2005 Orion Awards Overview

by Dim Aldebaran

Best Overall

The competition for best overall was fierce; between Elbereth In April’s crossover The Family Name, Blue Yeti’s sweeping epic Birds of a Feather, The White Lily’s near-flawless drama His Son’s Father, the Colfer lookalike Artemis Fowl & the Hostage Situations, by Lessa and Ryn, and AgiVega’s pop-hit Artemis Fowl: The Aztec Incident. The competition was then narrowed to AI and HSF: HSF won in both the People’s Choice Awards and in the Orion Awards themselves, though it was a close call to be sure!

Single-Aspect

Best Concept/Idea

Many of the fics nominated in this category represent the cradle of AF fanfiction, with an incredible variety of ideas ranging from drama-noirs (Jude’s Freyr) to crossovers (Elbereth in April’s The Family Name) to exploration of cloning (Blue Yeti’s Nebula Nostrum). Shortlisting in this category was FairyHunter’s pointed In Which I Point Out a Plot Hole or Two, Nallasariel’s dizzying exploration of dreams in Tears of the Never, and Lessa and Ryn’s heart-wrenching detailing of the mindwipe’s effects in What Have We Done?. And what could beat such fantastic representation? Artemis Awakening by Enigma, a near-flawless exploration of genius, madness, and the conscious mind.

Best/Most Memorable Line

The entries into this category fall into roughly two categories: the dark, and the hilarious. With fine representation across the board, with such ironic jewels as the culminating line from FairyHunter’s Storm and a somewhat shellshocked Holly from Lessa and Ryn’s Improvisation, this category ended up going to the humorous quotes, represented by an excerpt from Nyghtvision’s rollicking fic Idiot Savant in the Orion Awards and a newspaper excerpt from AgiVega’s Artemis Fowl: The Aztec Incident in the People’s Choice Awards.

Best Original Character

Original characters are apt to stray into the traps of Sueism and self inserts; however, the characters nominated were sparkling with three-dimensionality and life. Among the nominated was Artemis’s street-wise one-legged match “Andrea Black” from Mockingbirdflyaway’s Artemis Fowl: Cause and Effect and “Simon Badeau” from Lessa and Ryn’s Artemis Fowl & the Hostage Situations. Advancing to the shortlist was refloc’s rendition of “Valerie Ko” in Flame of the Gods and the deeply flawed “Darcy” from Angel46’s Dreaming of Quotes. The winner? The young son of Holly and Artemis, “Patrick”, from AgiVega’s Artemis Fowl: The Sword of God.

Best Overall Characterisation

Only theee were nominated in this category, but they truly represent the best in the fine points in characterization. Nyghtvision’s Idiot Savant remains the model of characterizing Artemis in humorous situations, and Blue Yeti’s Birds of a Feather has enough character development—and regression—to leave anyone marveling at the sustained quality. Winning this category was The White Lily’s His Son’s Father, a flawless performance in which the complex relationships in the Fowl family are explored without breaking stride.

Type

Best Songfic

Many songfics on the ‘nets today have the tendency to fall into cliché, or fail to find the balance between lyrics and prose. These, however, represent those that find that balance and strike a powerful chord. Those nominated include the thoughtful Faith, by Unknown-Wisdom, a pair of sweet AH fics (I Swore I’d Never Let Her Go by kris x and Forget Me Not by Sadezen) and the dramatic ArtemisOpal Misunderstood, by Spiderjuice. Shortlisting was my own Ireland and Kitty Rainbow’s Jolliet songfic Escapism. Perhaps the most unusual amongst the nominees was the winner If, by Black Knight, which used a Rudyard Kipling poem instead of song lyrics.

Best Short Fic

Short fics are the most common of the type fics, but the quality was not lacking. Nominated were two Butlerfics, Kitty Rainbow’s The Second Parent and Skywise’s Highest Honor, the dizzying Tears of the Never by Nallasariel, and Ophelia’s philosophic Crossing the Styx. Shortlisters were The White Lily’s thoughtful Artemii-fic Priceless, my own Carla Frazetti fic Bolero, and little miss demosthene’s jarring And Then There Was. Out of all these jewels, Blue Yeti’s fearless My Queer Young Mind was crowned the winner.

