The End! And Guessing Post!

[holmesticemods]

Well, that's it for this round!

We've posted exchange gifts for 41 fanwork creators in just under 2 weeks.

Reveals and the master list will be posted on the summer solstice - Monday, June 20th.

In the mean time, read the fic or view the art or listen to the podfic. And comment here or our AO3 collection to let these creators know how much we've all appreciated their work.

If you'd like to take a guess about who created which work, feel free to leave it in the comments. But we won't tell until the 20th. :)

Comments

[graycardinal]

An impressive round on pretty much all fronts. Congratulations to all the recipients, kudos to all the dedicated creators (look at all those multi-post epics!), and blessings on the moderators!

[starts building spreadsheet to facilitate guessing]

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

Wow! Thank you, mods, for running this lovely exchange once again. It's been a bright spot in my days the last few weeks. And congratulations to all the creators, thank you for your wonderful work! It felt to me like this round resulted in an exceptionally diverse anthology of fanworks.

Perhaps because of the diversity, I don't have as many guesses as I usually do -- I think a lot of people tried something new this time around, which is awesome! But it makes the guessing even trickier than usual :)

So I will stick to the few I feel confident about, and wait to be surprised with all the rest!

saki101 has such amazing imaginative style and detailed world-building, I think I see their hand behind The House of Usher (http://holmestice.livejournal.com/400309.html).

scfrankles loves Mrs. Hudson and loves to laugh; surely I see her spirit shining through Dust and Ashes (http://holmestice.livejournal.com/402296.html").

And, this is going to sound really weird since I haven't even had the chance to finish reading it yet, but given what I have read, the length, the adoration of its readers, its clean prose and powerful emotion, I feel like The Way to a Man's Heart" (http://holmestice.livejournal.com/401449.html) might possibly belong to swissmarg.

Also, the astonishing vid Something Good (Will Come From That) (http://holmestice.livejournal.com/409720.html) seems like a project that sanguinity might have chosen. But then, a number of other fanworks this round also seem to be likely contenders for her authorship, so who knows!

Thanks again to everyone :) I look forward to the reveals!

[saki101.livejournal.com]

Thank you for this! I've been waiting to affirm that you did, indeed, guess correctly! :-D

[swissmarg]

Thank you for the very flattering words accompanying your correct guess about my fic. The length definitely, ha! I just can't seem to write short things. :p

[sanguinity]

Why yes, that is a project that I might chosen, well-spotted! :-D

Would you enjoy prompting a vidlet? It's part of the Holmestice fun for me to offer a treat for people who correctly guess my contribution, and wouldn't you know, I have a TON of Holmesian source sitting on my hard-drive, plus a deep stack of notes about where the cool bits are, and I used only the barest fraction of any of it in the vid.

So. Prompt a vidlet? Topic or 'verse (no BBC please for force-balancing reasons, but obvs nearly anything else in the vid is a go, and I've got a few more adapts sitting around that I haven't used, try me).

[mahmfic.livejournal.com]

oh my gosh that's all!? wow!! you guys work hard!

Audiovisual deductions

[graycardinal]

In some ways, this is a fiendishly complicated round in which to make guesses; OTOH, in certain cases, the math is pretty straightforward – at least, so long as one can rely on the gifts as posted to match the offers as made in the signups. (Go go Gadget spreadsheet!)

We have, for instance, two excellent vids this round, and two players who offered to make vids. A combination of external evidence makes one of the two attributions nearly certain, and that neatly ties off the other.

Something Good (Will Come From That) – sanguinity
How Long – knowmefirst

Similarly, we have two podfics and three would-be providers of podfic...but both podfics are derived from BBC/Sherlock stories, and I think it’s safe to assume that gardnerhill is an unlikely creator for either of those. That sorts the other two out neatly:

En Passant – jagnikjen
Who is the Lamb? – rachelindeed

Art is a little trickier. We have four artworks in the round, (three BBC, one ACD) six prospective creators, and none of the recipients of art eliminate themselves by having offered to create it. On the other hand, of the six potential artists, three offered art exclusively, and one of the remaining three estimated a 5% of committing fic rather than art. This set of guesses is therefore more speculative than the prior two, but I should at least have the dimensions of the pool about right:

Positive Reinforcement – kinkajou
The Evolution Of Johnlock – penumbria_fics
A Time For Us – theanglophile
Till the very fire touched them – camillo1978

Prose fic guesswork coming later in the week (I am going to be Very Busy for the next 24 hours or so).

