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CHAPTER 2 BONUS REC: Are you in the mood for a delicious entrée of super lava-hot post case sex with a slow burn appetizer? Then do I have a fic for you!
Author bittergreen’s wonderful The City of Dreams finds our boys in an assumedly established relationship traveling to Vienna for a case, attending the opera and attending to each other when the suspect is finally apprehended.
Hot, sweet, well written, and fabulous, this is 13K words of Johnlock not to be missed.
CHAPTER 3 BONUS REC: As a sucker for all things Potter!lock from way back, if someone happened to write a gorgeous little imagining of our boys in Auror training as contemporaries of Harry Potter’s Eldest son James, there was absolutely no chance I wouldn’t read it. And if it happened to be so well written that I wish it was about 20 times longer than its just under 10K words of perfection, so much the better.
When the wizarding world and 221B collide, you get thisisfouryou’s lovely Expecto Patronum, and it is magical indeed!
CHAPTER 4 BONUS REC: So it’s hardly a secret I have a thing for Soulmate AU’s, and I ran across a precious little 1200 word beauty that I’m including here because it was an inventive twist on the “soulmate’s name mark” meme—and I offer my kingdom to the author (or any other brave soul) for a longer imagining of the premise.
Read JohnLockDivision’s The Beauty Of It and see if you don’t agree.
Fair warning: my kingdom includes two late model sedans, a modest Midwestern home, two grumpy old cats, one lanky high strung giant dog, and a human or two that are negotiable in the package.
CHAPTER 5 BONUS REC: Series 3 changed everything in terms of cannon compliant Johnlock.
Author naughtyspirit’s Cracks In the Pavement imagines how it could still happen—and it does so without complicated conspiracy theories or outlandish action movie confrontations.
It’s 35K words that are true to character and really quite lovely. Truly enjoyed, hope you will too!
CHAPTER 6 BONUS REC: I love it when a fic surprises me—when the title or premise intrigues me enough to give it a cautious look, and I end up adoring it. Accomplished author suitesamba’s The Sexual Awakening of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John Watson fits that bill.
When Mycroft calls in a favor and offers Sherlock’s consulting detective services in an auction, the boys pack up and head out to a Murder Mystery Weekend. In a lovely bit of meta, their roles mirror reality and hijinks (and feelings!) ensue. 25K ish of fun, fluff, and feels!
CHAPTER 7 BONUS REC: This particular rec already has had a ton of traffic, but I ended up loving it so much I could barely stand to see it end.
Even if magical realism isn’t your bag, Teumessian’s How To Build a Heart out of Ashes is a gloriously conceived epic that imagines a world where a certain portion of the population are Changelings, humans who have the innate ability to turn into a specific animal form. When John Watson realizes he’s one of them, he’s sent to the Baker Institute, a school that specializes in the unique needs of Changelings. It’s there that he meets another Student named Sherlock Holmes…
It’s beautifully conceived, cleverly plotted, gorgeously written and all around delicious. It’s a world I lost myself in, and would do so willingly again.
CHAPTER 8: Now that you’re all caught up, if you’re wondering what to do with the rest of your week, might I offer a totally unsolicited recommendation?
I admit that my obsession with Johnlock fic borders on the pathological (there’s a spreadsheet involved, for heaven’s sake) but every so often I find a fic so glorious that I can’t help but shout about it from the mountaintops, and OTP221B’s wonderful MURDER IN THE FAMILY is just such a fic.
A post series 3 fix-it project that’s deftly written and perfectly paced, the story is original, clever, heartbreaking, joyous, and smokin’ lava-hot all at the same time. Why it doesn’t have like 3 gajillion bookmarks and a quadrillion hits is beyond me. So if you’re looking for something to read, go forth and devour it. You won’t be sorry.
CHAPTER 9: And in this week’s installment of Fic Recs Nobody Asked Me For, may I humbly suggest that if you’re looking for 3500 words of classic Johnlock perfection, look no further than His Favourite Four-Letter F-Words by the incomparable cathedral_carver.
A lifetime together spelled out in sparse, poetic vignettes each inspired by a different four letter word beginning with the letter “F”, this fic was one of my Johnlock first loves—and one I’ve returned to multiple times.
Clever, touching, artfully structured and damn near perfect--give it a few minutes of your life. You’ll be glad you did.
CHAPTER 10: In this week’s issue of “Read This Or Don’t: But Really Do, Because It’s Awesome”, I present for your reading pleasure the 1,800 words of gorgeousness that is The Water Where I’m Wading by the terribly talented DoubleNegative.
Poetic and sexy and downright lovely, this little beauty enchanted me so much that I want to dive through the screen and live in it—you know, just kind of loiter in the corner of the bedroom watching. Like a total creep.
If you share my appreciation for Johnlock smut that manages to be as breathtakingly beautiful as it is scorching hot, give it a whirl. I did. Not a regret in sight!
CHAPTER 11: In this week’s installment of “Quit telling me what to read, Sara—YOU’RE NOT THE BOSS OF ME!” I submit for your reading pleasure the teenlock epic Cracks in the Wall by the wonderfully talented sweetcupncakes.
If there was a “creepy literary groupie” button next to the “kudos” option, I would totally click it for her. Read anything she writes, it’s all fabulous. But if you’ve somehow NOT yet read this fic, crawl out from below that rock you've been living under and get reading, already.