Best Work In Progress Chaptered Fic

WIP, whether abandoned or still active, are left unresolved but can nonetheless remain startling novellength works. Those nominated includes Ophelia’s pointed yet philosophic Concupiscence, Mockingbirdflyaway’s tale of thievery at the Louve, Artemis Fowl: Cause and Effect, and refloc’s tale of the exploits of Madame Ko, The Flame of the Gods. Shortlisted fics lean towards the grandiose, from the apocalyptic New Moon (Ivycreeper) and Demon Design (Marz) to the rollicking The Ivory Files (Nyghtvision) to the sweeping epic of AgiVega’s Artemis Fowl: The Sword of God. To top off this impressive stack of fics is Blue Yeti’s sprawling Birds of a Feather, which is—miraculously—still active.

Best Completed Chaptered Fic

To complete a chaptered fic is a feat in and of itself. To complete it with style to spare is quite another. Nominated is the impressive HPAF crossover The Family Name, by Elbereth in April, the delicate Artler Dance or something like it by Sacai fighter, and refloc’s volatile TroubleHolly known as The Spark. From there, Lessa and Ryn’s so-Colfer-it-could-be-canon Artemis Fowl & the Hostage Situations and AgiVega’s sweeping epic Artemis Fowl: The Aztec Incident both shortlisted, bringing The White Lily’s flawless, multifaceted His Son’s Father to the honor of best completed chaptered.

Genre

Best Action/Adventure Fic

This category had perhaps the most nominations of any category, including CoffeeAndCherryBrandy’s brooding People Are The Same All Over, refloc’s snappy Hitting Hard, Miadevil’s Another Year, Dawn Deianeira’s intricate Heir Apparent, That Aerin’s Artemis Fowl: The Heart of Time and SilverRavenStar’s Artemis Fowl and the Codex Crystal. Advancing to the shortlist was several fics, including Skye Firebane’s dark Killer Instinct, Marz’s spiral-of-a-fic The Demon Design, Blue Yeti’s all-encompassing Birds of a Feather, and AgiVega’s AH epic Artemis Fowl: The Aztec Incident. The winner? The White Lily’s His Son’s Father, which is one of the rare fics possessing the power to cause episodes of nailbiting, fistclenching, palmsweating, and of course insomnia while reading.

Best Alternate Universe Fic

Many alternate universes were represented here, including the nominated only a butler, by Blue Yeti, which presents Butler after the death of his charge in TEC, The Envied Life of Artemis Fowl, by Lost Darkness, which presents an Artemis driven mad after the events of TAI, both of startling emotional impact given their drabble length, and Diagonist’s Unfinished Business, which allows for another way for the mindwipe to have gone. With the shortlisters, FairyHunter’s In Which I Point Out a Plot Hole or Two takes canon to its logical extremities, a tale of an Angeline still mad in Stardust Firebolt’s Silver to Rust, and another tale of mindwipe-gone-wrong in Black Knight’s stirring Insecurity. Capping off this sequence is Jude’s Inertia, which provides a glimpse of a universe that eerily parallels the one we know.

Best Speculative Fic

Though this category has been discontinued, it does not mean that this any the less. FairyHunter’s The Grey Area poses the question of what Artemis would do when Butler dies, and the inevitabilities that follow, and Blue Yeti’s Harmatia and the Cold presents a chilling view of a world—Holly’s world—far into the future. My own Meeting Fair Persephone speculates on Artemis in Underworld, and Ivycreeper’s New Moon supplies an entirely new perspective on fairies and fairy magic. The winner, Artemis Awakening by Enigma, allows for a future in which the mindwipe has stirring consequences.

