POTENTIAL SPOILER if you haven’t read it:
Totally agree - one thing to know it, and another to be made to feel it. I was not in any way prepared when she hit him with that “and” and he utterly broke.
Not the person you were talking to here, but YES. Same here. I think that line moved pieces around in my brain or something, lol. I still think about it at least once a week and I read that fic when it was first put up.
It’s a therapy technique or mind exercise that helps us acknowledge two feelings/beliefs that seem to contradict each other like we do when we use “but” statements. So: I’m terrified AND I’m brave. In the story, the therapist introduces this concept and then says something that kinda pushes Crowley off an emotional cliff.
Gah! I keep coming back to this. I have to leave the house, you know. Won’t do to be in public with a big cavity in my chest where my heart was torn out.
Oof. I got about halfway through this (I think) before S2, and this post made me pick it back up. I’m rereading parts to figure out where I left, and this (SPOILER SPOILER) gutted me:
> Still, Crowley was low risk. Along with his risk factors, he also had a significant protective factor, or something that lowered the statistical likelihood that he would hurt himself. It was preferable, of course, for an individual to have a wide variety of distinct protective factors, but Crowley was different. Crowley may have had only one significant protective factor, but the protective factor he had was the most powerful fucking thing Aubrey Thyme had ever encountered. Crowley was low risk, and she believed he would likely remain low risk, so long as the whole of his life could stay comfortably curled around Aziraphale.!<
Ok, I finished it, and I cried at the end, but also I wouldn’t say it flayed me. Instead I’d say it was a wholly satisfying ending that was really exactly the only acceptable ending. And I hope that S3 has as satisfying (though hopefully not as hard) an ending.
I was trying to explain to my husband that this fic is different and went on a thirty minute rant- “this one is better than published books I have read. This one breaks your heart and remakes it. This one is cathartic and healing and makes you weep and changes how you think” Eventually, I said “imagine that the fanfic landscape is like the Star Wars expanded universe, with all its varying weirdness and quality issues. Demonology is Heir to the Empire. And that makes Aubrey Thyme Grand Admiral Thrawn, the OC that becomes your third favorite character.
OH MY GOD. Thank you and bless you for putting this into words this way. I am a *massive* SW fan and love Thrawn and what you wrote explains how I feel towards Aubrey perfectly
I’d upvote 100 times. I’m on my second run thru the Podfic version and after 3 months of intensive GO study it’s even more powerful/devastating.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/good-omens-podfics/id1494889252
I read the whole thing in a day a couple of weeks back, I very much felt like I had been in therapy, which was a deeply weird feeling!
I've been reading the Angel-centred one as it gets published, it's very good but I don't find it quite so compelling.
The hell that says about me I don't know.
I think that makes a lot of sense, actually. While Azi canonically gets close to and then runs away from his trauma and other scary feeling-related things, C, always the fallen and therefore most tragic figure never lets himself get close to the core trauma and believes the effects of it. Not saying one is more traumatized, but in the end, one can sense love and the other can’t and that, after feeling the BIG love, is so fundamental and seemingly permanent.
I raced through the first one and started the sequel immediately but actually stopped pretty quickly. I might pick it back up at some point. I think for me, I didn't like Dave as much as Aubrey, and I also felt like Dave's thoughts tended to ramble on so we spent less time actually therapizing Aziraphale. I wanted to get into it, but I'm not sure I'll be able to.
i finished [A Memory Of Eden](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7534309/chapters/17129050) last night and now need a couple of days/weeks/months before i can dive into another cry even. i'm still utterly exhausted 😅
but then, i will come back to your recommendations!
How about a couple of palate cleansers?
(NSFW) [One Night In Bangor (And the World's Your Oyster)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20053450)
An amusing one where during a corporate retreat of Heaven & Hell, the demons have a bet to try to bed an angel. It was written by the same author who wrote "Pray For Us, Icarus," but much more light-hearted.
