Mar. 12th, 2017

sanguinity: woodcut by M.C. Escher, "Snakes" (Escher Snakes)
[personal profile] sanguinity
Title: The Domesticated Detective series
Author: sans_patronymic / [livejournal.com profile] sanspatronymic
Pairing: Holmes/Watson
Length: currently 15K words in three stories
Rating: Teen
Warnings: none
Verse: ACD canon
Author's summary: Holmes's inability to attend to basic domestic chores causes friction between him and Watson. Featuring musings, squabbling, and eventual makeup sex.

Reccer's comments: Holmes and Watson have retired to Sussex together, and while living out his life with John Watson should be the stuff of Holmes' dreams -- nay, is the stuff of his dreams -- there yet remain all the pesky domestic details that must be solved again, and again, and once again after that. Such as the dishes. The everlasting dishes, which were washed yesterday, and must be washed again today, and will certainly need washing again tomorrow. For, as Holmes tells us in the opening of the second story, "The Sisyphean Art":

These recent years have brought to light many interesting truths regarding the complexities of human relations, and foremost is this: It is one thing to live with a man and quite another to set up a household with him.


This series is exquisite in its detailing of the frustrations and grace of a marriage: not only how a petty fight about making the bed can spiral beyond all reason or a sink of dirty dishes can drive one to despair, but also how well-earned exasperation from one's partner in one moment can transform to forgiveness and compassion in the next. The author has tagged these "domestic fluff," which is accurate enough, but also fails to capture the rindokulousness of being human, and the wrench of being loved far better than you (or really anyone) could possibly deserve.

And the writing is gorgeous, too.
sanguinity: woodcut by M.C. Escher, "Snakes" (Escher Snakes)
[personal profile] sanguinity
Title: like a spider in the centre of its web (also on tumblr)
Author: sophistry (AO3) / still-sophistory (tumblr)
Pairing: Gen
Rating: G
Warnings: none
Verse: 221B Baker Towers
Author's summary: When the greatest enemy is not a man, but the machine.

Reccer's comments: 221B Baker Towers is an open universe in which Holmes and Watson are contemporary young black British men from a council estate. Sophistry, the originator of the universe, gives a nutshell description in another artwork for the 'verse, "You See, But Do Not Observe":

[...] Imagine fandom’s reaction if the next big Holmes adaptation to come along had Holmes and Watson as British, yeah - young black British men, living case to case on a council estate in a dodgy area of London. How fandom would react if Sherlock Holmes didn’t employ street kids and homeless people like trained animals to do his bidding, but instead was part of that invisible underclass; if instead of having his eccentricities ~tolerated~ by Scotland Yard on account of being the Great White Genius, Sherlock Holmes, BME, school dropout, and sometime addict, was regarded by the police as practically a criminal already, one more thug, one more junkie, one more dealer in the making...


"like a spider in the centre of its web" extends sophistry's original idea to "The Final Problem." It depicts a tiny, lone figure in a hoodie on Westminster Bridge, his shoulders hunched against the looming presence of the Houses of Parliament. It is captioned with the FINA speech about the "mighty organisation" that Holmes is pitting himself against, the organisation that will trod him underfoot.

The graphics-work is subtle and effective. I particularly like the blown-out whites, blacks, and red: we're presented with a moment where everything has been pushed to its limit and something must give. I also like the queasy, slippery, double-vision aura applied to both Westminster Palace and the storm clouds above it -- an aura which serves the additional purpose of quietly picking up Holmes' red, visually integrating his figure into the work even as that red sets him apart.

But as much as I like the graphic itself, considering it as a premise for a story... It raises the hair on my arms. Oh, but I would love to hear the story that sophistry suggests. I want to hear it very much.

 

More info about (and fanworks for) the 221B Baker Towers 'verse can be had at the fandom tumblr: 221b-baker-towers.tumblr.com.

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