Title: The Missing Spark
Author: The Island Hopper
Rating: T
Genre: General (?)
Pairing: Calvin/Susie
Status: Complete
Summary: As an adult, Calvin had lived his life on his own terms, following his own rules. Now with the death of his father, he is called back to his childhood home once more to face his demons and reconnect with old friends, even ones that aren't human. Complete.
Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6077764/1/The_Missing_Spark

A touching story I found while browsing someone's favorites.

It brought Calvin and Hobbes back to life, for me. Basically focuses on how Calvin deals with who he is and his current life, mistakes and all.

The author is great at translating emotion to text. Writing is excellent and compelling.

5/5

 

This story actually finished very recently. I followed it through half of the story and I absolutely love it. 5/5

 

Yeah, really not what I was expecting from a Calvin and Hobbes fic. But, a pretty interesting story, I really liked how ambiguous some aspects were, and the mature yet dreamlike tone.

 

It's... alright. No doubt that it is well written and all, but the end kind of conflicts for me a bit.

With her mother's death, Susie begins to see Hobbes as well, pointing towards a more fantasy type explanation for the tiger's existence. However, with his epiphanies and the publication of his books, Hobbes begins to be seen less and less, pointing towards Hobbes as some weird sort of hallucinatory palliative to what had ailed Calvin (and to a large extent, Susie) since his childhood. So, not only do the two representations create friction, the latter also kind of misrepresents Hobbes, since I never really got the impression that he was a much wiser creature than little Calvin.

Essentially, "the missing spark" couldn't capture that which had animated the comics. Which, regrettably, is the very high standard that any C&H fanfic will be held to.

3/5

 

It has some noticeable flaws: the whole story is of the navel-gazing variety, and while it works beautifully with the source material, its bleed-through to the Calvin/Susie interactions seems absurd. The epilogue bugged me as well. The narrative shift book-ended an emotional story about growing up with a summary of how happy they all went on to be. It sort of works, but it doesn't mesh well the rest of the story.

I cried like a little girl. Not once, mind you. I was wiping tears away as I clicked on to chapter 6. I went through a box of tissues. I shit you not.

Aside from his infernal manipulation of my childhood nostalgia, the guy writes a damn good Hobbes. Calvin is exactly what he should be, and his relationship with Susie hits all the right emotional marks.

The whole story seemed right, in a rare and uncomfortable way which I don't know how to put into words.