InsaneJournal

Fic reviews: SPN and J2
All right, I had a request to do some spn_j2_bigbang stuff. I read three and didn't get any recs and by then I really wanted something shorter, so I read a couple of old ones I had tagged on delicious for ages (I really like being able to reverse sort). And wow, the one rec I did find is one of those rare stories I'd rate higher than a 5+ if I could. So awesome.

Into His Hand by drvsilla 3/5
50,500 words. JR Ackles is a professional bullrider at the top of his game. He's got one thing on his mind: winning the championship belt buckle and the right to call himself the best in the world. His unwavering dedication and focus is finally put to the test in the form of JT Padalecki, an up-and-coming rider new to the professional ranks, who has his sights set on winning the PBR finals - and Jensen. Cowboys ride and get by on grit and tough determination - the question facing Jensen is if they have to do it alone.

This is not one I would have picked from the summary. Rodeo just holds no interest for me, so I would have seen the summary, thought "rodeo romance", and scrolled on by. But it was specifically recced to me as something I might like, so we'll see.

Okay, have read it now. I enjoyed it fairly well, but I'm not sure what all the fuss is about. Aside from the romance, I did find the look at bullriding to be pretty neat. To be honest, I had no idea such a thing even existed. I mean, I know what rodeo is, and if pressed I guess I would have said it must still go on somewhere in some form, but I had no idea it was a huge sport like this. I assume the author must have some experience or else is a really thorough researcher, as it was very detailed. I certainly didn't need a whole novel about it, though, and the lack of interest in the subject matter did make it feel a bit draggy as I was reading. I wasn't really hooked at any point.

The story had an odd sort of timeless feeling. If there hadn't been a few clues that it was present day, I'm not sure I could have guessed. It was so much about either bull riding itself or Jared and Jensen driving and fucking that there wasn't much sense of this being modern day or even of them being young guys. It was just very much cut off from anything digital, I guess is what I'm getting at. Not unbelievable, but so far from anything I know that it feels like another world, and not just because of the rodeo stuff.

I both liked and disliked the writing. I liked the language. It felt very...southern? I guess. It felt like the right language for a story about rodeo. I wasn't that pleased with the style, though. Something about it felt difficult to read and I can't quite put my finger on what. I just kept finding the sentences hard to follow.

One thing that I felt worked against the fic was that both the cowboy theme and the language used, and even Jense's struggle with repressed homosexuality, it all felt so reminiscent of Brokeback Mountain. I keep feeling like this could easily have the names changed and be a modern day, happy ending AU of it. And Brokeback Mountain (the short story) was just so perfect as it was, that this seems like a pale imitation in comparison. I think it would read better if I were unfamiliar with BBM (or perhaps if I only knew the movie version, which I didn't feel really did the story justice, either). As it is, I found it hard to set aside and not compare.

Also, this is not specifically about this fic, but it's something I realised while reading it. I've long said I prefer to write/read about queer people than about straight people who happen to fall in love with someone of the same sex (whether that leads to questioning of sexuality or just WNGWJLEO), but I would always think, well, no, there are some times when I want to write/read about people who are coming to terms with their sexuality. But for me the difference is in focus, I think. While this story wasn't WNG (I was afraid it might be at first), it still was really not dealt with at all. While that fits in with the setting and is not a fault in the story, it make it less enjoyable to me.

The Learning Curve at Wakefield High by aynslee 2/5 - Didn't finish
22,200 words. When Jared accepts the job at Wakefield High, he expects the usual problems: lazy students, meddlesome parents, and an air conditioner that barely functions in the Texas heat. But he doesn't expect his biggest problem, which comes in the form of his new boss - Principal Jensen Ackles.

I love school AUs in theory, whether they're about students or teachers, but in practice they're often not my thing, so while I was hopeful when I bookmarked this, I'm not terribly surprised that I didn't end up finishing it. It's posted in three parts and I read the entire first one, even though I was pretty sure just after the first few paragraphs that I wasn't going to like it.

