changes (Sentinel zine)

Zine
Title:	changes
Publisher:	Keynote Press
Editor:	Marcelle Gibson
Author(s):	Jean Kluge
Cover Artist(s):	Jean Kluge
Illustrator(s):	Jean Kluge and Marty Siegrist
Date(s):	May 1999
Series?:	No
Medium:	print, online
Size:	202 pages
Genre:	slash, m/m, Disability Fic
Fandom:	The Sentinel
Language:	English
External Links:	at Artwork by Jean KlugeChanges — info/preview Changes — info/preview2008 url Changes — info/preview 2002 url
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

changes is a 202-page slash Sentinel novel by Jean Kluge, written as a "sequel", a fix-it or responsefic, to Myrna's story "Ever After." Both "Ever After" and "changes" fit into the category of disability fic.

zine cover - art by Jean Kluge

It is a controversial zine for both its subject matter, and for past discussion regarding fandom and profit. See Controversy: "Changes" and the Profit Discussion.

"changes" begins after "Ever After" ends, and slowly unspools the story of Blair's eventual recovery, making substantial use of the fanonical Sentinel/Guide connection.

A Change in Publishers in 2001

[Artwork by Jean Kluge]
Please note: Changes will no longer be agented by Agent With Style, effective May 24th, 2001. If you buy a copy from Agent With Style after that date, you are buying an unauthorized reproduction.

Currently, Jean is publishing Changes herself on a run-to-run trial basis. If at any time things don't work out, or it seems to be an insurmountable financial hardship, the zine will go out of print.

Available as a Download

The zine was made available as a download in 2009 for $20 and also October 2012 by Jean Kluge for a cost of $7.50. "Please note that the cost of the e-zine download helps to pay for the web hosting costs for this website which allow me to make the e-zine available."

Controversy: "Changes" and the Profit Discussion

When a 2009 email from Bast (the zine agent authorized to sell Changes) advertising its availability as a PDF file ($20.00 download or $24.00 CD mailed anywhere in the world—the higher price includes agenting fees) was forwarded to the TSstoryfinders Yahoo!Group in February 2009, a discussion both on-list and off regarding the question of selling fanfiction for profit was prompted.

See Think-y things about zines and fic and all, byslantedlight's post.

See Profiting from fanfiction, fluterbev's post.

See Profiting from fanfiction (a follow up to my recent poll), fluterbev's post.

About the Art

The zine is available directly from the author, and includes the author's own illustrations. When the paper illustrated version finally sold out, Jean Kluge created a PDF version that she offered for sale on her website ($15 download, or $18 on CD mailed).

The fully illustrated editions of Changes are currently sold out, but may be reprinted. Current editions have the text, interior graphics, and the original Changes cover. A very small number of prints remain of some of the interior illustrations, but not all, so it was no longer possible to create an illustrated edition, and a reprint of the 5 interior pieces of art, which were reproduced using negatives and metal plates with an offset lithography process, would be prohibitively expensive, but we are looking into alternatives. Please check with Jean if you are interested in obtaining a print of the Changes art by either Jean or Marty.

Sample Gallery

• 

  back cover

• 

  Jean Kluge: "Have You Hugged Your Guide Today?"

• 

  Jean Kluge: "Hidden Visitor"

• 

  Marty Siegrist

• 

  Marty Siegrist

Summary of changes

It tells the story of Jim and Blair's efforts to cope with Blair's brain damage and incapacitation with warmth and humor, of their hard work and struggles toward his recovery, and of their courageous and miraculous reclamation of their life together. (And, yes, it has a happy ending, for those who've asked. We're not too proud to mention that.) Currently available as a fanzine; there are no plans at this time to post the story online.

Author's Notes: Contains a Long Summary of "Ever After"

From the print zine:

"Ever After" opens with Jim and Blair in bed together; they are making love, and the relationship seems fairly new. Afterwards, they discuss some minor, but disturbing incidents of harassment that have been directed toward them at the Cascade PD, considering whether or not the incidents are going to escalate. (It is indicated that the two were out ted rather than having made the relationship public on their own.)

