Sherlock recs: Round 3, part 2

[aelfgyfu_mead]

Here's the big one.

As I said in my previous post (word for word, in fact):
I haven't worried much about ratings because most of what I enjoy is rated G through PG-13 or 15 with a lot of variation in what is considered what; I try to give appropriate warnings. Please let me know if I've left anything out.

Please also let me know if you find these recs helpful. I'm not always sure I'm not speaking primarily to myself, and if these end up being just for my own use, then I'll cut back on why I recommended items and leave out the excerpts.


HUMOR
Gen
OMG READ THIS NOW: "Barrie's self-insert fanfic is better than yours", introduced by fialleril but, yes, written by J.M. Barrie. I do mean NOW. This entry will still be here when you get back.
Excerpt:
I happened to look out of the window, and, perceiving two gentlemen advancing rapidly along Baker Street, asked him who they were. He immediately lit his pipe, and, twisting himself on a chair into a figure 8, replied:
'They are two collaborators in comic opera, and their play has not been a triumph.'
I sprang from my chair to the ceiling in amazement, and he then explained:
'My dear Watson, they are obviously men who follow some low calling. That much even you should be able to read in their faces. Those little pieces of blue paper which they fling angrily from them are Durrant's Press Notices. Of these they have obviously hundreds about their person (see how their pockets bulge). They would not dance on them if they were pleasant reading.'
I again sprang to the ceiling (which is much dented) and shouted: 'Amazing! But they may be mere authors.'
'No,' said Holmes, 'for mere authors only get one press notice a week. Only criminals, dramatists, and actors get them by the hundred.'

Untitled by paddlicons. It's on the kink meme; I've left off the prompt because trust me, it's better this way (even if you can probably see where this one is going). Lestrade has an uncomfortable wait for Sherlock and John; Mrs. Hudson doesn't seem to mind.
Excerpt:
The continued banging noise brought his attention back to the closed bedroom door just as he heard someone grunt. A quick glance over at Mrs. Hudson revealed that she apparently thought nothing of it. One of her feet swung gently through the air. Lestrade was sure she had enough imagination to figure out what was going on in there. Did her lack of concern mean this was a common occurence? Did they routinely make a racket of it in the middle of the day while their landlady was about?
"That's the wrong angle," John said loudly. God, didn't those two have indoor voices?


Sherlock says on the show that he always gets something wrong. This untitled fill by anonymous imagines Sherlock's first couple of meetings with John going a bit differently. (Hit "Parent" to see the prompt. Go here to see an image that's a spoiler for the story, so you might want to save it until after you've read the little fic [which might take less time than reading my rec here].) Again, I've left off the prompt in the name of humor, but hit "Parent" to see it if you like.
The cab ride, normally a rather dull necessity, allows Sherlock to examine the mystery of John in closer quarters. He lets John ask his questions, and is surprised by his lack of anger and delighted by his praise. The response, while atypical, somehow fits with the information he has been gathering regarding his new flatmate. But something is still not right.

"Boredom, Visitors, and Brothers" by Kathy Roland deserves a read. I can't give you an excerpt that does the characterization and the ending justice; these are the boys I fell in love with on tv. Her description: "Sherlock doesn't care about social niceties. Or anything at all when he's bored."

The Uncyclopedia entry on Sherlock Holmes isn't BBC-Sherlock specific at all, but it's a hoot and a half.
Excerpt:
No, Watson, this is an Uncyclopædia.
But how would you know this, Holmes?
Note, first, the logo on the top-left. This is not a sphere; it is a potato. This, as I know from my experience, is the logo of the Uncyclopædia. Also examine the serif-less typeface, and we all know any respectable encyclopædias are always set in a serif font.


CRACK
Gen
"The Adoption of John Watson Holmes" by cyerus: Mummy wants to ensure that the man who has been so good to her son can never leave her. Mycroft thinks this is a fine idea; Sherlock does not. John . . . well, you need to see what John does. The humor is quite broad and the characterization . . . I said it was crack, didn't I?
Excerpt:
"Then what's the problem?"
"-made out to 'John Watson Holmes.'"
The microscope made an unhappy sound as a knob was yanked way past its maximum. Sherlock slowly lifted his head. "...what?"
"And someone deposited 5000 pounds in my bank account," John said, with far more calm than he was feeling.
"What?"
"It was labeled 'allowance.'"