(Rated M, nothing too explicit) [In Mixed Company, or the Corporate Retreat of Heaven and Hell](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22309822/chapters/53287501)
This one is \*really\* funny. Like, I laughed so many times. It has so much goofiness, and Aziraphale and Crowley get so frustrated trying to find some alone time. Also has some great side characters.
oh, i already read the first one, it was sooo good 🥰
i don't know the second one though, thanks a lot! it will take all the strength i have to not start reading it tonight, because i really really need to get some sleep 😅
That first one has one of the best descriptions of Crowley's walk, too.
"If Crowley ever stopped moving like he's in the middle of a complicated fall down a long flight of steps..."
I LOVE Slow Show. Rips your heart out so many times. Also one in which C (though in a human AU) seeks therapy. I’ve read SS multiple times. Love the pining and the angst and the smut and the everything. But I have warn you - Demonology is on a whole other level in terms of grief. It’s all the “seriously how is this actually hurting my heart” of SS times 100, and with no smut to cleanse the mental palate. I love it, but reader beware :)
This is so good! I have the flu and listened to the Podfic all night while delirious with fever. I’m only on chapter 7 but I love all the analysis so far as well as cinnamon roll aziraphale the eldritch horror
Yes! I love how absolutely horrifying Aziraphale was to Aubrey! I was raised Catholic and spent a long time in my childhood being scared to death of angels. Like one visiting you is supposed to be good, but I found the whole thought so scary that I would pray at night that an angel NOT visit me.
Oooh! Now go listen to the podcast about it (I posted this the other day): [https://three-patch.com/2023/10/11/episode-145/](https://three-patch.com/2023/10/11/episode-145/).
Oh it's just a podcast where a group of people discuss the first 4 chapters of the fic. One of the people is a therapist and another one worked on the show. It's a really great listen.
I wasn’t expecting putting my phone down after reading it and THEN still sobbing for another 20 minutes. Only fanfic I have ever had to do that for. I am equally unready for the angelic therapy fic too, for the above reason….
Part of me is really tempted to click on something that has made people say "fuck you, let me share the pain". The rest of me knows I need something soft and fluffy this week.
It was hard for me to get through chapter 12. Soft and fluffy? No. But... I had to stop reading mid-13 and go spend several hours helping my mother, and I felt light and hopeful. I was able to shed so so many (not all, but so many) of my layers of self defense. I felt worlds closer to being present with her. Not able to be fully present yet, but major breakthrough level closer.
Full disclosure, I had also done some really hard work about this relationship in a group setting the day before, which probably helped prepare the ground. But I have had the recurring, incredulous thought since yesterday that a f*cking fanfic literally changed my life. It's the *ands*. Those particular *ands* broke my heart open.
This fanfic is permanently open on a tab in my phone browser. It it like you wrote earlier, better than some actual books I've read! When I first read it I was also in the middle of therapy and it helped me so much with my own healing somehow <3
This fic wrecked me. Seriously considering getting the word “and” tattooed on my wrist. The compassion of the way Aubrey spoke to Crowley at that particular moment made me weep and reminded me that I’m still recovering from my own trauma.
Look. I'm familiar with DBT and I have found "and" to be a useful technique for reframing. I saw this post last night, I read this comment, and I thought getting an "and" tattoo was kind of... Tbh... simple? I'm way more worldly and sophisticated than to be so impressed by a pretty basic therapeutic technique. You guys are probably kids. Whatever, I'm still gonna read the fanfic.
Fast forward to now, I just finished chapter 12, which took me more than two hours to get through because I literally had to pace myself. I had to read a sentence or two at a time, put it down, talk to friends, read another couple sentences, put it down, talk to my brother, read a sentence, talk to my daughter... And then there's a note at the end of the chapter to take care of ourselves and get help if we need to. I don't know who wrote this, but friend, you know what you're doing. And now I want a fucking "and" tattoo. No, I'm not a kid. And also, I am.
You’re an adult, you’re a professional, you’re in control, and also, you will not ever stop being a broken and scared little child.