Two weeks later, they are on a stake-out together to try to bust a drug syndicate, and go into a warehouse to check it out. They become trapped inside with no backup as the police outside are murdered by the bad guys, who've been tipped off by a dirty cop who has it in for Our Guys because of their relationship. Jim calls for backup and gets the dirty cop, Henderson, on dispatch. Henderson pretends to have a bad connection, and Jim knows they're screwed.

The bad guys come into the warehouse at that point, and as Jim and Blair are moving away, onto the stairs, Blair is shot in the right leg (the same as in "Survival"), and can't go any further without slowing Jim down and getting them both killed. He convinces Jim to go off on his own, that he's going to get out the fire escape door, and that they'll have a better chance apart. As Jim heads further up the stairs, he hears the bad guys corner Sandburg, shoot him in the chest, then drop him forty feet to the warehouse floor below. Backup finally arrives, and the bad guys are apprehended.

In the hospital, the news on Blair's condition is not good. He's in a coma, on a respirator, and there is some pressure on the brain, and over the following days, has several incidents of cardiac arrest.... Jim finally gels suspicious, thinks the cop(s) who set this up are targeting Blair, as the incidents always occur when Jim is away from Blair's side. Simon reluctantly sets a 24-hour guard; he doesn't believe it's a cop.

Shortly thereafter, Joel is on duty and is slipped a Mickey Finn in his coffee, and Henderson goes into Blair's room, disconnecting the respirator and electronically altering the monitors to transmit false information to the nurse's station. Blair is rescued just in time.

Jim blows a gasket, throws out all the cops... and later that night, disappears from Cascade, somehow taking the comatose Blair with him.

Six months later, we see a bitter Jim return to the PD, uncommunicative and there simply to do time until he gets his pension. He refuses to answer all of Simon's concerned questions about Sandburg. We see him go home that night, to meet a severely-impaired Blair Sandburg, who is functioning cognitively on about a four-year-old level, has seizures, and is walking with difficulty, and only with a full leg brace.

Even so, this Blair is very attached to Jim, who takes full care of him (except when at work, when a grandmotherly, "Aunt Bea" sort of lady named Emma is Blair's caretaker). Blair, it is revealed, has been pestering Jim non-stop about going camping in the backyard of their current home, a cabin about an hour from Cascade. Jim finally agrees, and Blair is thrilled.

After Jim puts Sandburg into bed in his room that night, and is in his own bed, he's feeling very depressed, thinking of all the things Blair will never do now - no Ph.D., no more travel to distant, exotic places, how they can't make love anymore - but comes to the conclusion that this Blair has a life as well, that he loves Jim unconditionally, that he's improved so much beyond the doctors' expectations, which had been grim (death, a vegetative state at best), that Jim can only try to look at the positive aspects and not dwell on the tragedy that can't be changed. The story ends with Jim saying goodnight to the memory of a whole, well Blair in his head.

Changes is my response to the story; it opens three days after the close of "Ever After". I hope you'll be pleased with my alternate universe. Comments are welcome.

changes is a Response Fic to "Ever After"

In "Ever After" by Myrna, Blair is incapacitated in the line of duty. The story is slash, positing a relationship between Jim and Blair which necessarily shifts from romance to caretaking after Blair becomes incapable of adult decision-making. "Ever After" was originally published in Come To Your Senses #8, and then posted at the 852 Prospect archive once the zine had "timed out." "Ever After" was controversial within the fandom at the time.

Kluge set out to ameliorate the sadness she felt at the end of "Ever After."

Other Response Fics

One fan wrote a story as a reaction to the Professionals story with the same theme (Gentle on My Mind) and included Jim and Blair in similar circumstances. A Magical Christmas by istia is: "a crossover with The Sentinel and a mild parody of the Gentle On My Mind series of zine novels about a brain-damaged, childlike Doyle and his (squicky!) relationship with his guardian, Bodie... I wrote this story in a frantic, incredibly fun two-day rush as a birthday present for a friend. I was later told there's an actual story about a brain-damaged Blair, but I've never seen it; I was never in the fandom, just watched most of the episodes. I threw in Jim and Blair just to double the fun and because my friend enjoyed them at that time."