Re: Audiovisual deductions

[sanguinity]

...you are going to come back and make your prose guesses, right? It always entertains me to watch you try to be sneaky.

Re: Audiovisual deductions

[sanguinity]

I'd ask to know what external evidence makes one of those two attributions nearly certain, but I'm guessing the stack of HOUN liveblogs in my journal might have helped facilitate your guessing. Or maybe the way I told you where you could find source for 1994 Baker Street. Or really, any number of other things. ;-)

But congratulations, you guessed correctly! Would you enjoy prompting a vidlet? It's part of the fun for me to offer a treat to people who guess me correctly, and as it happens I have a TON of mostly-untapped Holmesian source and content notes burning a hole in my hard drive.

So, prompt a vidlet? Topic or 'verse, please. Obvs nearly anything in the vid is a go, but also a few more 'verses besides, like Bravestarr/23C and various things that never made it into the vid. Try me. :-)

[venusinthenight]

I also think sanguinity did that epic fanvid.

[sanguinity]

You think correctly, congratulations!

Would you enjoy prompting a vidlet? It's part of the party for me to offer a treat to people who guess me correctly, and as you might imagine, I have a LOT more source and lists-of-cool-things-that-might-work-in-a-vid than I managed to actually use. :-)

So, prompt a vidlet? Topic or 'verse. Nearly anything in the vid is a go, obvs., but I've also got a bunch more stuff sitting around besides that never made it in, try me. :-)

[meredydd.livejournal.com]

I had some guesses going while I was reading along over the past several days but now I want to re-read, re-watch, re-listen, and re-see everything to make new guesses, lol. Everyone did such amazing work (and I am still giddy over the fic I was gifted)!

[ancientreader]

Whoa, I am such a crap guesser that the only one I can come up with is saki101 for "House of Usher," but that hardly even seems like guessing because there is no less imitable prose style than saki's.

ETA: Wait ... maybe tiltedsyllogism wrote "Ford"? Hm.

Warmest thanks to the mods for all your hard work! I am excited to see the reveals!

ETA2 rachelindeed, is that your fingerprint I detect on the pages of "The Book of Life"? Although you left kudos on AO3 and you're not usually sneaky like that ... Hmmm. Unless you wrote "The Hue and Cry"? OH I GIVE UP.

"Glitter in the Air": hiddenlacuna?

[saki101.livejournal.com]

You were right about me and that is no surprise. No one could ask for a more insightful reader! Still, when I saw your guess, I wanted to tell you straight away and had to contain myself! :-D

[amindamazed.livejournal.com]

first pass at guessing: sanguinity for "Something Good (Will Come From That)": among many other superlative details, the much-appreciated source list/credits was a giant clue, along with the inclusion of Bert Coules audio. I suspect k_e_p might be the collaborator...

k_e_p or gardnerhill for "Bee Yourself": I need to review the other non-BBC works to make my final decision between them. The length is not a sufficient aspect to identify the former as a candidate but it helps (affinity for Elementary, Elementary's bees, and Joan are the greater hints), while a history of crack bee Elementary fic points to the latter...

I think this may be the first Holmestice since I've been aware of the exchange that's had a MoreHolmes gift every single day of posting (and even more than one!). Thanks to all the participants and the mods for making that happen.

[sanguinity]

There was a good deal of moreholmes all the way back at sign-ups, too! I usually flag the moreholmes requests for myself as they get written (for my own sign-up, for treats, for guessing), and this round I flagged SO MANY. It was pleasantly overwhelming. :-)

And we got a really neat mix of moreholmes during posting, too! (Watson and Holmes, Murder by Decree, the Ritchie stories, three -- three! -- My Dearly Beloved Detective stories!)

[scfrankles.livejournal.com]

Hang on. Hang on one jolly minute. The "Who Is The Lamb?" podfic and the fic The Way to a Man's Heart were produced by the same person. The Way to a Man's Heart is 21,000 words long. I agree that gardnerhill will not have produced two BBC Sherlock works. But neither rachelindeed nor jagnikjen write fics of that length. So I think rachelindeed may be right - the fic, and therefore the podfic, belong to swissmarg.