?
I'm not sure how to classify the cover, description, and interview for The Science of Seduction by sexybee. Mycroft and Anthea use John's blog and Sherlock's cases as fodder for a mystery--a gay romance mystery. Click on the cover for a larger image and the back-cover copy. Neither the cover nor the interview is at all graphic, and yet I fear they are not for the faint of heart. I kept picturing John having an aneurysm when he realizes what they've done, and Sherlock would finally actually kill his brother. Too short to excerpt. Go look. You know you're dying to do so.

Slash
"Big Brother Is Watching You" by flawedamythyst: Mycroft decides that the safest place for John and Sherlock after "The Great Game" is the Big Brother house. The slash is mild (with one possible exception), and it's crack anyway, though surprisingly close to believable for these characters.
Excerpt:
Day Nineteen
Sherlock has not moved from the sofa for three days. During that time, John has brought him twenty-three cups of tea, two of which have been drunk, and nine pieces of toast, none of which have been touched.
The second round of voting. Sherlock and Dannielle are nominated for eviction. The housemates take it in turns to go to the Diary Room in order to beg the public to vote Sherlock out. Lisa cries for the entirety of her turn.
No one votes for John at all, because no one wants to risk being left to cope with Sherlock without him.



ART
Crack
Slash
berlynn_wohl did a mashup: xkcd cartoons with Sherlock. The same warnings apply as to xkcd: language and sexual content are such that you may not want to view at work or in the presence of children, and do not attempt to eat or drink while viewing. The way the comics are matched with stills from the series is really impressive (in an "oh, that's so wrong!" kind of way).


DRABBLES AND FICLETS
Gen

"Fatherhood" by joonscribble: Lestrade isn't exactly a father, but. . . . These scenes focus on Lestrade (and do so very well), but most of the other characters appear at least briefly. (Except John. A more recent story by the same author is making up for that lack, but it's not complete, so I can't rec it yet.) The characterization and dialogue are spot-on.
Excerpt:
While normally paperwork filled Lestrade with a sense there couldn’t possibly be a God, right now the mountain of forms gave him the perfect excuse of why he had to ignore Sherlock’s call about a murder in a high rise flat somewhere. Gleefully, Lestrade was going to have to turn it over to someone else.
DI Dimmock wasn’t exactly Lestrade’s first choice. But unfortunately upon hearing who was already at the scene, all the other DIs had fled like rabbits. Still, Dimmock was keen and rather mature, despite having the face of a 12 year old.


"Partners in Crime" by lbmisscharlie: John and Sherlock know each other's tastes and don't have a problem sharing food. Lestrade is a bit taken aback. Fluffy and fun, and a bit short to take an excerpt without giving a good chunk of the piece.

"Not Dying Today" by morganstuart: for the prompt "The first (and only) time John saw Sherlock and Anderson work well as a team without complaint, they were performing CPR on Lestrade." Tense and effective, with a strong supporting appearance by Sally Donovan.
Excerpt:
The procedure didn’t exactly reflect the latest standard practice of the medical community, but John had to admit that the two men were doing an admirable job — especially considering that one man worked solely with corpses these days, and the other seemed far more likely to delete first aid training than retain it.




DRAMA
Gen
"Drive Until the Rain Stops" by blackpeartree imagines a slightly more damaged John than I do, but very convincingly.
Excerpt:
John thrusts the open laptop at Sherlock and goes to put the kettle on. Sherlock had known from the lack of typing that John had been at his blog, but he sees now that he’d stopped on an old entry, one from before they met.
Nothing happens to me.
Indeed.
Sherlock is used to solving other peoples’ problems, but boredom-induced pathologies remain beyond his purview.