It's funny, because one of the main things that irked me was something musesfool talked about just the other day. Multiple POV can be a good tool to show different scenes that couldn't be shown with just one POV, but when it's just switching to show B's reaction to A, it almost always ends up feeling really tell-y and unnecessary. Overall the writing was kind of clunky, and though there was something other than the writing itself that gave me a really "it's not for me" feeling, I can't really put my finger on what. It wasn't that it was too sappy (it might have gone that way later, but it wasn't yet), so I don't know. I'd say too cute/schmoopy, but I do like some cute stuff?

Receiver by dotfic 3/5
21,700 words. In the wake of the events of "Fresh Blood," Sam and Dean find a hunt: a family whose youngest child has a monster in his closet. The Winchesters know exactly how to deal with monsters, but this hunt is a little too familiar. Sam starts to unravel while Dean's show falters.

I enjoyed this quite a lot, but not quite enough to rec. It's well-written and feels like it could be an episode, but if it were, it'd be one of those ones where I complain that the focus is all on family/brothers and too little on monsters and horror. The monster in the closet just wasn't cool; there was no mystery to it (and the mystery is a big part of why I like horror films), though I did like that it brought reinforcements when they shot, but didn't kill it. Anyway, I think anyone who likes stories with a strong focus on Sam and Dean and doesn't care so much about the actual supernatural part would like this a lot more.

Skinning Schrodinger's Cat by lyra_wing 3/5
3500 words. Sam travels back in time to try and fix things.

On the surface this is a fairly standard time-travel fic with added porn (though well-written), but it's one of those stories that really makes you think, especially in light of the S4 finale. I think I would have liked it less had I read it when it came out, but as a post-S4 story it works even better.

Future!Sam thinks that going back in time and telling Dean to convince John to let him go to Stanford will fix things (and I really like that it's not clear this is a Sam from a different reality until then), but if going to Stanford only leads to the canon reality, we still end up with both John and Dean dead. So does that Sam go back in time, too? Is it just an endless loop? (The loop with Sam telling Dean they've had sex before possibly leading Dean to start having sex with Sam later is interesting to ponder, too, and is really the only thing that saves the Wincest from feeling extraneous to me.)

My Mother Was a Tailor by traveller 5/5 Recommended
2800 words. She checks her lips in the bronze mirror, makes sure the red is even and not bleeding out at the edges; she makes a pout and gets a blurry kiss reflected back. She dabs a little perfume on the beauty mark on her cheekbone, wets her hands with the pitcher and smoothes her hair.

How funny that not that long after I made a post about the seeming ubiquity of stories without dialogue markers, here's a fic like that. I think it works excellently for this story. Please don't let that put you off of reading! (And it's only 2800 words and has very little dialogue to begin with, so.)

Also I'm amused that my last rec (Blink) and this both use an OFC's POV. Here that works so much better than giving us Dean's POV. Dean would know what was going on, so we would know what was going on.

I think I'm going to put the rest of my ramblings here under a spoiler thinger, because you really, really should go read this, and you really, really should not be spoiled.

I wasn't sure at first if this was a flashback to a ghost's previous life or what exactly was going on. I don't know why I didn't think it was an AU, but went immediately for something supernatural, but I did. Then when it was obvious the guy was Dean, I wondered if it was some sort of weird time-warp whorehouse.

It was after realising that was Dean that I made the connection between Mr. Sharon and Charon. Wikipedia says "Charon took the newly dead across the river Acheron or Styx if they could pay for the ride. Those who could not, or those whose bodies were left unburied, had to wander the banks of the Acheron for one hundred years." So I'm thinking this whorehouse is somewhere people have to stay on the way to the afterlife. When she talks about the "new girls" with their higher heels and such, I think they're actually from some time closer to the present than she was. Wikipedia also mentions "a coin to pay Charon for passage", so that fits in with the theme of money changing hands at the whorehouse.

I love fics that make me think.