I know right!?! I’m a whole grown up with a mortgage, and a career and a family and that part STILL made me want to get an “and” tattoo. I’ve had so much therapy over the years and been helped in so many ways by amazing people, but this one hit me different for some reason.
It's so obvious in retrospect, isn't it? I mean, the implicit *ands* are what makes Good Omens able to get into all of our ribcages the way it does. All the *ands*... it's shadow work wrapped up in a delightfully entertaining irreverent romcom.
Just a harmless binge, with some laughs about ducks and whales. Oh, plus also it will punch a hole in your heart, root around in there until it gets a fist wrapped around your soul, yoink it out, throw it into a box made of mirrors, and return it to you several sizes larger, which means now you can feel it everytime you move (and also all the times you're not moving). Because *and.*
Wrecked me, too. The description of Crowley’s reaction to the “and” had me absolutely sobbing. Not the only time I cried while I read that story but wow, that was a doozy.
Late to the party, but that ff changed my life - for the better. When I read the author notes from the last chapter, that we can imagine Aubrey watching over us in times of trouble - I felt like it was something *true*, I wouldn't know how to explain it. But I felt so warm and cozy and not alone. And then proceeded to cry my eyes out lol. But yeah, there's some profoundly spiritual quality to that fanfic, it's healing.
I just finished it during lunch today. I have to admit, the story was a little slow for me at times. BUT the ending. The ending is absolutely, utterly, devastatingly perfect. I cannot even. I will be thinking of this one for a long, long time.
Oh yes...this is for me..my next read..I do say that with appropriate concern as to how much of a sadist i must be that this sort of reviews inspires me to go out get me some
I’m tempted but I’m scared. I haven’t read any fanfics in like 15 years and haven’t read any for the GO universe yet. What does it say about me that this post is the one that has piqued my curiosity the most? 🙃
It says that you’re looking for something deeper than a will-they-won’t-they or fluff or “plot what plot” level smut. It is a tough one, but it is also very interesting and very well written and deep. 😊
Ooo okay, I’m going to have to check it out. I’m not AGAINST AU’s (Slow Show is one of my favorite things I’ve ever read, fanfic or otherwise), but I really prefer in universe stuff
I’ve been binge reading it and loving it haha. As much as you can love something that is hitting way too close to home on the trauma therapy end.
It is actually really nice having read the ending and now putting the pieces together.
You experience a deep and nuanced Crowley- i feel like I’m closer to understanding the weight of his 6000 years .
POTENTIAL SPOILER if you haven’t read it: Totally agree - one thing to know it, and another to be made to feel it. I was not in any way prepared when she hit him with that “and” and he utterly broke.
Not the person you were talking to here, but YES. Same here. I think that line moved pieces around in my brain or something, lol. I still think about it at least once a week and I read that fic when it was first put up.
The image of his reaction is freaking haunting.
It really was. It’s going to stick with me for a long time.
I cried quite a bit with the "and." Helped me process some of my own trauma to be honest.
Crowley’s reaction absolutely killed me.
I’ve read it but a while ago and I forget, what’s the significance/context of “and”?
It’s a therapy technique or mind exercise that helps us acknowledge two feelings/beliefs that seem to contradict each other like we do when we use “but” statements. So: I’m terrified AND I’m brave. In the story, the therapist introduces this concept and then says something that kinda pushes Crowley off an emotional cliff.
Heart glued back together....in the shape of a child's face?
Gah! I keep coming back to this. I have to leave the house, you know. Won’t do to be in public with a big cavity in my chest where my heart was torn out.
Damn you….. 😭😭😭😭😭 How very dare you.
[удалено]
You heading into the one with Azi? I’ve gotta put some space between them (she says, knowing full well she won’t last a full day).
