It was fun to see certain characters meet for the first time, and to see some inbetween moments that we didn't get to see in the series.

 This kind of collaboration isn’t something that happens these days, and I’m not sure how often that sort of thing happened back in the 2000s, either, it feels like a very unique thing but honestly, it’s such a great way to showcase fandom. I feel like it’d be a bit of a nightmare in today’s climate to make such a collaboration feel fair, though, and I’m not sure under which conditions this one got made, either - though from what I gather in the description it feels like it wasn’t a source of profit for the fanartists, rather just something the author’d included with their permission & credit? They used the word “donated” to describe how they acquired the fanart, so. I guess this would’ve worked in those days, but in 2024 I doubt that would fly. Which is why this book is so unique, and such a product of its time it feels like an antique but in a good way? I don’t even know how to describe it. Nonetheless, I adore the fact that this exists and it brings me immense joy to see a collaboration like that, and I’m very grateful to all the artists who freely gave their works for this project. 

Most of the short stories in this collection have smut in them.  It’s obvious from the text that it’s not something the author’s practiced at, and I appreciate her effort, even though the clunky smut scenes with some outdated vocabulary took me out of the story like nothing else. This collaboration is obviously a project for fans, so I can’t judge the writing, but reading this in 2024 does take me back to those times when smut was called lemon, and explicit stuff read as basically taking a barbie and a ken and frantically smashing them together over and over in a horrid imitation of the real thing. I’m sorry for the analogy, but it’s simply me talking from the dubious privilege of having read a lot of literature with some degree of spice to it. 

Overall, I think I'm happy I own the book, but not because of the short stories. I lowkey think it should belong in a museum, or be studied at a uni somewhere because it's such an excellent showcase of what fandom was in the 2000s. From the pencil fanart down to kinda gross smut scenes, this was it.

To quote Patricia Briggs’ blurb on the front cover, “this rocks” 😂😂😂

BUT ACTUALLY IT DOES - SEREGIL AND ALEC HAVE MY HEART FOREVER AND I MISS THIS SERIES EVERY DAY

only read the chapters I was interested in