Sarabande (Blake's 7 story)

Fanfiction
Title:	Sarabande
Author(s):	Alicia Maria Susanna Fox (Susan Matthews)
Date(s):	1988
Length:
Genre:	het
Fandom:	Blake's 7
External Links:
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Sarabande is a Blake's 7 A/OFC, implied Avon/Cally story by Alicia Maria Susanna Fox (Susan R. Matthews).

It was published in Straight Blake's #1.

This story is a sequel to Matthews' controversial Love & Necessary Discipline.

Reactions and Reviews

This story is a sequel to a PGP fic I haven't read where Avon was so upset he beat Tarrant and not in a sexual way. I'm guessing from the reviews of the original that our two male characters in this are... from a contemporary fandom? Pros? I don't know enough to say, I'm afraid, but what I can say is the initial first person narration here from one of these guys is very engaging. Similarly, once we hit the sex scene, I think the writing describing the way Cally moves (even though it's not her) is really good, and she's very effectively invoked. I also quite like this as a way for Avon to put his beating-Tarrant ghosts to rest, though the A/C stuff bores me because I don't believe it. Unfortunately, the actual sex writing is very over-the-top, although it's not the only fic in this zine (I think) to refer explicitly to 'mounds of Venus' (a phrase that shouldn't be allowed), but it is the worst.

He held her with one hand flat on her belly and kissed her flushed white flanks down to her center, down to the flower whose musk-salt perfume had spoken to his seeking masculinity, down to the tender bud that lay beneath the curling cushion Venus had ordained should shield a woman's sweet private domain from the violence of a man's impassioned thrusting.

(I realise that I deserve for someone to quote large chunks of my sex writing back to me in a sneering tone, don't think I don't realise that.)

Susan Matthews also has an overly poetic way with her dialogue - which makes you feel like you're reading a Donne poem. It's not too noticeable in here, but it is in Bolero where all our heroes talk like that. I... don't entirely dislike it, but it is weird.

A sequel to Susan Matthew's "Love and Necessary Discipline" involving Avon and a created character who is recovering from rape. Rather tender and wistful. I particularly like the poem immediately following the story.