221b_recs | Series Rec: The Good Morrow

Special note: The first part of this series was already recced on this community back in February. However, the original reccer has since deleted their account and removed the rec. You can still find a record of it on delicious here: http://www.delicious.com/sh_221b_recs/author%3Agreywash

Title: The Good Morrow Series
Author:

greywash
Pairing: John/Sherlock, John/Fem!Moran
Length: 178,355 words with two parts complete
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: None
Verse: BBC Sherlock
Author's summary:
Summary of the sensation of falling as you just hit sleep: Love is a much more vicious motivator.
Summary of in deed accomplish our designs: When I don't touch you it's a mistake in any life, in each place and forever. Set after and in the same universe as "the sensation of falling as you just hit sleep"; ~~orders of magnitude more plotless and filthy~~ okay that's less true than it used to be. (Now complete!)

Reccer's comments: It's another epic. It's going to get another one of my longer reviews. TL;DR version: 178,000 words of Sherlock and John delivering all the feels. All of them.

The first part of this series picks up immediately after Sherlock's fall, before John visits the graveyard, and carries through the hiatus and return. The second part continues from there, with Sherlock and John working together to bring down Moran's network from within. The first part is told from John's point of view, for the most part, although toward the end it switches between the two of them. The second part is told exclusively from Sherlock's point of view. I really liked seeing both of their points of view (although not on the same scenes), as often when a fic is told only from one point of view, I wonder how the other one sees things, and exactly how reliable the narrator is. This way, each of their peculiar brand of madness is revealed, but in a way that doesn't feel redundant.

(As a side note, the first part benefits from the addition of inserted images simulating text messages, emails, and web sites. However, they are not visible from all platforms; they do not show up in Safari on my iPod, for example. So for maximum enjoyment, I recommend finding a solution that will allow you to view all of the embedded images.)

Although there are cases and investigations going on, the focus of this series is the relationship between Sherlock and John. Their codependency is at times disturbing, which both of them realise and yet seem both powerless and unwilling to overcome. The sexual energy between them is off the scale, and the smut is messy and hot and awkward and filthy and emotional and did I mention so incredibly hot? The author's personal archive tags, 'John is a horndog', 'Sherlock's filthy mind', and 'Sherlock is a hot mess' really just about say it all. It's not PWP, but the sex is definitely a big part of the story, both in terms of the plot and in terms of the character development, and it easily earns its Explicit rating, although not always in an 'in your face way'. Here is an excerpt:

"Can you tell me?" John whispers, his lips moving over Sherlock's skin, and Sherlock shakes his head, rubbing their noses together and breathes, "No, it's," and John drops the last bit of his weight against Sherlock's body and moves against him and kisses him until John feels the heat of Sherlock's blood boiling up through the pores of his own fucking skin, until Sherlock gasps out, "Like—like my cells aren't big enough," and John moans and Sherlock puts his hands on John's arse and John presses down orders of magnitude harder than gravity as they shake and shake and shake.

One of the great skills of this author is in giving us only part of the picture, and only later – sometimes many chapters later – revealing what the heck that was all about. Some things that are hinted at are still not revealed in their entirety (there are further parts to the series planned). This technique gives the story a three-dimensional feel, with layers and motives that are hidden or masked. It also means that sometimes the reader has drawn a false conclusion (which some of the characters may have as well), and sometimes the reader may skim over certain details, not realising their importance. What this boiled down to for me was that I felt more drawn into the action of the story, as I was played in the same way that some of the characters were, and it made me pay much closer attention, so that I was analysing everything that happened, perhaps in the same way that Sherlock or John was. It caused me to become more personally involved and emotionally invested in the story.

Another thing I really enjoyed about the series was the casting of Moran as a female. Her back story is altered a bit from canon in addition to the genderswitch, but she delivers her part admirably and is a worthy opponent.

This is an emotional powerhouse of a series, with angst like whoa, but it's addictive – so addictive! - and with these two main parts complete it easily takes a prominent place among the visions of what will happen in series 3.