Reactions and Reviews

1999

[eliade]
Changes by Jean Kluge. One of the classics of the fandom, now finally online […]

Why you should read this: This is one of just two or three Sentinel stories I've ever read that made my chest clench up tight, made me feel true empathetic anguish, made me cry. Someone, I can't recall who, once called this a rara avis, a true 'catharsis' story, and said that at the end of the story you feel a sense of release, of joy. I pretty much agree with that.

What might throw you off stride: It may not be everyone's cup of tea--in fact, though this is mostly well-loved, I've seen a few strong critiques. You either accept the premise or you don't. It's a story crafted on carefully chosen terms, with a deliberate pace and focus. But even when I have issues with the pacing, or wordiness, or the length of attention given to a scene or subject matter, I'm also aware that these things serve the author's purpose. The thing is, respect for the characters permeates the fabric of this story, and demands that a certain respect be paid to the story itself--sure, I could pick at it using beta-vision and maybe mention some specific things that are less than perfect. I've actually done that on list, but I don't want to do it again here. Just read it, you maroon.

[Cheryl Rice]
Just wanted to mention that I finally got the chance to read the zine...Changes...by Jean Kluge.

I was a bit put off at first by the characterization of Blair but once I got into the plot , it moved along wonderfully. The illos by Jean and Marty Siegrist are real works of art.

I have zines in my collection from both of them clear back to Star Trek from the ''70's and they have only gotten better as years go by.

2000

[Sandy Hereld at Prospect-L]
Changes is good. Very good. One of the best novels in Sentinel fandom.

...and I rather wish it had never been written.

Ever After -- the story by Myrna that preceeds Changes -- is a wonderful story with a beautifully sad and wrenching ending. I *loved* it. Even when I was reading Sentinel stories like m'n'm's, I remembered it. Good stories with well-written unhappy endings are even rarer in this fandom than good novels.

I just wish that once Ever After inspired Jean to write the novel, that she'd gone ahead and written her own similar story (what would happen after Blair got hurt, intentionally, by members of the Cascade PD)-- with her own stamp, and then explored what would happen next.

For me (and for some reason, I keep wanting to repeat those two words), sequels (especially "fix-its") forever change my view of the original story. It was so beautiful in its sadness, and then, poof! all they have to do is believe, and yay, Blair is better.

[And yes, I know that writing sequels (especially "fix-its") to other fan's work is a long tradition...but personally, I'd rather people just wrote their own story.]

Sandy, who wanted to write a sequel to Justine/Sandy's Sacred Space in the worst way...

[Raonaid]

I had some serious problems with the content of the Sentinel novel 'Changes' - I don't think a novel has seriously disturbed me as much as this in ages! A story about a man having sexual relations with another man who is brain-damaged and has the mental age of a child squicked me in ways I could go on and on about. This was so disgusting to me personally that I couldn't bring myself to finish the novel, after months of trying.

[...]

I got an email from Jean Kluge about my comments about her Sentinel zine above. I opened it with trepidation, since I was expecting the mother of all flames, but she was actually very nice. She did point out that she has a lot of personal experience with brain-damaged individuals, and had done a lot of research for her novel. She said that she didn't feel it was fair to expect sexually active adults to become a-sexual simply because of accidents beyond their control. Was I claiming that mentally handicapped adults should not be allowed sexual relationships? Not at all. I wouldn't claim that. I can only say that I have no personal experience with such injuries, except among aged relatives who have had strokes and for whom sexual expression isn't an issue. So for me, when I read about a Blair who is coloring a picture for Jim using crayons, and then jumps in bed with him to get all hot and heavy, I get a little nauseous. It's too much like pedophilia for me. I know it isn't, and that isn't what Jean intended. I think it's just one of those types of stories in slashdom: One person's kink is another person's squick. And this was a squick I didn't know I had until I started reading this zine.

I've since discovered that there have been big blow-ups about stories of this type in slashdom for years. Evidently a slash writer named Jane wrote a series of Pros novels, published as zines, about a Ray Doyle who suffers a brain injury, and Bodie takes care of him. Though having the mind of a child, Ray remembers loving Bodie, and expects to resume that part of their relationship, which they do. There were strong factions both pro and against these zines. I've seen some zine publishers, when requesting stories for zines in production, ask for "no brain-damaged, brain-injury stories." So there are definitely strong feelings about these stories. I read a Sentinel story on the SXF archive a few years ago where Jim was injured in an accident, and had to re-learn much of his life. In that story, it was a few years before Jim was mentally able to handle sexual relations with Blair again, but eventually they did so. That story didn't bother me at all. This one did. Like I said, I couldn't even finish the story. It hit a personal squick I didn't know I had. But I recognize that others really enjoy it, since a lot of people adore this zine. YMMV.

