Truth and Measure

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Fanfiction
Title: Truth and Measure
Author(s): Telanu
Date(s): 30 April 2013
Length: 271,584
Genre(s): femslash
Fandom(s): The Devil Wears Prada
Relationship(s):
External Links: Archive of Our Own

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Truth and Measure is a popular Andy/Miranda story written by Telanu. In 2017, Ylva Publishing announced it would be publishing 3 of Telanu's stories, The Lily and The Crown, The X Ingredient, and Truth and Measure. Unlike other instances of Filing Off The Serial Numbers where authors often take a fic down once it reworked for publication, Telanu's work remained online.

Telanu has also reflected on Truth and Measure in a piece about femslash fandom:

Here’s the best example I can think of that shows what femslash fandom is about. In 2007, I wrote a DWP fic titled Truth and Measure, which weighs in at over 250K words and to date stands as the longest single work I’ve ever written. By far. Nearly 9 years later, I still get comments and feedback on it, both from first time readers and readers who have read it multiple times. Femslash fandoms might not be big compared to some, but they’re dedicated, passionate, and close-knit. [1]

Synopsis

Summary

Andy doesn't leave Miranda in Paris, and learns that a single decision can change your life. But the main thing about decisions? You don't get to stop with one.

Author's Notes

Disclaimer: All the characters and places you recognize are the property of Lauren Weisberger and 20th-century Fox. I made up the rest, so they're mine, although you're welcome to borrow them, I guess. Either way, I'm making no money from this project or any of the website's other contents.

Countless thanks to Luthien and The Last Good Name for saving this story from its author. Thanks to Thalia for her helpful advice re: mechanical physics. All remaining errors are, of course, entirely my own.

Reactions and Reviews

It doesn’t matter if you were never into The Devil Wears Prada, if you were never in that fandom or even really aware it was there; Your life is not complete unless you fucking read the amazing, the incomparable, the tour de force that is Truth and Measure written by the equally incomparable Telanu, or as you may remember them from LJ, somnieesperus

Truth and Measure is the story of everything that should have happened in The Devil Wears Prada, where Andy stays, and things get more difficult, and better, and more difficult still. The length is nothing short of EPIC, coming out at a 250k total wordcount, and it reads beautifully. There’s an enviable grasp of the characters, everything they do or say feels true. The ever-present positivity of Andrea Sachs measured against the glacier that is Miranda Priestly is as slow burn as they come, but this story really does reward the reader tenfold.

So if you haven’t already read it, (and how JEALOUS are we of everyone who gets to read this for the first time?) download it on your phone, your e-reader or tablet, bookmark it, and get ready to be sucked into Andrea Sachs’ real journey. If you’ve read it before, well, read it again.[2]

All four of us love this story and it’s at the top of all of our lists. I heard about Truth and Measure on a podcast, and it CONSUMED MY LIFE for a week. I didn’t want to go to work, I may not have been as attentive to my kids as usual, and when I wasn’t reading Truth and Measure, I was thinking about it. If you read no other story, read this one, because it’s excellent.[3]

Well, I've completed my customary yearly reading of Truth & Measure along with the other accompanying stories. (In case you haven't read it, it is THE Mirandy fanfiction & my bible for all things stunning, perfect & beautiful in an exceptionally human way.) I can't believe it's taken less than two weeks - it's been excruciating, dipping in & out whenever I could. Undoubtedly worth every single moment. & will continue to be so for many years, that much I believe whole-heartedly. My first reading (back in 2012) took 48 hours, straight reading with six hour breaks for sleep in an empty house I loved & was leaving in a week due to finishing Uni. I wish I could experience it that way again. It was divine, soul-building & shut my brain down for several hours. This fanfic - I don't say it often but it is the ultimate. The one. The be all, do all, end all, live forever type work. Please read it.[4]

I don't know if it's a masterpiece, but I dearly love it and reread it regularly. It fixed a canon so thoroughly for me that it is now my personal head-canon, despite dealing with a narrative setup (unexpected pregnancy + May-December romance) that is generally not my cup of tea at all.[5]

This was the conversion fic for a lot of people in Devil Wears Prada fandom including myself and I'm pretty sure you need zero background. I think it's better than the vast majority of original lesbian romance I've read. Slow-burn boss/assistant fic that actually takes on the power differential head-on and has two women (eventually) (sort of) sanely handle it. Zero fashion industry knowledge or interest is necessary. There's a pregnancy, but it's not babyfic and it drives part of the plot, but it's not misused and I think is handled reasonably realistically. The UST is very, very subtext for most of the book and there's a lot of denial, but it doesn't dwell in angst much and their interactions tend towards pretty charged. As with canon Miranda is vindictive, unpredictable, a little seductive, very very territorial, and almost as good at hiding her affections as she thinks she is. Andy (Andrea) is one of her assistants, scared & enthralled by her, and has almost no life outside of pleasing her. Also fluffy and funny at times.[6]

How to even begin to write about Truth and Measure by Telanu – the greatest piece of women loving women (wlw) fanfiction ever written? When it comes to reading I regret two things: that I haven’t read Truth and measure sooner (I read it about six months into my fanfiction journey), and that I can’t read Truth and Measure anew. Every time I recommend it to people, I am always awash with envy that they get to experience it for the first time. And then right after recommending it, I schedule my yearly re-read of this story. For those who are still to experience the marvel that is Truth and Measure by Telanu, it is a story that legitimately COULD have happened after The Devil Wears Prada movie ends. It slots into the DWP universe perfectly, giving the characters of the movie a wonderful journey and a perfect ending.[7]

A Mirandy epic about working womanhood—but not just that: about finding a balance between your career and your children; about forming an identity separate from the family of your birth; about bisexuality and its perceptions and realities; and also about having really hot sex with your ice queen boss.[8]

Telanu wrote several incredible fics in DWP fandom, but this is probably the most ~essential. It’s a sequel to the movie, wherein Miranda unexpectedly gets pregnant and Andrea helps her with the pregnancy, leading to an even more unexpected romance. It’s very long, as you’d expect from a story that has to sort out a lot of issues between the two lead characters, and while I haven’t read it in several years, I remember it being brilliant. As someone who doesn’t read many pregnancy/baby stories, this fic is a rare exception for me.[9]

Inspired Fanworks

Fanart

Manips

References

  1. ^ from I Am Femslash: The Person Whose Calls You Always Take
  2. ^ [1]
  3. ^ [2]
  4. ^ [3]
  5. ^ Anon comment on fail_fandomanon, June 28, 2020
  6. ^ Anon comment on fail_fandomanon, Dec 22, 2014
  7. ^ "Milena's 11 Favorite Fanfiction Stories". Archived from the original on 2022-05-02.
  8. ^ "The Rec Center #57". Archived from the original on 2024-07-21.
  9. ^ "The Rec Center #107". Archived from the original on 2024-07-21.
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