Above All Else

This article is about the The Ghost and Mrs. Muir & Phantom of the Opera zine by Linda Mooney. For the OFMD zine focused on Izzy Hands, see Above All Else: Izzy Hands Zine.

Zine
Title:	Above All Else
Publisher:	MacWombat Press and Lucy Green
Editor(s):
Date(s):	January 1997
Series?:
Medium:	print
Size:
Genre:
Fandom:	The Ghost and Mrs. Muir & Phantom of the Opera
Language:	English
External Links:	flyer
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Above All Else is a 62-page het zine with two stories by Linda Mooney. It has a sequel called Testament.

Contents

• While The Music Lasts (Phantom of the Opera) (After Christine goes back to Erik, they discover the love they knew they were destined to have.") (20 pages)
• Cry Of The Wind and Wave (The Ghost and Mrs. Muir) ("When Carolyn lies dying from a venomous spider's bite, Captain Daniel Gregg is finally able to go to her. Yet she soon finds she must make the terrible decision between leaving him... or her two young children.") (37 pages)

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  front cover

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  another version of the cover

Summary

This digest-sized zine contains two stories of impossible loves, written by Linda Mooney -- from The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, when Carolyn lies dying from a venomous spider's bite, Captain Daniel Gregg is finally able to come to her. Yet she finds she must make the terrible decision between leaving him. . .or her two young children. And from Phantom of the Opera, after Christine goes back to Erik, they discover the type of love they knew they were destined to have.

Reactions and Reviews

With the consummate skill of a born storyteller, Linda Mooney weaves an intricate tapestry combining elements from both Shakespearean romance and Greek tragedy into a tale of Karma, Destiny, and Immortal Love. In this reviewer's opinion, if The Ghost and Mrs. Muir was an ongoing, syndicated series today, Linda Mooney would be one of the primary staff writers, and her "Cry of the Wind and Wave" would be categoriezed as a series "canon" episode and perhaps even chosen as a season finale. In a freak accident involving a Black Widow Spider bite, Carolyn Muir's life hangs in the balance, while her soul becomes trapped in the same interdimensional vortex as the spirit of Captain Gregg (frankly, this reviewer could think of worse places to be) where they are at last able to touch--perhaps for the first--and the last--time. Occasionally, the media has a tendency to over-use the simple sense of touch--reducing it to nothing more than sex, when the truth (is out there) is by far more complex. Yet who among us can forget Navarre's despairing cry in Ladyhawke as he and Isabeau almost, but not quite, touch fingertips as dawn breaks over the horizon? Or in Edward Scissorhands, Winona Ryder's heartfelt plea of "Hold me . . ." and Johnny Depp's stark reply of "I . . . can't . . ."?... Of the two central characters is virtually flawless (not to mention her True Ear for dialogue): her literary voice is both luch and vivid and her handling of carnal nuances and physical description run to the "tastefully hot", rather than subjecting the Reader to the alternative of cringing at the clinical, listening a lecture by Dr. Ruth, or feeling as if they were shopping for sushi or syrup or Jacqueline Susann. Admirably, Linda also manages to avoide that Pitfall of so many writers: the God-Box. Don't expect to find any heroic animals, all-knowing Celestial messengers, the-Captain-as-Mary-Sue, or even a Handbook for the Recently Deceased in this story. Do, however, expect to find Romance. And to say any more would be to give it all away. "Cry of the Wind and Wave" is the second of two stories by Linda Mooney--the first being "While the Music Lasts", a hauntingly poignant Phantom of the Opera story, in the MacWombat Press fanzine titled Above All Else. A read like this for the equivalent of dinner-for-two at Sonic Drive-In (if you split a Sonic-size order of fries) is a deal that can't be beat, as far as this reviewer is concerned.