Best Angst Fic

This was another category not lacking in nominations. BigGreenMonkey’s Failed and Kitty Rainbow’s The Second Parent both detail the relationship between Artemis and Butler. Tyranny’s Izzy relates a story of despair and hope in a surprising time. Stiggy’s Alone provides a stirring glimpse into Julius’ dreams and despair, and The PenMaster’s Haunted, into Artemis’s. Skye Firebane’s The Confessional shows a Holly broken and battered by years of self-crucifixion and abandonment, and Ophelia’s The Wake presents a scene of brooding loss and despair. Lyona of Tartarus’s Taking The Chance follows Artemis’s musings on heroes and altruism, and Travithian Axile’s I Don’t Want To Forget follows his thoughts before, during and after the mindwipe. Shortlisting were FairyHunter’s Storm, a spiraling perspective on Angeline’s madness, The White Lily’s Priceless, a reflection on family, Enigma’s Artemis Awakening, a deeply brooding story of memories lost, and Black Knight’s Cold Comfort, which follows a Butler hell-bent on revenge. After all of these formidable entries, the winner was Blue Yeti’s Genesis, arguably the only fic that truly does justice to the term ‘angsty centaur’.

Best Drama Fic

Nominations include Breaking Christmas, by Pash, which follows Artemis and his family in a season when happiness is the word, Good Intentions, by Quenna, provides a glimpse into a young Artemis and his family, Dark Purposes, by Alyt, which follows a quintet of genii as they fight through science gone wrong, I Remember This, by Gilthoniel explores the memories of Artemis, and in The Bogeyman, by Under The Bridge, we get a taste of a dark fairytale never told. Shortlisted were a fine pair of fics, Tears of the Never, by Nallasariel, a complex, immaculately detailed fic on dreams and nightmares, and And Then There Was, by little miss demosthenes, following Artemis through a kidnapping—and beyond. Winning was What Have We Done, by Lessa and Ryn, a heartwrenching following Artemis’s childhood through his memories—and the guilty party in taking thm away.

Best Crossover

Nearly all of the crossovers nominated were of the AFHP variety, but two exceptions were the nominated Artemis Fowl: The Supernaturalist Journey, by Matt, and The Tall Man In The Tunnel, by Chuthulupenguin, which combine Colfer’s other books of The Supernaturalist and The Wish List, respectively. Closing up the nominees was The Family Name, by Elbereth in April, the original Artemis-goes-to-Hogwarts fic. Shortlisters included two AFHP novels, my own The Rapunzel Complex (cowritten by Saeriel), which takes a decidedly darker bent to a common theme, and Of Magic and Mayhem, by Nallasariel, which by contrasts oscillates between moments of hilarity and sobriety. Winning this category was Black Knight’s But You Gave Up The Sky, a gentle fic that bridges the gap between AF and HP more completely than any of the nominated novellengths in this category had managed to.

Best Humour Fic

Humour is a notoriously difficult genre within this fandom because of the sheer difficulty of Artemis’s characterization in such scenes. Nominated fics include Halloween Below Ground, by Wing Pikepaw, a general, well-rounded fic, Drunk!Arty, by Bizzle, an uproarious account of… a drunk Artemis. Also nominated are Definitely Worth The Trouble, featuring a date between Holly and Trouble plagued with every trouble imaginable, and Kitty Rainbow’s Tales from the LEP, which have a certain heartening aspect to them. Shortlisted fics include Improvisation, by Lessa and Ryn, which details a particularly demanding mission of Holly’s, Life’s Lessons, by L. A. B. Salita, a series of brief anecdotes regarding our favorite characters, and the epic The Seven Deadly Sins of Holly Short, by slime frog, in which Holly stumbles her way through a curse. Winning this category is Idiot Savant—arguably the best humour fic this fandom has ever seen, with a precise sense of characterization and a firm knowledge of where all the right buttons are in getting a laugh.

Best Parody Fic

This category was largely dominated by parodies of Sues, ever popular no matter what the fandom. An exception would be the nominated Artemis Fowl and the Quest for Common Sense, by Here be Draggons, which rambles about in the Fowl household. Two other nominated fics both deal with general Sue!bashing: Adorabelle, by Tie Kerl, and The Taming of the Sue, by ShikariHunter, both rollicking good fun. Shortlisters include Forbidden Love, by Big Friendly Walrus, including arguably the most bizarre mix of pairings out there, and Hail Desdemona! by Stardust Firebolt, provides a very complete Sue for our bashing disposal. Winning this fic was Wintergreen, by Diagonist, a ‘cliché compedium’ covering everything from Mary Sues to crossovers to angst fics.

