In focusing on the 852 archive/collection, I definitely leaned heavily toward slash this month. So, I’m ending with a gen story that gives one more tip of the hat to Father’s Day. Cheers until the next time.

Fandom: THE SENTINEL
Characters: Jim Ellison, Blair Sandburg, Naomi Sandburg, Simon Banks, surprise characters
Length: 9K words
Author on LJ: unknown
Author Website: at Wolfpup’s Den

Why this must be read: It covers a popular fandom subject: just who the heck is Blair’s father ?

Post-series, Naomi is still feeling terrible guilt over the release of Blair’s dissertation and the subsequent fiasco. She and a friend join a group of nuns who are in a Central American country to help set up schools. But they are kidnapped by an insurgent group and thrown in with other Americans; one of them being the last person she expected to see thirty years and hundreds of miles from when they parted.

Crowswork has written dozens of stories that range from funny to heavy, and has been a consistent contributor to our fandom for close to a decade. If this is your first intro to her, I suggest you take some time to wander through her offerings. Enjoy.

The Road to Hell by Crowswork (PG)

--magician’s mantra: make an author’s day. Send feedback if you like her story!

Fandom: DUE SOUTH
Pairing: Benton Fraser/Ray Kowalski
Length: 25,854
Author on LJ: seperis
Author Website: AO3 is here
Why this must be read: This is one of the first fics that I ever read that actually have RayK needing to train before the adventure. Not only that the boys are so ridiculously precious while they fall into a relationship that it never fails to make me smile and laugh. This story tells not of two men that go from friends to lovers but of two friends who have both been hurt and are scared of being hurt again that decide to take the leap because they trust the other man that much. It also has Deif being awesome and Frobisher knowing everything before anyone else and not bothering to hide it.

Where the Story Changes

Fandom: STAR TREK REBOOT
Pairing: Jim Kirk&Winona Kirk
Length: 4177 words
Author on LJ: No lj listed on AO3 profile
Author Website: http://archiveofourown.org/users/Thistlerose/pseuds/Thistlerose
Why this must be read:


Hey guys. First, I want to apologize for being such a flake on the reccing front. Real life just slammed me until I found myself with only a few hours left to rec. But enough excuses, I will try to squeeze in at least a couple recs with the little time I have left.

Now for the rec. Normally, I pass right on by gen. It just does not do it for me. But for some reason I've lately been completely taken by interesting depictions of the relationship between Winona and Jim. Despite the title "Darkness Always Gets There First", a fitting way to complete that thought would be "But Light Eventually Follows". I've read and enjoyed both ends of the Winona spectrum in fic: the ones where she's ruthless, icy, ambivalent towards Jim at best, though not completely cold-blooded; and the ones where she's just as kick-ass and free-spirited as her son (her seemingly canon-supported neglect conveniently smoothed over, if not blithely ignored). But Thistlerose's version of this mother-son relationship is probably the most realistic as far as canon-support goes. The author restrains his/herself from demonizing or idealizing any of the characters, including Frank The Stepdad, who, although unseen in the movie, we all pretty much assume is an asshole. ( Read more )

Darkness Always Gets There First

Fandom: THE PROFESSIONALS
Pairing: B/D
Length: Novel
Author on LJ: Not known on lj
Author Website: Not known
Why this must be read: My final rec for the month is a story that is, very sadly, not online at all, but can be found via emailing Gryphon Press (scroll through this list). It's one of my very favourite Pros stories, because it's hugely long and lush throughout. The author is beautifully adept at putting both Bodie and Doyle, and the reader, through the wringer, so that it feels we're breathing right along with our lads, and feeling their every heartbeat. Her stories are realistic and gritty, and Redemption is no exception, but her lads turn out to be just as I imagine from the eps - reacting just as they probably would to the various twists and turns of that wringer... and they're eternally in love, which is what I want from any Pros fic. The link below or the email above should help you find this zine - it's absolutely worth it...

