Fic Rec: Blink Blue

[chapbook.livejournal.com]

Title: Blink Blue
Author: aderyn
Pairing: Irene/Molly
Length: 221
Rating: Teen
Warnings: none
Verse: Sherlock BBC

Author's summary:
She sits up on the slab, the woman Sherlock knew from not her face.
Blinks blue at Molly, winks.

Reccer's comments: 221Bs as stunning prose poetry: sharp attention to rhythm, syntax, and imagery that gives more than it takes.

Such is the talent in this fandom that more than just a wide range of genres and tropes are covered. Many writing styles also find welcome home here, from powerfully concrete prose to ambiguous works of poetry that resist easy readings. What I admire most about this piece is that it is erotic as hell as well as painful and that both qualities are established with sparse, vivid prose.

As in some of Aderyn's other post-Reichenbach works the dead and the living haunt the bereaved; the healing process requires ghosts on its fog-patched paths. Three shades appear before Molly in this ficlet, but it is Irene who both recognizes and adds to Molly's strength. And yet: although Molly is united with Irene in the dream world, awake she seems as alone and as sorrowful as dream!Sherlock is.

Fic Rec - Five Times Sherlock and Lestrade Never Met

[archea2.livejournal.com]

Title: Five Times Sherlock and Lestrade Never Met...
Author: grassle
Pairing: Sherlock/Lestrade
Length: about 25 K words (six chapters)
Rating: PG-13 except for chapter 4 (strong R)
Warnings: mention of drug use
Verse: Sherlock BBC
Author's summary: “The symbol perfects itself by the accumulation of approximations. As such, it is comparable to a spiral, or rather, a solenoid, which each repetition brings closer to its target.” Gilbert Durand, L'Imagination symbolique.
Reccer's comments: Don't let either the title (if you're a sentimentalist, like me) or quote (if you're wary of French structuralists) put you off. This is one of the most subtle, poignant yet hopeful S/L sagas recently posted. If you're interested in the two characters but have never held much faith in a romantic relationship for them and want to give belief a go, go for this.

One somewhat consensual headcanon in the Sherlock fandom, struck early on, was that Sherlock must have met DI Lestrade when he barged into a crime scene high as a grasshopper on grass and began to rattle off briliant deductions. Well...you won't find it here. What you'll find instead is a series of might-have-been episodes in which their paths cross again and again, ever since teen!Greg found a solitary child looking for fossils in his native Somerset, only for life to spin them apart.

Yet each transient meeting leaves its trace, each contributes to shape their respective identities. In the meantime, there's laughter, tears, suspense, casefic, Sherlock-made craziness and a crowning chapter that brings together all the loose ties and takes the spiral of eternal return to a wonderful, glowing conclusion. As in her other works, Grassle's mature writing, her grasp of pacing, humour, imagery and detail make this series a joy to read, as I've found time and again since it was first posted.

( Excerpt )