Best Het Romance Fic

Nominated in this category were a pair of angsty AH oneshots, Elissa-Dido’s Moonlight Reflections and Kitty Rainbow’s All Too Well, as welll as The White Lily’s lucid AngelineTimmy drabble Pieces and refloc’s HollyTrouble novel The Spark. Shortlisted were holikimaela’s bittersweet AH Token, Blue Yeti’s volatile HollyRoot Hu Gardarn and Ophelia’s sharp, seductive tale of a Artemis as a Don Juan in Concupiscence. The winner in this category was Skye Firebane’s brilliant Philophobia, exploring all the intricacies of an OpalBriar that most fervently “isn’t love”.

Best Slash Romance Fic

Slash was somewhat underrepresented in last year’s Orions, with only five nominations out of a veritable sea of slash fics. The two nominations included the angsty Artler novella Dance or something like it, by Sacai fighter, and a bittersweet Jolliet drabble by The White Lily, Pieces. Shortlisting was Kitty Rainbow’s half-serious Girl Talk, and Ophelia’s dramatic, philosophic dream-of-a-piece, Crossing the Styx. Winning this category was the Blue Yeti’s My Queer Young Mind, a fascinating, authoritative exploration of Artemis’s sexuality as no other author has quite matched yet.

In the People’s Choice Awards, things went very differently for the combined categories of Best Slash and Best Het. Shortlisting in “Best Relationship” for the People’s Choice Awards were My Queer Young Mind and Philophobia, the two winners for their respective categories, as well as Hu Gardarn, but refloc’s The Spark took the win.

Best Miscellaneous Genre Fic

Best Misc, the home to all those stray genres that don’t have enough representation on their own, had some surprising contenders. Jazi’s Fowl Mannered is a gentle fic about Fowls of times past; shadowgirlvg’s Finding a Destination is similarly gentle in tone, though its content focuses on the beginning of Mulch’s criminality. Elben’s One Last Goodbye focuses on precisely that: the death of Artemis, and what he does thereafter… though despite its content, it remains gentle, a gen fic. violomana’s Disillusioned or Jaded: What’s the Difference? was not given the length to determine itself as anything other than general genre, though it promises to be a fine fic. Shortlisters include PyRo4’s The Dementia Complex, another beginning of what could still become a fine novel. Meelu the Bold’s That Dumb Blonde, for all its gentle style, can still elicit a smile or a frown in its rambling Juliet monologue. Slimefrog’s Strictly Ballroom is a complete novel of the lightly romping variety, and Li Kayun’s As the Moon Falls into the Sea manages a gentle, quizzical anecdote on Artemis’s morality before even the events of TAI. The winner of this category, however, is the most distinctive: the horrific, apocalyptic Incubi, by Jude, whose seeming opacity with his chosen subject matter of vampires and hounds of death may be peeled back like the shrouds before a sepulcher to reveal a story of truly terrifying beauty.

Concluding Notes

There are several fics that may have been blurred in this piece that require special attention because of multiple nominations.

The White Lily’s His Son’s Father is the foremost of these, with a staggering five Awards, including Best Overall in both the People’s Choice and the Orion Awards.

AgiVega’s two novels, Artemis Fowl: The Aztec Incident and Artemis Fowl: The Sword of God also did remarkably well in the Orion Awards, with two Awards and five Shortlistings between them. Her popular phenomenon on the ‘nets was matched with success at the Orion Awards as well.

Other fics to be noted are two novels, Elbereth in April’s The Family Name and Blue Yeti’s Birds of a Feather, with several nominations and shortlistings apiece, and Enigma’s Artemis Awakening oneshot, with two Awards and a shortlisting to boot.

In addition to this, there are lessons to be learned. These winners represent the best of Artemis Fowl fanfiction; but those critical things that make these fics so flawless are not merely criteria for fanfiction, but for all writing. Studying the winners and the devices they use is a perfect opportunity to improve, to grow and develop one’s writing until it is something that might win an Orion Award today; or a Pulitzer Prize tomorrow.