221B Recs

Title: Into the Dark Stream
Author: lbmisscharlie On Ao3
Pairing: John/Sherlock, OFC/OFC are the main pairings
Length: 119,503
Rating: E
Warnings: Graphic Depictions of Violence, Minor Character Deaths (including children, as happened during the war)
Verse: Sherlock BBC
Author's summary: Ireland, 1920. There's a war on, but no one seems to be playing by the rules. John Watson, injured and unemployed after his time at the Front, joins up with the special forces sent over to keep the peace, but when he meets Sherlock Holmes, the second son of the local lord, he begins to lose track of which side he is on.

Reccer's comments: True history AUs are rare indeed in any fandom, primarily because it takes so much research and practice to richly communicate a complex foreign culture and tell a good fictional story. Most history AUs require years of research to get to the point where the author can adroitly share the cultural and social realities of the peoples living in the past. Therefore, it's no surprise that most authors find it already challenge enough to skillfully create a genre AU like a Western. It's frankly a miracle that this fandom has been blessed with more than one history AU, let alone more than one that is as beautifully wrought as this one.

That lbmisscharlie loves 20th-century Irish and British history is made abundantly clear from the first chapter. John Watson, soldier of King and Country, is not patrolling Afghanistan, but another restive part of the British Empire, Ireland, just as England's grip is slipping. Although BBC!John never has reservations about his deployment to Afghanistan or what he did there, the John of this story will grow to question what he does in Ireland. Without slipping into overt preachiness, the author makes vivid the cultural clashes and how the characters choose to navigate them. Both sides commit atrocities, leaving one wondering who really is in the right.

John and the other canonical characters like Sherlock and Molly are deftly smoothed into their AU roles. For the most part, the political, social, and cultural beliefs and values they express and act on as English and Irish of the 1920s are blended skillfully with the traits of the BBC characters. Alterations to characters are made purposefully. For example, John is a not an officer or doctor in this fic, something that allows the author to play with class differences in England and in Ireland. Him not being a doctor is, more than once, subtly presented as a lack; something John could be, but never had the opportunity given his social class (several rungs below ACD's Watson for sure and maybe below BBC!John as well).

Of the many OCs, Eva stands out. Both Eva and Molly demonstrate the challenges of women living in Ireland during the troubles of the 1920s. They might support Irish independence, but the violence is personally painful, compelling them to look or hope for alternatives to the high costs of war. These women might risk themselves for Sherlock at different moments of the plot, but it is clear they have lives and concerns outside of Sherlock's Work.

Apart from the layered portrayals of major and minor characters, there is the vibrant sense of place throughout. From the bloody fields of the Continent near the end of WWI, to London and many locations in Ireland (primarily in and around Macroom), the scenery is beautifully rendered, often amplifying the mood of a particular scene. One of many examples is a cinematic rendering of the interior of the Honan Chapel on the grounds of University College in Cork, a setting that conveys the menace and mystery of what is facing John, before suddenly inspiring a brief moment of wonder and nostalgia:

Scrubbing his hands through his hair, John looks around the small chapel once more. The weak candlelight barely penetrates the dark corners, its flickering light producing strange, monstrous shadows in the lurking depths. Bracing one hand on the pew, John hauls himself to his feet and makes his way to the wall. Thrusting the taper in front of him, he traces the walls with his hand as he surveys the perimeter, noting anything that could be used as a weapon: this heavy candelabra, that bible stand, the blunt granite edge of the font. The altar is bare but for an embroidered altar cloth; underneath is empty.


From the altar, John walks down the steps back into the nave, testing the stability of the pews as he passes down the centre aisle. Dead ahead, St Patrick in his emerald robes offers a benediction, while down each side of the nave saints less familiar pass judgement. Pausing in the middle of the aisle, his eye is captured by a brilliant column of blue, its deep tones blending to amethyst in the fading light, which leads to an imperious face with a sharp, beaked nose. But for the long mass of crimson curls, the face, with the haughty set of its eyes and the thrusting, stubborn chin, could be familiar. Some forgotten ancestor of Sherlock’s, perhaps? Amused, John steps closer, craning his neck to examine the details, when his eye focuses and he frowns.


