Coming over here from zhadra_ahni's rec. This fic is brilliant!
- You've gifted Raven with such depth, she's superbly fleshed out and your voice for her is great. It is fascinating to see how this works together to really give an intelligent, well rounded perspective of not just herself but of everybody. That takes some doing.
- Someone quoted above most of your (Raven's!) descriptions of both Charles and Erik. They really are wonderful. Both characters shine through your writing, which is refreshingly honest and unpretentious (possibly because that's your Raven-voice) whilst remaining beautiful, lyrical and evocative.
- Same person I believe mentioned that your Charles/Erik scene is one of the best read out of this fandom despite it's length, and I agree (and I've read a lot of C/E!)- tingle-inducing and very powerful. I love seeing it through Raven's POV too.
There's a lot more but, yeah, just know I'm impressed and delighted with this story!
Thank you! One of my favourite methods for talking about pairings that I like is to consider how they look through the eyes of someone else, and writing Raven was the perfect excuse to do that for Charles and Erik; she knows one of them so well, and is so fascinated by the other.
I legit have no way to react to this even remotely coherently so I'm just going to copy-paste half your fic back at you, k? Cool. UGH ALL THE HEARTS IN MY EYES FOREVER. (and all the tears.)
CHARLES AND RAVEN. Ugh you are so good at them, at the layers and levels and complicated bits of their relationships, and especially how Charles is sometimes terrifying even for Raven. Backstory *______* I love them learning themselves and each other. They're so beautiful, the way you write them.
For the first time in her life Raven has the normal, human experience of being able to lie to her brother. She doesn't, often. Just sometimes. Just to prove she can, she tells herself; not to see if he's still listening. OH RAVEN.
"You're powerful enough to wipe a lot of memories, Charles," she says, and already knows what he'll say next. "But I don't want to have to." He puts a hand on her shoulder. "Please, Raven. Don't put me in that position. We have good lives here, we musn't jeopardize them." EXCUSE ME: ALL THE TEARS. ;_____;
HALF-DROWNED GERMAN <3 Ngl, one of my high points. I just imagine Charles sort of bouncing through the door all RAVEN I BROUGHT US SOMETHING LOOK and Raven's like CHARLES REMEMBER WE HAD THAT TALK ABOUT HOW YOUR GIFTS ARE NEVER FUNNY oh my god it's a hot dude who smells like seaweed.
O T fucking 3, just wait until I get my hands on them five years and a whole lot of invented politics later. Oh the kissing there will be!
I love this so much! I had pretty mixed feelings about the movie, but you captured all the things I thought worked about it and wove them into a fantastic story.
This: "Charles found her early; saved her early. If Charles had found Erik as a child -- he wouldn't be Erik, would he? He wouldn't be this bullet of a man whistling lonely and deadly through the clear air of his life. He wouldn't have that strength and that charcoal humour and that inexorable determination to never, ever have to hide the fundamental truth of himself from the world."
...amazing. Particularly the description of Erik as a "bullet of a man whistling lonely and deadly through the clear air of his life," but the whole paragraph just works so well.
I love Mystique so much, and I thought she was kind of under-written in the movie. Your portrait of Raven filled her out and brought her to life in a way that feels really satisfying. Excellent work!
Yeah, the movie gave us her situation, and then failed to show us what she FELT about a life lived by and large in someone else's shadow, except for that single outburst the night before the fight. I couldn't resist digging a bit deeper. I'm so glad you liked it, thank you!
FANTASTIC. I have the urge to pick up my laptop and twirl it around the room with gleeeeee. I'm just so excited you wrote x-men fic!! And as always, it was amazing... You have such a knack for highlighting subtle parallels/differences between characters, and that made every moment of this story feel like an exciting revelation, like "AHA! That's so prefect, that's totally the way it is," and "OH MY GOSH, I NEVER THOUGHT OF THAT BUT THAT'S ALSO TOTALLY THE WAY IT IS."
Aww, THIS FANDOM, it is so great. Not that it couldn't be improved by your art :D
I think it comes from writing three-way relationships so often, this tendency I have to focus carefully on ways in which people are subtly different/similar in their interactions and motivations. Erik/Charles is an epic pairing, obviously, but I think Erik and Raven are really good for one another in ways that Charles can't be, just because of who he is. Raven needs someone to see her anew and admire her, and Erik -- well, it's harder, I'm not as good at writing Erik, but I think being in the role of catalyst and supporter for someone is a necessary balance against the comparative passivity of his early relationship with Charles, where he is the saved one and the helped one.
But then I have OT3 blinkers the size of a planet, so ymmv :D
Comments 143
- You've gifted Raven with such depth, she's superbly fleshed out and your voice for her is great. It is fascinating to see how this works together to really give an intelligent, well rounded perspective of not just herself but of everybody. That takes some doing.
- Someone quoted above most of your (Raven's!) descriptions of both Charles and Erik. They really are wonderful. Both characters shine through your writing, which is refreshingly honest and unpretentious (possibly because that's your Raven-voice) whilst remaining beautiful, lyrical and evocative.
- Same person I believe mentioned that your Charles/Erik scene is one of the best read out of this fandom despite it's length, and I agree (and I've read a lot of C/E!)- tingle-inducing and very powerful. I love seeing it through Raven's POV too.
There's a lot more but, yeah, just know I'm impressed and delighted with this story!
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UGH ALL THE HEARTS IN MY EYES FOREVER. (and all the tears.)
CHARLES AND RAVEN. Ugh you are so good at them, at the layers and levels and complicated bits of their relationships, and especially how Charles is sometimes terrifying even for Raven. Backstory *______* I love them learning themselves and each other. They're so beautiful, the way you write them.
For the first time in her life Raven has the normal, human experience of being able to lie to her brother. She doesn't, often. Just sometimes. Just to prove she can, she tells herself; not to see if he's still listening.
OH RAVEN.
"You're powerful enough to wipe a lot of memories, Charles," she says, and already knows what he'll say next.
"But I don't want to have to." He puts a hand on her shoulder. "Please, Raven. Don't put me in that position. We have good lives here, we musn't jeopardize them."
EXCUSE ME: ALL THE TEARS. ;_____;
When the odious ( ... )
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O T fucking 3, just wait until I get my hands on them five years and a whole lot of invented politics later. Oh the kissing there will be!
<3333 Thank you darling!
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This: "Charles found her early; saved her early. If Charles had found Erik as a child -- he wouldn't be Erik, would he? He wouldn't be this bullet of a man whistling lonely and deadly through the clear air of his life. He wouldn't have that strength and that charcoal humour and that inexorable determination to never, ever have to hide the fundamental truth of himself from the world."
...amazing. Particularly the description of Erik as a "bullet of a man whistling lonely and deadly through the clear air of his life," but the whole paragraph just works so well.
I love Mystique so much, and I thought she was kind of under-written in the movie. Your portrait of Raven filled her out and brought her to life in a way that feels really satisfying. Excellent work!
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and the end ;____; mmmmmm. deliciously sad.
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I think it comes from writing three-way relationships so often, this tendency I have to focus carefully on ways in which people are subtly different/similar in their interactions and motivations. Erik/Charles is an epic pairing, obviously, but I think Erik and Raven are really good for one another in ways that Charles can't be, just because of who he is. Raven needs someone to see her anew and admire her, and Erik -- well, it's harder, I'm not as good at writing Erik, but I think being in the role of catalyst and supporter for someone is a necessary balance against the comparative passivity of his early relationship with Charles, where he is the saved one and the helped one.
But then I have OT3 blinkers the size of a planet, so ymmv :D
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