Fans of Peter's Room

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

I'm just about to write a post-canon Merricks' Twelfth Night party (2 years on from that in Peter's Room.), and I'm making some POV decisions. From whose viewpoint would you like to see the party, and why? Peter's been packed off to Selby's for the Christmas hols, sorry, I had to limit the cast a bit. The only definite decision so far is a staff POV (probably Mrs Bertie 'helping out', as she's much better characterised than Nellie). I can't promise everything will make it into the finished fic, but I'll try and write a ficbit for everything suggested.

Comments

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

Are you going with the semi-canon of Ginty' s having run away to Ireland and Ann's having run away, too, to check on her, which is what we know AF had planned for them both? Is Patrick at uni, or has he decided not to go? If not, what I'd he doing with himself?

I think Rowan' s take on this would be interesting.

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

I've already had a commission for Rowan on my own lj, so I think she is inescapable.

I didn't know that continuation was semi-canon, actually, though I'm familiar with fic versions of it (http://archiveofourown.org/works/135737/chapters/194417). I think Ginty has to be around, though; for one thing, I like her, for another, she's the best possible person to express some attitudes that are quite important to the crossover element of the fic. Though as someone who is Hiberniores Hibernis ipsis I'd like to see more Ginty-in-Ireland fic too.

This is set (for said crossover reasons) on a very early Marlows timeline (it's January 1952), which means that Patrick's quasi-expulsion can have to do only with the exam irregularity, rather than what Forest suggests is the real reason; his dogmatic differences with the school. So I have him at home, somewhat lackadaisically pursuing self-directed study--I hope just about plausibly in view of recusant traditions of home education and a certain sort of minor-landed-gentry complacency about the value of qualifications. And if not, I hope the crossover interactions make up for the implausibilities!

[coughingbear]

I'm another vote for Rowan.

And I'd be curious to see inside Mrs Merrick's head some time, and how far it matches the outside.

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

Helena Merrick for coughingbear. I'm afraid the inside turned out quite a close match for the outside!

(In this fic it hasn't been possible to find Patrick a school after the events of Attic Term, because the reasons for his being asked to leave his previous establishment sound a bit flimsy and euphemistic, and everyone is assuming the worst.)

Helena was enjoying a brief respite from circulating among guests and directing staff when the Marlows came into the drawing room. Taken together, she thought, they rather had the look of a fashion-plate, more Country Life than Vogue: Pam perfectly Caesar's wife is beyond reproach in her black velvet; Rowan in burgundy, all wrong for that weathered, florid complexion; Ginty in a fashionable but ill-advised charcoal lace and cerise sash; the twins the best of the lot, one in rich peacock chiffon, the other in midnight-blue grosgrain; and that good-looking young man in Navy mess undress, as redundantly decorative as the masculine figure on a pattern-packet, was, yes, Giles. She smoothed her own aubergine satin and glided over.

‘My dear—how delightful!’

‘Mrs Merrick—my son, Giles.’

‘How do you do?’

Some of the things Pat and Tony had let slip about the quixotic events of a year ago started to make sense; she tried to picture what might happen if it all came out—Giles as the defendant in a court martial, but couldn’t quite decide whether that fulsome self-satisfaction would prove impressive or crumple entirely. She greeted the girls, carefully leaving Ginty till last.

‘Virginia, how do you do?’

‘How d’y’do, Mrs Merrick—’

‘Such a pity Ann couldn’t make it—’

‘Yes, the nursing school term starts frightfully—’

‘Of course—she’s left school. But you are still at Kingscote.’ She let a little percussive bounce fall on still.

‘In—in—the Sixth, Mrs Merrick.’

‘Delighted to hear it, Virginia. I think it’s most important that girls take advantage of the opportunity of education—when it is unjustly denied so many.’

‘Yes, Mrs Merrick.’ The girl was unbecomingly scarlet, it was enough. Helena smiled sweetly at the rest of the family, and swept away, intercepting Edwin and Rose, who were making their way towards the Marlows.

‘Mr Dodd—’

‘Oh, good evening, Mrs Merrick.’

‘You’ll be taking Mrs Cropper in—do you know one another?’

‘Yes, thank you. We’ve spoken. Mrs Merrick, this is my daughter Rose.’

Helena had not even seen the snub-nosed child in forest green. She had perfectly glorious thick, toffee-coloured hair.

‘Oh, goodness me—I am sorry. How do you do, Rose? I must introduce Oliver Reynolds to you; he’s your supper partner.’

Rose blanched and ducked her head. Helena feared momentarily for her Isfahan carpet, but the child contained herself.

‘Now,’ Edwin said reprovingly, ‘you know we shan’t be able to sit together at supper. We explained this, didn’t we?’

Rose nodded mutely. Helena smiled gaily, but escorting her youngest guest to the small knot of young people among whom Ollie Reynolds stood discoursing solemnly on equine form gave her a distinct intimation of what it must be like to be a wardress in Holloway.

[coughingbear]

Thank you! Lovely exchange with Ginty.

Poor Rose.

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

Thanks, glad you liked it.

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

I may write Ginty-in-Ireland; I've written some of it in my head.

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

Ooh, that'll be interesting to see!

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

Some Rowan: I've clipped it for references to the crossover because my acquaintance with that canon is much briefer than with the Marlows, and I want to run it past a beta before unleashing it. Sorry it's a bit disjointed...

Rowan wondered whose was the sense of devilry at work in the seating plan. It seemed too subversive for Helena, but too merciless for Anthony, too perceptive for Patrick: probably they had semi-innocently pooled their collective social knowledge, with exquisite result.

[...]

Mum’s reward for enduring the new owner of Monks’ Culvery and his differences with the county council planning office was to be a pleasant, chinless Squadron Leader straight out of Betjeman; she must have recovered reasonable odour since the Ginty business. Giles, presumably an unknown quantity, had been landed with two utterly unexceptionable females whom Rowan knew only by sight, while Patrick was wrestling like a weedy Jacob with Mrs Prescott, and had only Gail Cropper to look forward to. Lawrie appeared to be amusing Ronnie Merrick; on his other hand was a dumb, stricken Rose, upon whom Ollie Reynolds had given up before the removal of the soup plates.

[...]

Rowan herself had drawn as a partner John Lidgett, to whom she could safely devote about a tenth of her brain while she observed the company; on her other side was another of the district’s farmers, dull but easy. She felt a sudden obscure agitation: this, which felt like an antechamber to it, really was her life. She had better buckle down to it. Perhaps Dad would retire from the Service before her total metamorphosis into That Queer Miss Marlow; though if not, she supposed it wouldn’t actually matter to her by then. Lidgett was asking about the New Forest ponies; grateful to be relieved of thought, she plunged into a detailed account.

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Great excerpts.

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

Thanks!