and apparently I can only like this once and *howls*

(I'm up in the middle of the night getting a drink of water like a sane human being and then apparently I had to check my dashboard, and now I'm reviewing this thing and I'm going to be tired out for work tomorrow and it's all your fault but I don't care a bit)

Firstly WELL DONE ON THE CRICKET REFERENCE TITLE ALLIE colour me impressed :D

Secondly, your Psmith voice is unparalleled. How on earth do you do it? Making a case for immortality based on developing cricketing expertise is so hilariously him. And it's hard to pick out a best-of Psmith line in this because they're all so perfectly perfect, but maybe this one?:

"As my confidential secretary and adviser, your place is by my side," said Psmith. "Time, as you know, flows swiftly for me. Where my perspective is concerned, you and I have scarcely met. We are still mired in our first exchange, enjoying that easy give and take that occurs between strangers who begin to warm to one another. I should hardly like to see you rotting away in mid-conversation."

And, like, if I had a dollar for every time somebody made me choke up in the middle of this, I'd be able to retire in comfort. Psmith getting more and more honest as the conversation wears on because of how much he doesn't want to lose this one friend of his; Mike's attachments pulling him so hard both ways at once; Psmith eventually just putting himself right on the line--

"What say you?" said Psmith gently, watching him. "Shall you and I make centuries together?"

I love this line. It encapsulates the whole of the fic: Psmith doing his best not to be pushy, but watching him for his answer because what Mike says matters so much--there's a lot of vulnerability here--and the little cricket pun tops it off.

The day may come when I shall see no more of you, but you, in your finite lifespan, shall not get rid of me. What a lot of time we have allowed to slide from under us

Stop making me cry, please. 

This response is so inadequate for how greatly wonderful this fic is, but I do have to sleep, so just WOW this is more than I ever could have imagined it to be, and you've totally hit that elusive tone right on the head and I am so impressed and full of emotion and if I spend the day occasionally breaking down, well, that's all on you. 

Half-Century

Or: if you had told me that my first real long Wodehouse fanfic posting would be about vampires, I would have said you were out of your mind. But this whole “Psmith as dissatisfied immortal” concept insisted on being written, and then it got completely out of hand. So—

AU. Psmith’s a vampire, Mike’s a werewolf. Kind of a downer, if I’m gonna be honest. Read at own risk.

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