Mr. Holmes, I'm afraid I'm going to leave logic behind now and rely on my female intuition ^^ If we say jagnikjen is responsible for the other podfic, then that probably means rachelindeed has written a fic. And there's one particular fic that has been puzzling me: a rare 'verse that was only listed by the fic's recipient, and a fic that I thought had been written by sanguinity before Something Good (Will Come From That) happened. A fic packed with brilliant ideas and connections, a relatively short fic, a fic in which Mycroft comes to the fore, a fic that rachelindeed hasn't commented on...

I think Art in the Blood (http://holmestice.livejournal.com/400751.html) is by rachelindeed.


Some other guesses:

I think The Prince-Detective and the Several Types of Beans (http://holmestice.livejournal.com/398938.html) is by hiddenlacuna. The confident, seemingly effortless, sustained humour makes me think of their work.

And purely going by a process of elimination - I'm not familiar with their work - I think my excellent gift fic Mrs. Hudson’s Unique Tenants (http://holmestice.livejournal.com/409309.html") is by piplover.


Thank you to the mods for all your hard work, and well done to everyone who took part!

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

I just want to say I'm delighted you guessed mine -- I really didn't think anyone would! Bravo!!

[theanglophile.livejournal.com]

I'm afraid I don't have any guesses, being new to all this, but thanks so much to the mods and everyone else who participated! I love seeing such a burst of creativity. I shall have to roam around and leave some comments!

[jesse_the_k]

No guesses from me, but I love how carefully deductive and defended the opinions so far have been. Sherlock Holmes fandom, of course.

Prose deductions/guesses (1 of 2)

[graycardinal]

With thanks to sanguinity for the reminder, herewith guesswork as to prose authors. Note that a good deal of this is very much guesswork rather than deduction, and (also as implied by sanguinity) that in order to be complete, one or two of the guesses here and in the next post may be deliberately wrong (since I must have written something in the round...).

With two exceptions, I'm omitting any guesswork for BBC/Sherlock stories on grounds of non-familiarity with the fandom. Those two exceptions are "The Prince-Detective and the Several Types of Beans" (because it's a fairy tale) and "Date Night" (because it's Star Trek), and I can resist neither crossover/AU. The challenge is to pick candidates from a field where I'm less familiar with the contributors, so these are relatively speculative guesses.

"Prince-Detective": cleflink
"Date Night": pippnfrodo

Next we have two singular fandoms, Murder by Decree (gifted to me), and Watson & Holmes (gifted to sanguinity). The first of these (as noted upstream) is problematic in that there were no offers for Decree; the second is a little more interesting.

scfrankles has made an intriguing guess for "Art in the Blood", but I'm going to go in another direction. Of the handful of individuals who might have written it, I'm going to eliminate both gardnerhill and sanguinity; both are certainly literate in the fandom, but both have also written for me in past rounds, and I think both are much likelier authors of other works in this round. And matching gardnerhill with sanguinity is a little too easy as well. But I do think I see a familiar hand in this story, from an author whose work I've seen before....

"Art in the Blood": rabidsamfan
"A Time to Remember": venusinthenight

There are two Ritchie-movie stories in the round. I was initially tempted to theorize that methylviolet10b wrote one of these and was gifted with the other, but ultimately I think "Loose End" has to be gardnerhill's contribution to the round.

"My Dear Watson": monkiainen
"Loose End": gardnerhill

We have two Elementary stories, and this too is interesting, because my candidate for the author of "Bee Yourself" did not offer for Elementary . I have two reasons for this guess: one is that said author is on record with certain other bee-related Holmesian weirdness, and the other is that I do not think it's coincidence that the first giver of kudos to that work on AO3 is a known associate of said author.

That leaves "Flowers Can Say More Than I Ever Could". Fortunately, prior guesses knock out a couple of otherwise possible candidates, and I feel safe in making a guess from among those remaining.