"The Shadow Boys Are Breaking" by Morgan Stuart: in this scene set in the aftermath of "The Great Game," Lestrade goes to 221B Baker Street; Mrs. Hudson sees him. This story doesn't resolve anything; I recommend it for its attention to what the secondary characters experience and excellent characterization of the loyal Lestrade, and Mrs. Hudson, who is neither naïve nor dotty.
WARNING: Excerpt may spoil for TGG:
Both his damp coat and rumpled jacket hung open, displaying a once-white shirt now painted red-brown with gore. Looking down at himself, Lestrade felt his mouth go dry.
"It's not mine," he rasped.
Mrs Hudson retreated haltingly until her back came to rest against the entry door. For a moment her gaze darted back and forth between the detective inspector and the quiet flat upstairs.
She pressed a palm to her mouth. "My boys," she whispered past her fingers.
"They're alive," he hastened to reassure her. "Still alive."
Her sleep-muddled gaze grew overly bright as she nodded toward his torso. "Which one?"

"Adequacy" by AJ Hall: Sherlock hears John in a nightmare; that has happened before, but things play out differently this time. Sherlock is still trying to figure out this caring business, and John has to figure out Sherlock a little; top-notch characterization and a touch of humor make this scene very effective.
Excerpt:
The quality of light on the stairwell changes; John has switched his bedside light on. A break in the pattern. Hitherto, John has sat out the aftermath of his nightmares in the dark. In Sherlock's world, breaks in patterns spell danger.
He is out of his room, poised at the foot of the second flight of stairs, before he knows it.
Five halting steps cross the floor above. Five steps represents the distance between John's bed and the dressing table. Sherlock's taking the stairs two, three at a time before he even hears the familiar creak of swollen wood as the dressing-table's top drawer is pulled open.


MYSTERY
Gen
"Rigging screws, size 1 3/8 inch, galvanised" by AJ Hall is a 15000-word case told mostly from the point of view of the woman who becomes Sherlock's client. I enjoyed reading a complete, well-written case, with Sherlock making his deductions. Hall creates a realistic, engaging character in Majorie Jameson, the client who not only hires Sherlock but also works with him.
Excerpt:
"Someone spent twenty minutes - twenty minutes, John - the average time on a site page is a second and three quarters and the average hit length for the whole site is 4.357 seconds – browsing scienceofdeduction.com. And this is the search term she used to get there: 'How's a woman supposed to prove her husband's a murderer, dammit?' God, that's beautiful."
"It is? As opposed to, say, bonkers? Rhetorical? Demented?"
"Oh, for the umpteenth time, how can you stand to live in a mind that small? Can't you see what's happening here? She's not asking me to investigate, she's asking me to validate her conclusions. 'How can I prove my husband's a murderer?'"


Slash
"Parallel" by brbsoulnomming (also available on her LJ here). This story fills the prompt, "There's a case at a secondary school/University, some series of threats or string of bizarre murders that has the entire campus shaken. In the course of the investigation, Sherlock and John meet two students. One is well liked if not popular, athletic, intelligent without showing off, involved only because they were close to a victim or witnessed something important. The other is a loner with no regard for social norms, an insufferable genius, always in the chem lab, and involved because everyone, including teachers/professors, think they're behind everything.
Sherlock and John are responsible for these two meeting. And, because they both want to help with the investigation, they get to watch them become friends and fall a little in love. And that makes them feel things about themselves that they've been working very hard to not feel, thank you."
This story is rated Mature for "off-screen death; mild, consenting somnophilia."
Length: over 77,00 words
My long-time LJ friends may be surprised to see me rec a slash story rated Mature; the rating really applies just to one scene. I'll confess that that scene made me uncomfortable, but it makes sense in the context of the story and the way the author develops the characters.
Sam and Fiona, two original characters developed at length and in depth by brbsoulnomming, really won my heart. They occasionally verge on being too precious, but they never quite crossed the line for me. I've excerpted a little bit of their dialogue. Two factors really make this story. First, though Sam and Fiona offer obvious parallels to John and Sherlock, they have clear differences too; I like them each in their own right, not simply as reflections of characters I already loved. Second, the author gives us a real mystery—one that kept me guessing.
Excerpt:
“Just – didn’t figure you for the pub type, I suppose,” Sam replies.
Fiona scowls. “I don’t have to be a boisterous, drunken idiot to enjoy-”
Sam grins at her, and she cuts off.
“You’re right,” Sam says. “This is fun. And you make entertaining irritated noises, too.”
Fiona scowls, and stalks off into the pub, muttering about immaturity.