But I will say this: Jean Kluge is a *great* artist, and her artwork in the novel 'Changes' makes the purchase of the zine worth it, to my way of thinking.

2001

[anonymous]

>>But I have to ask, why is "Changes" icky-poo ? Is it too romantic, too sappy, too OTT ? And is it style or the story ?

Style and story both, for me.

1) Repeat the plot up to this point. Repeat the plot up to this point, up to *this* point. Repeat the plot up to this point, up to *this* point, up to THIS point... <<DO UNTIL WORD COUNT = 80,000>>

2) [personal info snipped] ... I've seen first-hand exactly how magical and enchanting mental retardation is to the patient and the family. Changes!Blair is the cleanest, quietest, best- behaved and most continent brain-damage patient I've ever seen. Never once does he embarrass Jim in public with bizarre behavior, obsessive routines or conversation, shrieking spells, pants-soiling or wetting, physical violence, or any of the other symptoms of *real* mental illness. My sister is far more likely to mutter "I hate my life" than "I love you, little dork."

2a) Steven Warbucks. Gosh, a quaint little cabin in the woods -- standard equipment for the recuperation of mental patients. [personal info snipped] So darned convenient to have that bottomless wallet so you don't have to deal with the real financial consequences of mental illness and self-medication. (Jim never even has to change one of Blair's adult Pampers -- thanks to Lil Bro's magic purse, he can afford a kindly grandmotherly Mammy to do his shit-work for him.)

There's never a day when Jim is tired of the work involved in caring for a mental patient. Never a day when he's overwhelmed at work *and* at home. Never a day when he looks at their bills piling up, their back-rent notices, the charges for $10-a-pill anti-psychosis drugs that need to be taken 5 times a day, and then looks over at the shrieking Blair banging his head against the wall as he's been doing for 4 hours now, and just for a moment thinks it might have been better if that cop had finished the job that night. Cruel. Brutal. And very, very real. Nope, this is a *fantasy,* so here comes the Money Fairy and all we have to concentrate on is:

3) Dude, You Have Sex With Children! Infant!Blair, quickly upgraded to Smart-Prepubescent!Blair. Can't finish the alphabet, but he knows every move in the gay and straight Kama Sutra. (Not sure what version of mental illness that is -- Kluge's Syndrome?) Definitely an icky sense that this plot-point is to give Jim a nice safe *legal* alternative to going to Thailand.

4) Plot Point Coming -- Whoops, Missed it! This zine drags on and on and on and on and on, packed with reams of unnecessary words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs and pages when it isn't necessary to the plot -- but the one scene vital for the actual *story* (Jim tracking down the SOB who put Blair in the Romper Room) is...not there. Blink, and Jim's back at work whistling the Barney theme song and washing the blood from his hands. What did he do, where did he go, what happened, who was in on it, how did he track the guy, did the guy track them back, was he a threat to Blair, were there others in on the plot, is it bigger than those two? Oh, well, must not have been important. Back to repeating the entire plot up to this point, up to *this* point, up to THIS point, up to *THIS* point, up to...

So.

Other than that -- why, yes, "Changes" is the most perfect, wonderful, beyootiful, romantic, excellent Sentinel novel-zine ever.

[anonymous]

Oh my gawd, but that one made me to the technicolour chunder! [J's] eloquent reminiscences of its chief failings bring it all back in horrifying detail.<g> Apologies to those for whom this is a favourite. But I think there are many fan readers who prefer 'comfort' over 'credibility.'

I guess it was thankfully grammatically sound, but it was just, just -- like [J] says. I guess we share similar sensibilities there. It was a cheesy, clichéd emotional remedy for the estranged reader, worse than anything you ever see on a bad television show. Next time someone throws brickbats at bad scriptwriting, I'll remind myself that these are the people who wanted "Changes."