"Bee Yourself": sanguinity
"Flowers Can Say...": horrorfangirl

There are three stories for My Dearly Beloved Detective, and (after eliminating candidates I've slotted in elsewhere) three prospective authors available. Luckily for me, two of these are also recipients, which further limits the variables. I think this shakes out as follows:

"my tired soul on fire": k_e_p
"so that you will hear me": phoenixfalls
"The Hue and Cry": garonne

And this has gone on long enough that I'm going to stop here, and do the ACD stories in a separate post.

Re: Prose deductions/guesses (1 of 2)

[sanguinity]

*cackles madly*

*chinhands for part two*

Prose deductions/guesses (2 of 2)

[graycardinal]

[slightly delayed due to phone call]

And now the ACD stories, of which we have six (one of which incorporates aspects of BBC/TAB). Saving this group for last simplifies the problem somewhat, as guesses in prior posts knock out a good half-dozen of the prospective authors for these.* Thus I have a pool of thirteen from whom to guess (okay, technically twelve, since one of those thirteen is me).

I'm going to start with "The House of Usher"...and I'm going to concur with the consensus-guess of saki101 for that story, both because most of the prior guessers are better-versed in the BBC side of things and because I tend to agree on stylistic grounds.

Now, then: if I've organized my spreadsheet correctly, there are two authors** to whom I have not already assigned a work -- and who offered for ACD canon but not for BBC/Sherlock. While it's very tempting to think that scfrankles and wolfatthegate might have written stories for one another, I think that's a little too tidy. Of those two possible attributions, though, I think that for "Dust & Ashes" is the likelier. And if "Mrs. Hudson's Unique Tenants" is not wolfatthegate's work, then I think I want to pin it on meredydd.

Next I step sideways, because "Good for the Soul" is a particularly distinctive piece, and I think that of all the possible writers left on my spreadsheet, snarryfool is likeliest to have come up with that particular spin.

This leaves us with "The Book of Life" and "Broken Silence"...and with wolfatthegate. I'm honestly torn here; the two stories share a certain slant (one from Mycroft's POV, one from Sherlock's), and I could go either way. But that very tonal similarity gives me a thought: if the one story was written for red_chapel, perhaps that's a clue to the origin of the other. And that finishes the list neatly....

"The Book of Life": wolfatthegate
"Broken Silence": red_chapel
"Dust & Ashes": scfrankles
"Good for the Soul": snarryfool
"The House of Usher": saki101
"Mrs. Hudson's Unique Tenants": meredydd

####

*I have been assuming one work per author -- with the exception of the known-to-be-prolific sanguinity, whom I've tagged for two works based on a variety of external considerations.

**To be strictly accurate, there are three, but we're omitting one name for obvious reasons. :-)

Re: Prose deductions/guesses (2 of 2)

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

I just want to say that I really enjoy the rigorous game of guessing / taunting that you and sanguinity play, it is one of my very favorite parts of holmestice. My one regret is that S. apparently has too much inside knowledge this year to fully engage in the performance. But I love the thought you put into all this!

[hiddenlacuna.livejournal.com]

Sending a thousand kisses to the mods for running another wonderful Holmestice. Thank you, you fabulous people!

[methylviolet10b]

What a fabulous guessing thread! I've somehow missed these in the past. What fun! I'm very impressed with everyone's logic. Bravo guessers!

Thank you to the mods for all the work!

[ancientreader]

I am now dying for the reveals. Because of reasons.

[burnt-hearts.livejournal.com]

^

[graycardinal]

And the post-mortem:

I ended up doing really well on the audiovisual side (7 for 8 correct!). but not nearly so well on the prose-fic side (4 of 17 correct, with three of the four in very narrowly defined pools). I also, per comments elsewhere, once again entirely failed to fake out sanguinity. (Clearly, that's a well-deserved user name....)

OTOH, the floor show appears to have done a good job of entertaining the gallery while we were awaiting reveals, and that's not to be sneezed at.

[sanguinity]

Concerning your guess of me for the bee story, you're at the disadvantage of not being familiar with the Elementary fandom: gardnerhill has been writing crack about the brownstone bees for longer than I have. The "Bees - character" tag was hers first. :-)

But my cackling was about your theory that you could recognize a contribution of mine by a kudos from grrlpup. I challenge you to find any story of mine she's clicked kudos on; I don't think there's a single one. :-D