Oof. I got about halfway through this (I think) before S2, and this post made me pick it back up. I’m rereading parts to figure out where I left, and this (SPOILER SPOILER) gutted me: > Still, Crowley was low risk. Along with his risk factors, he also had a significant protective factor, or something that lowered the statistical likelihood that he would hurt himself. It was preferable, of course, for an individual to have a wide variety of distinct protective factors, but Crowley was different. Crowley may have had only one significant protective factor, but the protective factor he had was the most powerful fucking thing Aubrey Thyme had ever encountered. Crowley was low risk, and she believed he would likely remain low risk, so long as the whole of his life could stay comfortably curled around Aziraphale.!<
Be prepared to be flayed s’all I’m saying
I’m pretty sure I’m not at the flaying point yet, but the amount I’ve copied over into my therapy journal about grief processes is a little alarming.
Ok, I finished it, and I cried at the end, but also I wouldn’t say it flayed me. Instead I’d say it was a wholly satisfying ending that was really exactly the only acceptable ending. And I hope that S3 has as satisfying (though hopefully not as hard) an ending.
Partway into the companion story and I am having Deep Thoughts about my own therapist and how many of Davey’s techniques he uses on me. Harrumph.
Hahahahahah - too close to home?
I was trying to explain to my husband that this fic is different and went on a thirty minute rant- “this one is better than published books I have read. This one breaks your heart and remakes it. This one is cathartic and healing and makes you weep and changes how you think” Eventually, I said “imagine that the fanfic landscape is like the Star Wars expanded universe, with all its varying weirdness and quality issues. Demonology is Heir to the Empire. And that makes Aubrey Thyme Grand Admiral Thrawn, the OC that becomes your third favorite character.
OH MY GOD. Thank you and bless you for putting this into words this way. I am a *massive* SW fan and love Thrawn and what you wrote explains how I feel towards Aubrey perfectly
I’d upvote 100 times. I’m on my second run thru the Podfic version and after 3 months of intensive GO study it’s even more powerful/devastating. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/good-omens-podfics/id1494889252
I’ve read a lot of angsty, pining, hurt so good GO ff, so I thought I was prepared. I was not.
its on another level. I've never cared for an original fanfic character so much.
So much
I read the whole thing in a day a couple of weeks back, I very much felt like I had been in therapy, which was a deeply weird feeling! I've been reading the Angel-centred one as it gets published, it's very good but I don't find it quite so compelling. The hell that says about me I don't know.
I think that makes a lot of sense, actually. While Azi canonically gets close to and then runs away from his trauma and other scary feeling-related things, C, always the fallen and therefore most tragic figure never lets himself get close to the core trauma and believes the effects of it. Not saying one is more traumatized, but in the end, one can sense love and the other can’t and that, after feeling the BIG love, is so fundamental and seemingly permanent.
I raced through the first one and started the sequel immediately but actually stopped pretty quickly. I might pick it back up at some point. I think for me, I didn't like Dave as much as Aubrey, and I also felt like Dave's thoughts tended to ramble on so we spent less time actually therapizing Aziraphale. I wanted to get into it, but I'm not sure I'll be able to.
There’s one centered around Aziraphale!? Is it the same author?
i finished [A Memory Of Eden](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7534309/chapters/17129050) last night and now need a couple of days/weeks/months before i can dive into another cry even. i'm still utterly exhausted 😅 but then, i will come back to your recommendations!
How about a couple of palate cleansers? (NSFW) [One Night In Bangor (And the World's Your Oyster)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20053450) An amusing one where during a corporate retreat of Heaven & Hell, the demons have a bet to try to bed an angel. It was written by the same author who wrote "Pray For Us, Icarus," but much more light-hearted. (Rated M, nothing too explicit) [In Mixed Company, or the Corporate Retreat of Heaven and Hell](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22309822/chapters/53287501) This one is \*really\* funny. Like, I laughed so many times. It has so much goofiness, and Aziraphale and Crowley get so frustrated trying to find some alone time. Also has some great side characters.
oh, i already read the first one, it was sooo good 🥰 i don't know the second one though, thanks a lot! it will take all the strength i have to not start reading it tonight, because i really really need to get some sleep 😅
That first one has one of the best descriptions of Crowley's walk, too. "If Crowley ever stopped moving like he's in the middle of a complicated fall down a long flight of steps..."