I've never finished any of Myrna 'trafficking in misery' epics, just not my cup of tea, so I have no particular loyalty to their thematic constants. But for me "Changes" stood well enough on its own as a prime example of everything I don't like about fanfic. I'd sooner recommend Em Brunson's "The Longest Walk" series for a far more realistic and satisfying journey into serious injury and the miseries and ecstasies of the triumph of spirit over flesh.

Well, you did ask. I guess the surprise for me is that this story came so ecstatically recommended.

Thanks for the memories, [J].

[anonymous]

I liked Changes without loving it. I liked the... well, in a way the expansion of the wolf/panther merge, the idea that the connection between them could restore so much of what Blair had lost. Other parts of the brain can take over the function of damaged parts, after all. So I didn't find the 'reset' not credible. But if the characters are to be seriously injured, my preference is still for an injury that is not going to result in more than very minor permanent disability - a persistent limp, perhaps, having to learn to write left-handed because they've lost the use of the fingers of their right hand - that sort of thing. But then I'm not fond of any story that causes physical damage; I prefer angst.

[anonymous]

And just to weigh in on the whole reset button phenomena, I'm generally against them. I don't, however, consider Changes to be a reset-button story. Keeping in mind that my definition of a reset-button story is "it never happened, and nobody remembered it, and it won't affect them".

I *get* the motivation behind Changes -- it was about undoing what Myrna did to Blair, because that story made Jean Kluge so unhappy (at least, that's what I got from the story notes, and the story). I've been, in the past, so freaked by a story that I had to immediately write some warm fuzziness that would make the bad go away, so it's an impulse I can understand.

I don't generally read disability fic - there are things in my life I've thus far been sheltered from, like the gruesome realities of mental and physical disability, and I find that I don't mind being sheltered from them. I read Ever After and Changes because of all the discussion about them, and I found that after reading Ever After I *did* have a lingering cloud of doom hovering over my head; Changes managed to dispel it. So in that sense I feel like Changes accomplished its purpose, and made me happy.

On the other hand, there are [J's] complaints, which totally make sense in retrospect, but which didn't bug me at all while I was reading. It makes me wonder if liking Changes might be a question of what you needed, emotionally, after reading Ever After? *I* needed to feel like I never read it, and so Changes really worked for me, because in this particular instance I *wanted* a reset button. But if you didn't have that need....?

And how odd and sick is it that I don't generally need a reset button after a rape story, but after a *disability* story I do? Maybe it's all about my discomfort with the idea of disability, period? And now that I think about it -- are all, or most, or any, rape-recovery stories considered "reset-button" stories?

[anonymous]

"Everything that happened didn't happen and no one remembers it" is a reset button (and honestly, I should have expected the Voyager reset button, since it was about a guy *trying* to reset his universe), and it's probably the worst one for me to deal with, emotionally. I get *invested*, emotionally, in the changes, and to have them go away so abruptly is distressing.

My second-least-favorite is the kind that "Changes" is: permanent and unrecoverable situation miraculously recovered. I'm marginally less likely to throw things in this instance, since it's not a sudden reset, but anyone who's ever encountered me a few seconds after realizing what a story like that is headed into knows I'm even more unpleasant than usual at that point in time.

[anonymous]

"Ever After" is one of my favorite TS stories ever and Myrna one of my favorite authors (I have lost count as to how many times I have read "Promises to Keep" and "Miles to Go"). I will state upfront that disability fic *is* a kink for me that I am well aware some others don't share--and that's OK.

"Ever After" was sad, but it was realistic. Jim had to deal with a totally changed (and it is made clear, never to be changed back) Blair.

I was actually excited when I heard about "Changes," hoping to see more of how Jim was going to deal with these changes. I was *incredibly* disappointed when it turned out to be a "Fix It" story. It was clear to me that Jean couldn't *stand* Myrna leaving Blair broken and just had to fix it, no matter how unrealistically it was done. And [J] is right, it was really unrealistic.

[snipped]

To bring this back to "Changes," I think the thing that bothered me most about the story was that Jim was able to heal Blair. That was the author's choice, but it still really annoyed me. Brain injuries don't do that. I just can't pull myself away from the reality of brain damage to get to the fantasy of Jim's Sentinel bond being able to heal Blair. Sorry.