It’s hot, and sweet, well crafted, brilliantly written, perfectly paced, and all around amazing. Other than that...it’s just ok. ;)
And it turns out that if you’re reading MY fic, then you should read hers—because it was that little masterpiece that convinced me there were still new stories about our boys out there waiting to be told. Which kind of makes “Colors” her fault. So consider that buck passed.
“Cracks in the Wall” by sweetcupncakes. Read it. Love it. And try not to sprain your finger getting it into your bookmarks.
CHAPTER 12: For this week’s edition of “OH MY GOD IT’S SO GOOD I’M MAYBE GOING TO DIE!” I submit for your approval PoppyAlexander’s oh-so-beautiful period piece Art and Nature.
Have you ever wondered what might happen if Sherlock was the head butler at a Downton Abbey-esque manor house and John Watson came to work there as a gardener? If the answer is YES, then do I have a fic for you! And if you haven’t wondered that, read it anyway—because it’s just that good.
I stumbled on this little beauty when reading through the author’s tags made me giggle like an idiot, and I figured that anyone who added the tag “My ongoing subconscious making of John Watson into the ideal man” to her fic was someone I would want to hang out with—and reading her fic seemed like the next best thing.
Stunningly romantic, breathtakingly hot, superbly penned and all around delicious, this is 7600 words of AU gorgeousness that you won’t want to miss. And it has SEQUELS! Which I mention because I just realized that RIGHT THIS VERY MINUTE, so if anyone is looking for me tonight tell them “Too bad! She’s reading hot turn-of-the-century servant porn with feelings--so many, many feelings.”
CHAPTER 13: Welcome to the part of this little adventure where I continue to list some of my favorite Johnlock fics in the name of spreading the fangirl love.
Ever read a fic and love it so much that you wish it was alive so you could hug it, and snuggle up to it, and maybe follow it to work and just stare at it from afar until it disappears into the building and you sit in your parked car and try to imagine what it’s doing right now while you can’t see it?
No one? Really? Just me? Hm. Ok then. But for the record, that’s how I feel about this fic.
So in this chapter’s installment of “Love this as much as I do. I DEMAND IT!” may I heartily recommend (and by “heartily” I mean “with the fiery heat of a thousand burning suns”) emmagrant01’s beautiful post-fall fic Nothing To Make A Song About.
This wonderful work imagines a post Reichenbach world where John couldn’t forgive Sherlock when he returned home, and a decade long separation ensued. When John returns to London, it isn’t long before Sherlock returns to his life. They’re both a little older, a little wiser, and yet still essentially the same. After all that time apart, can the men they are now finally admit what they mean to each other? Read and find out. And then swoon. SWOON I SAY!
CHAPTER 14: In week’s installment of “I SAID I Was Sorry--Now Here’s Something To Cheer You Up” I offer you my apology via not one but TWO wonderful fics that I hope will distract you while you wait for the final chapter and epilogue.
First up is a poetic little beauty that I ran across purely by accident the other day consisting of 2,435 words and I love EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. OF. THEM. Author cwb’s Of Velvet and Silk, Cotton and Cashmere is a gorgeous little imagining of Sherlock’s lifelong obsession with all things sensory, and how loving John allows him to embrace and express it. I’m not even going to try to explain it any further because you’ve got to let your own senses devour this little piece of magic in order to understand just how delicious it is.
And then if you’re still depressed go and sink your teeth into the big old pile of cotton candy that is allfinehere’s wonderful little AU tale Learning Curve. John is a kindergarten teacher, Sherlock is a single Dad of a precocious five year old, and this is the softest, fluffiest, cuddliest little bunny of a fic ever written and I want to hug it, and kiss it, and pet it, and name it Bluebell.
CHAPTER 15: So I’ve read a lot of Johnlock fic. An embarrassing amount, one might even say. There’s a rather extensive spreadsheet detailing said obsession, and I’d apologize for being such a nerd…if I was at all sorry. But it turns out I’m not.
There are an astonishing number of wonderful works in this fandom—juggernauts of fanfic that are so well known for their fabulousness that they have earned single word nicknames: Performance. Progress. Bravo. Paradox. Ollie. Eugenia. And the list goes on. There are countless others—long, short and somewhere in-between—that I love just as much.
But if I had to pick my very favorite, I know what it would be.
So in this final installment of my ongoing series “Seriously, Sara? Do you read ANYTHING else?” my parting gift to you is my heartfelt recommendation of Todesfuge’s brilliant post-fall epic: Be Here Now.
Written in post-series 2/pre-series 3 headspace, the story picks up six months after Reichenbach and reunites our boys with the help of Mycroft Holmes and Irene Adler. Forced to deal with the fallout from Sherlock’s jump and what it all means for their future, the emergence of a new enemy sets each of them down a solitary path that they must walk alone if they ever hope to come back together.
Beautifully written, impressively cannon-compliant, superbly plotted, perfectly characterized, and ingeniously crafted—this fic is the equivalent of having an alternate series 3 beamed directly into your brain. I adored it the first time I read it. And the second time. Etc...
I hope you will too.
And now THAT is the end. And this time I mean it.
For now. :)