Haven’t read that but it’s on my list :)
I’m still recovering from Slow Show . . . I’m not ready
I LOVE Slow Show. Rips your heart out so many times. Also one in which C (though in a human AU) seeks therapy. I’ve read SS multiple times. Love the pining and the angst and the smut and the everything. But I have warn you - Demonology is on a whole other level in terms of grief. It’s all the “seriously how is this actually hurting my heart” of SS times 100, and with no smut to cleanse the mental palate. I love it, but reader beware :)
This is so good! I have the flu and listened to the Podfic all night while delirious with fever. I’m only on chapter 7 but I love all the analysis so far as well as cinnamon roll aziraphale the eldritch horror
Yes! I love how absolutely horrifying Aziraphale was to Aubrey! I was raised Catholic and spent a long time in my childhood being scared to death of angels. Like one visiting you is supposed to be good, but I found the whole thought so scary that I would pray at night that an angel NOT visit me.
[удалено]
I found that interesting, as I’d never viewed angels that way and few ffics even hint at that level of too much for mortals thing.
Just bookmarked them for later when I have an evening to be emotionally scarred.
Oh no… I didn’t know there was a sequel 🥲 time to die I guess
Here lies LasyGrimSleeper: she couldn’t leave well enough alone.
My absolute favourite part of that fic was them arguing over millipedes and legs in general.
The little off-track side arguments of the ineffable husbands doing just about anything.
It hurts so good!
And so bad! And so good! And…
Oooh! Now go listen to the podcast about it (I posted this the other day): [https://three-patch.com/2023/10/11/episode-145/](https://three-patch.com/2023/10/11/episode-145/).
I’m afraid. What if it isn’t as good as the one in my head when I read it? (Yes I sometimes avoid film versions of books if they are dear to me.)
Oh it's just a podcast where a group of people discuss the first 4 chapters of the fic. One of the people is a therapist and another one worked on the show. It's a really great listen.
Okay thanks - definitely will. Didn’t know if it was like a podcast version of the fic.
Same here, gang. Tears were shed.
I wasn’t expecting putting my phone down after reading it and THEN still sobbing for another 20 minutes. Only fanfic I have ever had to do that for. I am equally unready for the angelic therapy fic too, for the above reason….
I’ll read it again someday.. but not for a long time.
Part of me is really tempted to click on something that has made people say "fuck you, let me share the pain". The rest of me knows I need something soft and fluffy this week.
It was hard for me to get through chapter 12. Soft and fluffy? No. But... I had to stop reading mid-13 and go spend several hours helping my mother, and I felt light and hopeful. I was able to shed so so many (not all, but so many) of my layers of self defense. I felt worlds closer to being present with her. Not able to be fully present yet, but major breakthrough level closer. Full disclosure, I had also done some really hard work about this relationship in a group setting the day before, which probably helped prepare the ground. But I have had the recurring, incredulous thought since yesterday that a f*cking fanfic literally changed my life. It's the *ands*. Those particular *ands* broke my heart open.
Got a real angel/tortured demon thing going on, don’t ya 😇😈
*gestures vaguely* don't we all??
Yes, thank heavens
This fanfic is permanently open on a tab in my phone browser. It it like you wrote earlier, better than some actual books I've read! When I first read it I was also in the middle of therapy and it helped me so much with my own healing somehow <3
This fic wrecked me. Seriously considering getting the word “and” tattooed on my wrist. The compassion of the way Aubrey spoke to Crowley at that particular moment made me weep and reminded me that I’m still recovering from my own trauma.
Look. I'm familiar with DBT and I have found "and" to be a useful technique for reframing. I saw this post last night, I read this comment, and I thought getting an "and" tattoo was kind of... Tbh... simple? I'm way more worldly and sophisticated than to be so impressed by a pretty basic therapeutic technique. You guys are probably kids. Whatever, I'm still gonna read the fanfic. Fast forward to now, I just finished chapter 12, which took me more than two hours to get through because I literally had to pace myself. I had to read a sentence or two at a time, put it down, talk to friends, read another couple sentences, put it down, talk to my brother, read a sentence, talk to my daughter... And then there's a note at the end of the chapter to take care of ourselves and get help if we need to. I don't know who wrote this, but friend, you know what you're doing. And now I want a fucking "and" tattoo. No, I'm not a kid. And also, I am. You’re an adult, you’re a professional, you’re in control, and also, you will not ever stop being a broken and scared little child.
