holmestice | (Reply)

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More guesses!

sewing her skin together as i sew mine: I think this is by

language_escapes. Not many people were going to be writing in either of those ‘verses, let alone going to put them together. I also looked up the title and found it was a quotation from a poem. I think language_escapes has done that at least once before - had a title in lower case that was taken from a poem.

The Fixed Foot: I think this is by my colleague in guessing,

starfishstar. Only three people mentioned MDBD this time, one of whom was the recipient. And I don’t think the style is sanguinity’s. Also the author notes seemed to suggest someone who had newly seen the film, and the use of exclamation marks and double question marks in the notes did rather match starfishstar’s use of them in their sign-up.

The State of His Mind: OK, I’m going to be bold. I’m going to say this is by

graycardinal. When I read this fic I immediately thought of him - right sort of ‘verse, right sort of style and I thought I could hear his voice in the author notes. But then he stated on the guessing post: And I think that I've probably achieved one of my primary goals this year, which was to write something that did not immediately and unequivocally appear to have my byline stamped all over it. Which naturally immediately made me doubt my choice. But perhaps he means that this fic has a pairing when he doesn’t usually include one…? In any case, I’m going to stick with this guess now.

A Woman Is Herself: Apart from the recipient, nobody mentions this ‘verse in their sign-up, but I think the beta for the fic may have given the game away. A little bit of sideways Googling and I found that

elareine often credits prettylittlepliers as their beta.

Insoluble Puzzles: So I assume this has to be by

angelqueen04, even though they don’t offer Charlotte Holmes in their sign-up. They do offer Mary Russell though - and I believe they know the recipient from another site, which may have encouraged the mods to match them.

Choice of Exit: You know, I really resisted matching this fic to a particular author. Because it seemed too obvious an answer - this writer and recipient were the only two who had mentioned this ‘verse, and the recipient had written for this writer last time. Also, there was the author note Holmes and Moriarty as time-travelling actors - how could I resist? This suggested to me that the writer had only recently read the novel - had decided on it after getting their assignment. So for a long time I thought the author was pocketbookangel - a lot of people don’t rule out Holmes/Moriarty but pocketbookangel is one of only three who explicitly rule it in. In their offers they mention BBC Sherlock Sherlock/Jim and they also mention being willing to write incest - in this fic Holmes and Moriarty have a quasi-incestuous relationship.

But I just couldn’t track down the fic for the writer I had originally rejected, and they’ve commented on all other possibilities. Sometimes the simplest answer is the correct one. I think the author of this fic is

trobadora.

Candid Review of a Fine Play: This was a tricky one. Only four people mention Coules in their sign-ups - the recipient, two people who’ve left kudos on AO3, and one person who I’ve got pegged as being very busy elsewhere. So it had to be someone who hadn’t offered the ‘verse.

I’d already made myself a list of people who’d offered More Holmes ‘verses and these were the creators who sanguinity was likely to have been matched with. I was able to cross some people off by a process of elimination, then I had a look at fics for some of the creators who were left. And I think I’ve made a match on style and quality but I’ve also made a match on author replies, looking at vocabulary and regularly used phrases. So my guess is