Surrounding the figure, at feet and head, are sparkling, crimson bees, their wingspan the breadth of a man’s spread palm. In one hand, the figure holds a miniature of the chapel, formed from golden beeswax, and John is startlingly thrown back to the summer. To Sherlock’s outstretched thumb, coated in honey, to his caring hands on the hives. John’s laugh, when it breaks the silence, is hoarse, peculiar and cracked. Beekeepers, watching him.

I could go on and on about the many virtues of this lovingly crafted fic, but I urge you to see for yourself!

Title: The Madness of Angels
Author: ayalesca
Pairing: Sherlock/John
Length: 87,457
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions of Violence, Canonical and Minor Character Deaths
Verse: Sherlock BBC

Author's summary: Urban fantasy AU. In which John Watson is a war sorcerer recently invalided home from Afghanistan. In London he meets Sherlock Holmes, the world’s most irritating urban sorcerer and only consulting detective. There, John finds himself and Sherlock suddenly under attack by a mysterious and malevolent power—and drawn into a mystery that may tear London apart. A fusion with the Matthew Swift series by Kate Griffin, but no prior knowledge is needed.

Reccer's comments: No S3 Spoilers

This impressive work is one of my favorite BBC series fics.

The bare facts: it is a fusion (with crossover elements consisting of cameos from two urban magic series) that requires no knowledge of the originals to steal your breath, squeeze your heart, and cause you to pound the nearest surface in amazed delight. The vivid, sharply realized settings and the stunning way in which John, Sherlock, Mycroft, and Irene just fit as their IC selves into the dangerous and fantastic landscapes of the City of London is truly remarkable. Let me not leave out the brilliant dialogue, the skillfully re-imagined S1 and S2 cases, and the plot twists so gorgeously done that my sole desire (aside from thanking the author) was to find the other enraptured commenters and hold a joyously raucous re-reading party.

I'll be honest: This fic reminds me exactly why I fell deeply, madly in love with the BBC series in 2011.

Excerpt: “What are you exactly, John?”

“Washed-up RAMC,” John says lightly.

“Oh, no, I think there’s rather more to you than that,” Sherlock breathes.

He grabs John by the elbow and yanks him to a stop; John nearly stumbles. He gets his footing back and has his mouth open to swear at Sherlock when the iron-like grip loosens, shifts, and then Sherlock takes John’s hand in his own with surprising gentleness. Their eyes meet, dark blue to an ice blue so intense that John has to remind himself to breathe. Then John feels a softly glowing warmth in his hand, and in the next instant all of London thrills through John’s body and his heart suddenly jumps, resets its rhythm, palpitates, and then pounds in the rhythm of cars stopping and starting at thousands of traffic lights. His head fills with the laughter and sorrow of eight million souls; his lungs fill with the air they inhale and exhale. John closes his eyes and allows himself to exist within every footstep on every cobblestone, every raindrop falling on every roof, every spark of electricity burning through every streetlamp in London.

Sherlock pulls away and his gaze is challenging, his lips mocking.

Silently John reaches into his pocket and takes out the shell casing belonging to the bullet that is currently lodged in a dead serial killer’s heart. Sherlock’s face opens in a grin and John is absurdly pleased by Sherlock’s smile.

He reaches out for Sherlock’s hand.

The shell casing firmly fixed in his mind, John clears the London fog from their eyes and shows them both the clear starry night skies above a starkly beautiful desert. He fills both their lungs with the rush and roar of air during a parachute jump. He makes their hearts step in time with the inexorable march of conquering soldiers down through thousands of years of history. Then he presses the shell casing between his and Sherlock’s hand. He feels the sharp, desperate struggle between life and death imbued into the metal; he can feel the tiny thing pulsating as if it were the heart that it had stopped so recently.

And he sends a thrill of power into Sherlock’s body, filling him with the hot roar and spray of blood that the bullet remembers and will always remember.

“You’re a war sorcerer,” Sherlock says the words like a spell that is new to him: feeling the words for their hidden powers, tasting and feeling them for secrets and nuances. His eyes are scanning over John, studying every molecule of him, sniffing out every tendril of magic that is awakening deep inside John’s blood. “How can you be this powerful in London?”

“Because you are a battlefield,” John whispers, and with that realization his world blurs, reels, and then snaps into razor-sharp focus again.