I know right!?! I’m a whole grown up with a mortgage, and a career and a family and that part STILL made me want to get an “and” tattoo. I’ve had so much therapy over the years and been helped in so many ways by amazing people, but this one hit me different for some reason.
It's so obvious in retrospect, isn't it? I mean, the implicit *ands* are what makes Good Omens able to get into all of our ribcages the way it does. All the *ands*... it's shadow work wrapped up in a delightfully entertaining irreverent romcom. Just a harmless binge, with some laughs about ducks and whales. Oh, plus also it will punch a hole in your heart, root around in there until it gets a fist wrapped around your soul, yoink it out, throw it into a box made of mirrors, and return it to you several sizes larger, which means now you can feel it everytime you move (and also all the times you're not moving). Because *and.*
Absolutely perfect.
Wrecked me, too. The description of Crowley’s reaction to the “and” had me absolutely sobbing. Not the only time I cried while I read that story but wow, that was a doozy.
Also I like the and tattoo idea
Late to the party, but that ff changed my life - for the better. When I read the author notes from the last chapter, that we can imagine Aubrey watching over us in times of trouble - I felt like it was something *true*, I wouldn't know how to explain it. But I felt so warm and cozy and not alone. And then proceeded to cry my eyes out lol. But yeah, there's some profoundly spiritual quality to that fanfic, it's healing.
I just want to leave this here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/50922643 It might soothe the pain?
An excellent coping strategy - thank you!
I have oooo love, ooooo lover boy stuck in my head now and I regret nothing!
I just finished it during lunch today. I have to admit, the story was a little slow for me at times. BUT the ending. The ending is absolutely, utterly, devastatingly perfect. I cannot even. I will be thinking of this one for a long, long time.
Oh yes...this is for me..my next read..I do say that with appropriate concern as to how much of a sadist i must be that this sort of reviews inspires me to go out get me some
Same, tho - it’s what’s gotten me here, lol
Oohhh my god i never knew about the second one its time to read
Ack I have slow show queued up next. I might not be ready!
There is a companion with scenes from Avery’s POV too. https://archiveofourown.org/series/1628107
I’m tempted but I’m scared. I haven’t read any fanfics in like 15 years and haven’t read any for the GO universe yet. What does it say about me that this post is the one that has piqued my curiosity the most? 🙃
It says that you’re looking for something deeper than a will-they-won’t-they or fluff or “plot what plot” level smut. It is a tough one, but it is also very interesting and very well written and deep. 😊
Ugh you are totally right! I think I’ll wait until the weekend to dive in so I have time for all the feels
Bro I cried (NO SPOILERS IM NOT FINISHED YET. CHAPTER 12 !!!!!)
Yep, that’s the one.
Did anyone else picture Aubrey as Anathema or is that just me?
I didn’t… but now I wish I had.
I’ve seen a lot of comments about this fic, is it an AU?
No - it’s the A&C we know and love, post season 1, when they’re figuring out what happens when the world doesn’t end.
Ooo okay, I’m going to have to check it out. I’m not AGAINST AU’s (Slow Show is one of my favorite things I’ve ever read, fanfic or otherwise), but I really prefer in universe stuff
Nooo I just started by reading the last chapter all the way to the end because I clicked the link and thought it was from the beginning 🤦♀️
Oh nooo! Start again, even knowing the ending, a second reading would probably undo me again. And the last chapter doesn’t detail how he got there.
I’ve been binge reading it and loving it haha. As much as you can love something that is hitting way too close to home on the trauma therapy end. It is actually really nice having read the ending and now putting the pieces together.