I am glad to hear that there were other people who were disappointed in this zine. I ranted and raved about it to friends after reading it, but felt sure I was alone.

[anonymous]

I don't think "Changes" shows any kind of anti-disability prejudice on Jean Kluge's part. I grant you that a lot of people are uncomfortable with disabled folks, and I agree that that needs to change in RL and probably also in fiction. But I don't think "Changes" was written out of Jean's disability-phobia -- I think it was written out of her desire to see the story end another way.

Which is basically the impulse behind writing slash in the first place, no? We don't write slash because we're secretly heterophobic; we slash Jim and Blair because we want to see them together. Doesn't mean we hate straight people, just that we want to explore the possibilities of things happening differently than they did on the show. Seems to me Jean's doing the exact same thing, except the story she wanted to rewrite was one written by a fan instead of one written by Petfly.

[anonymous]

I enjoyed "Changes" for the most part. My big problem with it is that it set things up that never happened. For instance, I kept expecting the bad guys to go after Blair. The story set it up and really gave me the impression that it was going to happen. Then it never did. This happened more than once and was very frustrating.

[anonymous]

I'm just amazed at how different opinions can be, and ain't that grand? I'm not as negative toward Changes as [J M] was, but I do agree with a lot of her comments, and I have actually not finished Changes yet. About half-way through I felt like "My God, is this never going to end?" and put it down. Haven't picked it up since. I liked the story fine for a while, but it does go on and on for too long. I couldn't keep interested in what Blair and Jim were doing.

2002

[anonymous]

This zine is my favourite TS zine because it helped me get over the story that spawned this zine. The way Jean wove the story around Blair's recovery was just wonderful. And her art piece "Have You Hugged Your Guide Today?" worked perfectly.

[anonymous]

Read this one so many times, I actually have 3 copies now, in varying stages of well-lovedness. <G> It's a beautiful story. I've even mentioned on occasion that I feel like I will always love this story even if (okay, *when*) my TS interest is a distant memory. When I'm 70, I'll still be clinging to my Jean Kluge and Suzan Lovett prints and a few tattered TS 'zines. <G>

Even if I didn't know the characters, it's a touching story of two men whose love for each other truly knows no boundaries: figuratively and literally.

2003

[Mysti Frank at Dear Disreputable Zine Dealer]
[...] what I said was that *I* wouldn't pay $5.00 for it. Art work is subjective and different types of artwork appeal to different people. Just as you don't seem to like my zines, I don't like your artwork. It's got a fuzzy, unfinished feel to it that doesn't appeal to me, and thus, I would never buy one of your pieces. The *only* reason I did so was because Candy Apple said, "If you buy a commissioned cover from Jean, I'll give you my novel." I did. She didn't. So I'm now stuck with this piece of fuzzy artwork that I would never have bought for myself in a million years.

[anonymous]

The only thing wrong with this 'zine is that even though I've read it so many times I *still* can't just pick favorite parts to re-read... nope. Every time I try that I end up reading from cover to cover! LOL! I won't try to come up with just what makes it so wonderful for me. At any time it could be something different. It just feels good to read it.

[anonymous]

The only thing wrong with this 'zine is that even though I've read it so many times I *still* can't just pick favorite parts to re-read... nope. Every time I try that I end up reading from cover to cover! LOL! Even peeking at the beautiful art causes a need to re-read the 'zine. I won't try to come up with just what it is that makes this 'zine so wonderful for me -- believe me, I've tried to pin that down before. At any time it could be something different. It just feels so good to read it.

2005

[Katya Baturinsky]
Beautifully written and illustrated, and (I think, still) available from the author. OK, I'll admit it, the initial premise turned me right off, but that's precisely the reason this was written; it was a fix-it for a completely unpalatable scenario. And darned if she doesn't make it all better, while writing one of the great classics of fandom along the way. A powerful, emotional read.

