SGA rec: Ardhanarishvara
Sep. 14th, 2007 10:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lunabee34Ardhanarishvara by Auburn and Mona (aka ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
auburnnotlisa); McShep and various; Adult
This is still a WIP, but it appears that it is likely to be finished very soon. There are twenty six chapters thus far (and though most of them are linked internally I think at one point I did have to click on the tag function to get to the next chapter which is no biggie) so it's a lovely meaty read.
This is also a gender switch fic, which I have never liked. Even when a story is well written, I usually just don't buy girl!Sammy or girl!Rodney. It's not a genre that's ever worked for me until I read this fic (bearing in mind that I know I haven't been exposed to the whole of gender switch fic and there's probably plenty others out there I'd like if I gave them a chance). So even if gender switch isn't your bag either, I'd urge you to give this fic a try.
Hardly anybody was writing gender switch in my little corner of the Jossverse when I first got into fandom and then when I moved into SPN everybody was writing it, but I just couldn't get into it. I felt like most of the gender switch stories I found read like the writer was afraid of writing slash and was looking for ways to justify sex that they felt uncomfortable writing with two men together (or as an offshoot of “We’re Not Gay, We Just Like Each Other” which I find very problematic most days). Or that what I was reading was merely PWP (which is awesome and yay and I am so glad that fandom is full of fantastic porn) that didn’t address any of the issues that gender switch raises for me.
So I almost didn't read this one. I am so so glad I did. What this story does that the other gender switch stories I've come across doesn't is address gender in a real and meaningful way. It examines both gender as a construct and gender as an innate quality. It very plausibly explores how each character’s perception of him or herself might change as gender changes. In addition, it gives us a fascinating look at how much of the way our peers interact with us is based on our gender.
I’m most taken with Teyla in this fic. Her inability to be comfortable in this new form, her firm belief that what she is, WHO she is, is inextricably bound to her body is really interesting. Her people are completely unable to accept her as a man and so we have another moment where we as readers see just how culturally different the Earthlings and the Athosians are.
I like that almost everyone from the Atlantis expedition is able to accept that John and Ronon and Teyla are themselves, just in different bodies (partially I think because they know the change is temporary) but that they cannot stop themselves from reacting to them as if they ARE different. Officer Whatshisface would never in a million years hit on John Sheppard or think that he could get away with it, but he tries his luck with woman!John, even though he knows that John’s mind is the same even if the trappings are a little different.
And Rodney. Poor Rodney. In many ways, he stands in for us as readers. Since he’s the only team member whose gender is not changed, he’s left on the outside of the whole Experience, muddling through, trying to become Enlightened from the fringe. LOL And watching him alternately smother and give John the most awesome sex of his life is incredibly entertaining and moving. Actually seeing him get it in the last chapters—that John’s going to be a man again one day soon and realizing that he’s been treating him as if he is someone else—Wow.
auburnnotlisa); McShep and various; AdultThis is still a WIP, but it appears that it is likely to be finished very soon. There are twenty six chapters thus far (and though most of them are linked internally I think at one point I did have to click on the tag function to get to the next chapter which is no biggie) so it's a lovely meaty read.
This is also a gender switch fic, which I have never liked. Even when a story is well written, I usually just don't buy girl!Sammy or girl!Rodney. It's not a genre that's ever worked for me until I read this fic (bearing in mind that I know I haven't been exposed to the whole of gender switch fic and there's probably plenty others out there I'd like if I gave them a chance). So even if gender switch isn't your bag either, I'd urge you to give this fic a try.
Hardly anybody was writing gender switch in my little corner of the Jossverse when I first got into fandom and then when I moved into SPN everybody was writing it, but I just couldn't get into it. I felt like most of the gender switch stories I found read like the writer was afraid of writing slash and was looking for ways to justify sex that they felt uncomfortable writing with two men together (or as an offshoot of “We’re Not Gay, We Just Like Each Other” which I find very problematic most days). Or that what I was reading was merely PWP (which is awesome and yay and I am so glad that fandom is full of fantastic porn) that didn’t address any of the issues that gender switch raises for me.
So I almost didn't read this one. I am so so glad I did. What this story does that the other gender switch stories I've come across doesn't is address gender in a real and meaningful way. It examines both gender as a construct and gender as an innate quality. It very plausibly explores how each character’s perception of him or herself might change as gender changes. In addition, it gives us a fascinating look at how much of the way our peers interact with us is based on our gender.
I’m most taken with Teyla in this fic. Her inability to be comfortable in this new form, her firm belief that what she is, WHO she is, is inextricably bound to her body is really interesting. Her people are completely unable to accept her as a man and so we have another moment where we as readers see just how culturally different the Earthlings and the Athosians are.
I like that almost everyone from the Atlantis expedition is able to accept that John and Ronon and Teyla are themselves, just in different bodies (partially I think because they know the change is temporary) but that they cannot stop themselves from reacting to them as if they ARE different. Officer Whatshisface would never in a million years hit on John Sheppard or think that he could get away with it, but he tries his luck with woman!John, even though he knows that John’s mind is the same even if the trappings are a little different.
And Rodney. Poor Rodney. In many ways, he stands in for us as readers. Since he’s the only team member whose gender is not changed, he’s left on the outside of the whole Experience, muddling through, trying to become Enlightened from the fringe. LOL And watching him alternately smother and give John the most awesome sex of his life is incredibly entertaining and moving. Actually seeing him get it in the last chapters—that John’s going to be a man again one day soon and realizing that he’s been treating him as if he is someone else—Wow.
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no subject
Date: 2008-03-31 09:03 am (UTC)Will return after some studying!
no subject
Date: 2008-03-31 05:29 pm (UTC)You know re-reading this rec (and thinking about the fics we're reading in
I also first encountered genderswitch fic in SPN and a lot of those fics were just about sex. They seemed to me like the authors wanted to write Sam and Dean fucking and used this trope to make the sex more palatable to them. (Again, clearly not *all* of the genderswitch out there is doing this)
Ard was the first gender-switch fic that I read that I thought really thoughtfully considered all the ramifications of the change and really explored in detail what gender means and how it influences our identity and the way that others perceive us. Part of that is the length; because it's so long, you guys got to delve a lot more deeply into issues than someone else could in a 2000 word fic.