Trials and tribulations of writing the au

[llassah.livejournal.com]

This is a response to the question posted by bathsweaver about AU fics,

Oh, I've got questions about setting up/casting AUs, what's kosher or not (given the assumption that everything is acceptable, but some things are more acceptable than others).

Names, for example. If you're setting up an AU in--ah, bah--the Irish Potato Famine (examples are hard!), does it really make sense to have characters with Italian and Polish surnames? And familial relationships--is splitting up/fusing characters' families (Vecchio and Smithbauer are brothers! Frobisher is RayK's dad! Turnbull and Thatcher are siblings!) simply not done?

Or a better question, is there a way to make it work, without asking too much indulgence from your readers?

Notes: I have cited a fair few Alternate Universe fics in this essay. I am aware that the list is incomplete- there are fics I have not touched on, mainly due to time and space (I need a tardis). However, I might not have come across them, and would be very grateful if you could chip in with aus you have enjoyed. It is due to a peculiar cross between research and masochism at this point that I want to read them, for reasons that will become clear below. This essay should also possibly be called a meandering…chip in, correct, interact- I am in a position as far from knowledge as the original questioner. Enormous thanks go to eledhwenlin for her amazing powers of finding a fic based on a few vague phrases, and enormouser thanks go to lamentables for an amazingly fast, amazingly insightful beta on this thing. Errors are mine, the good things are hers *g*.

The Au: Trials, Tribulations, and…other things that begin with ‘T’

( 2600 words around answering the question )