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franciskerst.livejournal.com) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
crack_van2006-03-28 04:59 pm
franciskerst.livejournal.com) wrote in crack_van2006-03-28 04:59 pm
Entry tags:
Living with the Consequences by Brenda K. (PG-13)
Fandom: THE PROFESSIONALS
Pairing: None
Author on LJ:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
brenk
Author Website: ariadne's webspace
Why this must be read:
It's a sort of challenge for a reviewer to introduce this story with enough information to give a hint of the topic, without telling too much and so, spoiling the writer's carefully prepared effects. For, given the nature of the facts involved and the developments of events, to save the suspense, it would need warnings at the very beginning of the presentation.
So, what is it about, roughly? Roughly, it's all about responsibility: making a choice and facing the consequences; and about the loneliness of the one who had to take irrevocable, "life or death" decisions and must cope as he can with the aftermath. And, of course, the doomed one, in a "Pros" story, cannot be anybody else than Cowley, the "Controller", a very modest title for a man awarded with a "life and death" power.
A power with heavy counter effects and some severe setbacks, which cannot easily be ignored or suppressed, even with the help of the best of pure single malt scotchs, as long as a man's memory is working and keeps on feeding his dreams with pictures and words:
He'd gone through one such a period where the wee nightcaps - a ritual since longer than he could remember - had become a great deal more than 'wee'. That had meant mornings where his brusque manner wasn't just part of his persona but because his head was pounding and his tongue was furred.
So, the excesses had had to stop. He couldn't afford it - not yet anyway - but he did wonder if, when retirement came, he'd spend more time staring at the bottom of a whisky bottle than at his golf clubs.
Though the responsibility of power cannot be shared, it can be supported and somehow alleviated by the trust and loyalty of the same ones who have to bear its weight. As usual Bodie will get the last word: "You win some, you lose some," he said. "And sometimes you don't have the choice in this job (...) "I'd say that puts it in a nutshell. Making choices. Living with consequences."
The author's writing has the kind of style I admire most and can the least master: taut, dense and sober; and that restraint gives her text its strength.
Living with the Consequences
Pairing: None
Author on LJ:
brenkAuthor Website: ariadne's webspace
Why this must be read:
It's a sort of challenge for a reviewer to introduce this story with enough information to give a hint of the topic, without telling too much and so, spoiling the writer's carefully prepared effects. For, given the nature of the facts involved and the developments of events, to save the suspense, it would need warnings at the very beginning of the presentation.
So, what is it about, roughly? Roughly, it's all about responsibility: making a choice and facing the consequences; and about the loneliness of the one who had to take irrevocable, "life or death" decisions and must cope as he can with the aftermath. And, of course, the doomed one, in a "Pros" story, cannot be anybody else than Cowley, the "Controller", a very modest title for a man awarded with a "life and death" power.
A power with heavy counter effects and some severe setbacks, which cannot easily be ignored or suppressed, even with the help of the best of pure single malt scotchs, as long as a man's memory is working and keeps on feeding his dreams with pictures and words:
He'd gone through one such a period where the wee nightcaps - a ritual since longer than he could remember - had become a great deal more than 'wee'. That had meant mornings where his brusque manner wasn't just part of his persona but because his head was pounding and his tongue was furred.
So, the excesses had had to stop. He couldn't afford it - not yet anyway - but he did wonder if, when retirement came, he'd spend more time staring at the bottom of a whisky bottle than at his golf clubs.
Though the responsibility of power cannot be shared, it can be supported and somehow alleviated by the trust and loyalty of the same ones who have to bear its weight. As usual Bodie will get the last word: "You win some, you lose some," he said. "And sometimes you don't have the choice in this job (...) "I'd say that puts it in a nutshell. Making choices. Living with consequences."
The author's writing has the kind of style I admire most and can the least master: taut, dense and sober; and that restraint gives her text its strength.
Living with the Consequences