Redemption

Fandom: STAR TREK: REBOOT
Pairing: Jim Kirk/Spock
Length: 2618 words
Author on LJ: no lj listed under AO3 profile
Author Website: archiveofourown.org/users/waldorph/pseuds/waldorph
Why this must be read:

This is an interesting one. A quietly devastating and darkly romantic Spock POV, “my boy builds coffins” lives up to its chilling name. With the exception of a few Britisms, this fic is damn near flawless. It’s almost like a half-step towards Mirror ‘verse fic, existing somewhere between STR canon and that one. This is a less forgiving look at the codependence between Jim and Spock. It supports its reasoning for viewing the two men as maybe a little less heroic, maybe a little more sociopathic, with the same cold logic that the author’s Spock uses in his view of events. There’s a lot of mass killing here, but as waldorph’s Spock points out, it’s not unprovoked mass killing. It’s all done in defense of one’s self and one’s friends. The choice is repeatedly made: Them, or Us. Both Spock and Jim continually choose “Us”, meaning both the Enterprise crew, and each other. And maybe they even feel a little bad about the costs that come along with that. But not that bad. waldorph lets us see that not all of the characters embrace this menality. That maybe Spock and Jim are a very dangerous partnership.

I don’t necessarily agree with every slant of the facts and each bend of characterization (particularly regarding Uhura, considering certain reactions of hers in the Into Darkness movie, but this was written before then, so that’s forgivable) that waldorph takes here, but I can see the seeds for such an approach and appreciate it for its fiercely romantic and gleefully savage qualities all bound up in extremely elegant prose. This is kind of like Mirror ‘verse fic for people who have no stomachs for all that usually entails. It’s not about the gore, but the eerie beauty that can be found alongside the viciousness of protecting one’s own. It’s about what protecting one’s own really means.

It doesn’t come cheap.

Let me just leave you with one of my favorite non-spoilery lines:

Jim has taken hold of the universe and forced it to accept him[.]

my boy builds coffins

Fandom: STAR TREK: REBOOT
Pairing: Gaila/Jim Kirk, Gaila/OCs
Length: 1417 words
Author on LJ: no lj listed on AO3
Author Website: archiveofourown.org/users/Rubynye/pseuds/Rubynye
Why this must be read:

This one was a surprise to me, since it's not only STR het, but a Jim/Gaila fic. Two things that usually don't interest me that much. I never really understood fandom's seeming obsession with her. The only real impression she left on me in the first Star Trek reboot movie was that she was hot, nice, and liked to have sex with Jim Kirk. That was all fine and good with me, but I never felt more than dead-neutral about her. Ever since the first JJ movie came out, I've seen various fics where authors try and shoehorn her into some kind of cardboard polyamorous, feminist archetype. It always annoyed me and made me scroll right past any summary that hinted as such. I'm all for equality and female empowerment, but I don't like feeling like I'm being lectured when I read fic.

Which is why "False Friends" is so great. Even if you're not particularly into het in this fandom, you might be into a unique and sincere portrait of a friendship that defies conventional boundaries. Here, Jim and Gaila are friends who occasionally like to have sex with each other. I say "friends who occasionally like to have sex with each other" rather than the harsh "fuck buddies", for a reason. The center of this fic revolves around a very sweet and considerate friendship between two people who don't always follow the usual definitions of friendship that other people do.

In this story, Gaila confides in Jim a troubling incident in which a casual, fully consensual threesome with a friend and that friend's boyfriend results in the "homewrecker" accusation being thrown around by that friend's roommate. Gaila wants to know the exact meaning of this term and if she has hurt anyone by her actions, as is implied by the namecaller. The way Jim responds to her questions is perceptive and kind and above all, helpful.

Rubynye gives us an intriguing glimpse into an alien culture without making it come across as a cheap podium for intrusive authorial beliefs.

False Friends