[ceares at rec50]
This is my last rec and I'm breaking the rules and 1. Reccing two stories, and 2. Reccing one that isn't available online, but I love this story just that much. Ever After is posted at the archive, and it was powerful enough to spawn not one, but two sequels by different authors. One has a more real world (I won't say realistic, because by TS standards, they both qualify as realistic)ending, and a sadder one. The second is Changes. I first read Changes a few years ago in one sitting. It was the zine of a friend, and after she sold it, I couldn't stop thinking about it. I don't buy very many zines due to finances, but this one I bought full price so that I could have it. Incredible artwork and a wrenchingly beautiful story in which Jim and Blair heal each other in so many ways. Changes is about love and loyalty, and most of all about miracles-small ones and large ones. If you get a chance to beg, borrow or -okay, don't steal it-but if you get the chance, any chance, read Ever After, and then read Changes.

2007

[Angie at Destinies Entwined]
Contents/Description:

"Changes" tells the story of Jim and Blair's efforts to cope with Blair's brain damage and incapacitation with warmth and humor, of their hard work and struggles toward his recovery, and of their courageous and miraculous reclamation of their life together. (And, yes, it has a happy ending, for those who've asked. We're not too proud to mention that.)

There is a preview of "Changes" available on-line.

[…]

Observations:

Okay. This is IT. You know that "If I could have only one..." question? Well, this is the 'zine I would choose if I were stranded on a desert island. I have read this three times so far, and cried buckets each time. Sometimes from sadness. Sometimes from happiness. Don't sit down to read this without time to read from cover to cover and a family-sized box of extra soft tissues!

This is a sequel to Ever After by Myrna in Come To Your Senses #8. But you do not have to read that first. Jean has given the background for that story in her forward.

I have to mention the art, too. I can't believe this woman's talent, but she also did the art-work for this 'zine! Beautiful full page sketches. You can see some of the art in this 'zine (you can buy the art, too!) right here Changes, 'Hidden Visitor and Have You Hugged Your Guide Today are among the lovely sketches you'll see in this 'zine.

Angie's Rec:

There doesn't seem to be much point in reviewing this, since so many people have, lately. Pretty much, everyone says the same thing, and that's what I'm going to say here. I loved it. I thought it was a beautiful love story, where true love conquers all in the traditional style. No disrespect to Myrna, but I detested Ever After, probably since it was so well-written, and did exactly what it was supposed to: reduce me to tears. I read it once, and never again, and the first time I was going through Agent with Style's page, and saw the words, "sequel to Ever After", I never looked at it again. At least until the subject came up on a discussion list, and I started hearing all kinds of spoilers for it. I bought it a week later, and was thrilled with it.

It's fairly small print, but not overly difficult to read. The only gripe I have with it is, there's no protective plastic cover on it. It's got Jean Kluge's gorgeous piece "Sentinel and Guide" on the front cover, and I'm terrified I'm going to spill something on it, or tear it, or otherwise harm it. It stays safely in my bookcase unless I'm reading it, and as soon as I'm done, it goes straight back in there. No one touches it but me. Other than that, the zine is pretty damn near perfect. It's the zine to read if you're having a terrible week, and you need to be cheered up. Pick a day off, and read it, cover to cover.

Why you should buy this 'zine: There's no way I can tell in mere words how much this 'zine has meant to me. It's the epitome of The Sentinel. It is about friendship. But it's also about the power of love.

Why you shouldn't buy this 'zine: At the risk of being very rude...because you have very bad judgment! ;-)

2009

[whipsandscums]
Jean Kluge- Changes

Blair is brain damaged and has seizures. A great story, with illustrations!

2016

[kslangley at What was your first fandom?]
The Sentinel fanzines:

Changes (slash novel, 1999, written by Jean Kluge, illustrated by Jean Kluge and Marty Siegrist, edited and published by Marcelle Gibson) - A zine deservedly praised throughout the fandom. For every glowing comment made in every on-line discussion, I'll see you and raise you ten. Jean sucks you into this story and turns you inside-out before she lets you go. And you thank her for the experience and get in line for another go-round. This is another zine I have multiples of.

2022

[Local Menace]
What was the fic that got you INTO fanfiction?

I took a long break from reading them and I read The Night We Met and that shit broke me and I got super into reading again.

Would love to hear yours and some recommendations ❤️☺️

[BernicexPanders]
The most memorable one for me would be Changes by Jean Kluge, in The Sentinel fandom (Jim/Blair A.U. romance)

I have the framed art & possibly still the original fanzine from the only fandom convention I ever got to go to... 😍

#SlashFanfic #Fanfiction