Quite a specific request for fanfic recs: I've been reading a lot of stuff like this in the last few days: Spike/Buffy, post Lessons, fairly terrible. Is there any post Lessons stuff out there that's better? I don't care if it's het or slash, so long as it's Spike centric and not spoilery for episode 2. If the answer's "no", that's okay, but I figured this was the place to ask.

Can you write believable slash about someone who is canonically in a committed relationship with a woman? I've tried Lemon Lashes' Firefly series, but found that I was totally unable to suspend my disbelief at the thought of Wash shagging some another member of the crew while being married to Zoe.

Ditto on the Lemon Lashes thing.

I think it could probably be done, but not by a) completely ignoring the issue or b) demonizing the woman and kicking her out the door. It would require a very delicate touch, and I can think of maybe five people I'd trust to pull it off.

Can you write believable slash about someone who is canonically in a committed relationship with a woman?

Can you slash Angel in BtVS season 1 or 2? Yes, but you have to be very, very, VERY careful how you deal with the fact of Buffy's place in his (un)life. People have done it- Angel/Xander, for example, often takes place in that time frame- but it's hard to make it work.

Can you write believable slash about someone who is canonically in a committed relationship with a woman?

Here's the thing -- Wash and Zoe have a relatively happy and healthy relationship, as well as an active and satisfying sex life.

There's also an equality there that's rare on TV. Wash and Zoe are each highly competent in their areas of expertise, and Zoe outranks her husband.

I have zero desire to read or write a story that slashes Wash while he's married to Zoe. I might be open to reading a story where Wash is slashed prior to meeting Zoe, but...

In my opinion, why bother, when Wash and Zoe are so great, and so many of the traditional reasons for writing slash have been rendered moot?

So, are we not considering X/A committed? Or is it Xander's ambivalence that makes the difference? Or maybe he is "everybody's butt monkey".Just curious.

Lemon Lashes' stories-- I have more problems with the Mal-in-a-dress bits. Which is not to say that the Wash/Simon wasn't hard for me to get over-- but I felt it was about as well done as possibly could be.

And they broke it up not too far down along the line, so it's all good.

But her River/Kaylee makes me squeal.

Mal-in-a-dress

The FUCK?!?

ITA, shrift.

The thing is, Firefly lenders itself to amazingly diverse number of pairing, het and slash. Simon and River for example, I can see paired with almost anybody on the crew, of either sex. Ditto Jayne, although I can see him better in slash than het. The *only* people on the ship who resist random pairing-offs are Wash and Zoe. Why go after them when there are so many other rich possibilities to mine?

As for Angel - for some reason, I've had absolutely no problem with either Spike or Angel boffing someone else, whether they were in a relationship with Buffy or anyone else. It's probably to do with my impression on vampire sexuality, and the fact that most of their relationships, even when they professed to be in love, were so gorram unhealthy.

Heh heh heh. Yes.

I had to kind of shut my eyes and wing it for that characterization.

But very many bits are very beautifully written.

I think vamps are at least bi.And they don't think about relationships like people do.