Are you saying you think they're soulmates?

So there's a fic. It's AU, yay! It's 5k, yay! It's PG, hmmm. (c'mon, there at least needs to be punches thrown, blood spurting, violence, gore...). It says it's deliberately bad writing in Harlequin style.

Hold the phone.

Why would I read five thousand words of deliberately bad purple PG prose. I'm failing to see the pro in the pro-con here.

The author is being self-deprecating. It's not that bad. If that was their aim, they missed. It's dramatic, but...pirates. It should be.

Much worse has been committed by mistake.

huh.

Also, ita, I can't believe you finally read the Soul/Soldier fic. I mostly skimmed it ages ago, so I can't speak to the descriptions. I didn't catch that the description for Dean didn't match to JA. But I def do not like when one character turns out to be another. There's disconnect for me, although in that case it did explain why Dean seemed so NOT Dean and OOC.

If Dean's going to be OOC for the whole fic, well, thank god it was a decent Castiel. But I'm reading for Dean/Castiel, dammit. I want both of them to be there, even if there's a good reason Dean's not acting like Dean. And it wasn't, IMO, a rewarding reason. I hate that plot choice.

I did like the chemistry between them, but that was about it. I was mightily frustrated by the end of it, and ended up skimming from the final confrontation on through the resolution. Instant disconnect. And I'd invested a lot to get there! I know folk don't want to be spoiled, but I'd rather know so I don't waste my time with that plot.

I've gotten so picky. If I'm going to read more than 3,000 words, the characters better feel like the SPN writers wrote them.

I remember a Harlequin challenge a while back, and I think authors had to choose from actual cover copy as the prompts.

Dean was a reconciliator in this fic, which I buy, but he was also devoutly religious and following in his preacher father's steps. In the end we find out he's Michael, so I guess that explains everything, but that's *exactly* why I don't like it. Because it explains why I'm not reading about the character I am in love with.

I get that Cas is hard to write, and people take some liberties and shortcuts (or have girl!Cas shriek at an unexpected lizard) and I roll with a lot of it. But don't make him inherently needy or uncertain or needing of protection. Just not that.

Well, okay, glassyskies broke him pretty badly, but he was still mega-competent in some ways.

However, I'm more hardcore on Dean. He's easier to write just because we have that much more canon, and it doesn't veer all over the place like Cas does. It shouldn't be the weak part of the story.

Dean was a reconciliator in this fic, which I buy

Some of my favorite S1 moments are when he's mediating the latest growl-off between Sam and Sir.

Relevant to some's interests.