Crystal Blue Persuasion (Starsky & Hutch anthology zine)

Zine
Title:	Crystal Blue Persuasion
Publisher:	Asbestos Press
Editor(s):	Kelly and Rosemary C
Date(s):	1997
Series?:
Medium:	print
Size:
Genre:
Fandom:	Starsky and Hutch
Language:	English
External Links:
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The cover by Suzan Lovett was the inspiration for the story of the same name.
Both were inspired by the 1968 song by "Tommy James and the Shondells". In June 1996, a fan asked others: "Does anyone have a copy of the words to the song Crystal Blue Persuasion. Flamingo, one of the hottest writers in slash has written a S&H story to go with Suzan Lovett art work of the same name. Now, she needs the words to the song to finish off the piece. Can someone email me with them? I'll pass them along to her." This statement illustrates that the ease of simply looking something up on the internet was not an option at the time.

Crystal Blue Persuasion is a 202-page slash Starsky and Hutch fiction anthology. It has a front cover by Suzan Lovett. There are no interior illustrations.

The story by Flamingo won a Huggy Award at Zcon and a STIFfie, both in 1997. The cover won a 1997 Stiffie for Best Starsky & Hutch art.

From the Editorial

An excerpt:

This zine was inspired by the exquisite Lovett piece you see on the cover. Suzan, we can't thank you enough. Especially since that amazing fantasy scene directly resulted in the incredible Flamingo story that closes our zine. We'd like to thank Kathy O. for all her help, encouragement and inspiration. Friends like her are one of a kind. Her high caliber quality makes us all strive to do better. No one does slash like you do, Kathy. Here we must also offer our thanks to Ann M., for putting up with endless rhapsodizing about Starsky's nosehairs without killing us all. We'd like to thank our Ottoman Queen for coming through for us, and so well. Torquemada's got nothing on you, Glo. Poor, poor Starsky! Thanks to KayCee for above and beyond the call of friendship -- you know why. We'd like to thank Trish for her encouragement and Mary for her patience. Our poets add the final touch to this steamy stew. Thank you both for trusting us with these gems. And, finally, we thank our readers.

Contents

• Solace by Glow (1)
• Serenade Silence by Lynne Dhenson (97)
• Firestorm by Mary Millard (98)
• Thirteenth Hour by Lynne Dhenson (104)
• Eclipse by Rosemary C. (106)
• Metamorphosis Revisited by Isabel Ortiz (133)
• Lost Weekend by Theresa Kyle (134)
• Impulse by Lynne Dhenson (154)
• Crystal Blue Persuasion by Flamingo. According to the author's note this was Flamingo's first Starsky & Hutch story and it was inspired by the illo "Crystal Blue Persuasion" by Suzan Lovett. An author's note: "I saw it at a friend's house and asked Suzan where the story was that inspired it. She told me there was no story...yet. The illo became the cover of the zine by the same name.'" (155)

Reactions and Reviews

See reactions and reviews for Eclipse.

See reactions and reviews for Crystal Blue Persuasion.

[zine]: [1997]:

Reviewer's Disclaimer: The following are my opinions and mine alone. I didn't get them from anyone else and I have no intention of strapping someone down and making them believe what I have to say, either. (Where did I leave that strobe light...) I review therefore I am. If anyone disagrees with any of the following, please say so. I'd love to see discussion on any of this.

CRYSTAL BLUE PERSUASION a 202pp S/H fanzine published by Asbestos Press [addresses removed] Price--Can't remember. Either $17 or $20.

I really enjoyed this zine. I thought I would since it had stories in there from a couple of my favorite writers, but there were a couple of very pleasant surprises in it as well. Like more and more zines in the last couple of years, it's a double columned format (I'm beginning to think it looks a little odd when I actually see a single-columned zine anymore!). However, the format could have been gone over one or two more times. The columns are unjustified-right, which is perfectly fine, but the whole set up was done so that if you hada string of words with ellipses, the word before, the ellipses and the word after are seen as one long word and everything is moved down to the next line of the column leaving a *very* ragged right margin and more white space than was at all necessary. In the case where you have several words in a row all linked by ellipses, it makes it all the more noticeable. All that would have been required to fix it would have been a few well-placed blank spaces.

The cover is a gorgeous Suzan Lovett that inspired the zine itself. She does do very good S/H.

"Solace" by Glow--Starsky's mom has died just a few months after his brother's death and Starsky is not handling it well. This was actually one of the surprises. For one thing, I generally don't read authors I don't know anymore in S/H. I'm far from the first flush and I've been very disappointed in alot of the newer writers to come out of that fandom. This is also one of those storylines where it could have been easily done *very* badly. Now, granted, *any* storyline can be done badly, but there are some that lend themselves to it a little more than others. The fact that this story works, and works well, is a tribute to the writing of it. Not perfect (it does have more than a slight tendency to wallow), it's still a very well written story and I think it has more strengths (it manages to keep from getting *too* far into a wallow, which is a feat considering the storyline) than weaknesses. It's by far the longest story of the zine, about 96 pages, and it is a very angsty, very solid opener for it. This author also wrote a fairly fluffy, though fairly sexy bit of a phone sex story in THE FIX 17. I'm really looking forward to seeing what else this author comes out with in the future.

"Firestorm" by Mary L. Millard--Pretty standard story about a near miss where one of them almost dies (in this case Hutch) and the other one suddenly realises what he's almost lost (in this case Starsky). An okay story, but one that's been done many times in this fandom before--albeit, not often with the total destruction of Hutch's house.

"Eclipse" by Rosemary C. --A death story--or not. Well written, very sexy story and don't stop reading if the first part seems a little morose. Keep going! I like the fact that it is a happy ending, with reservations.

"Lost Weekend" by Theresa Kyle--Okay, why, in the middle of LA, does Starsky decide he must go to *Hutch's* apartment in order to get condoms when he discovers in the heat of the moment with a lovely (if slightly disturbing) lady that he's out? What, he lives in the one part of town that doesn't have an all-night drug store? Even in the early eighties (this takes place sometime after the series finale), I doubt if they would be unheard of. Well, he had to go to Hutch's to make this story work, which is basically that Starsky finds some gay mags in Hutch's apartment, realizes some hometruths and after an initial confrontation-reconciliation-speculation scenario, everything turns out okay. A little mushy for me (yes, even in S/H, there is such a thing as too much mush), especially on Hutch's part.

"Crystal Blue Persuasion" by Flamingo--My favorite MV writer and one of my favorite writers in all of fandom has decided to come in from the Siberia of fandom into a realm where other people are actually *writing*! :-) As would be expected, it's a solid story filled with angst and hot sex. This particular story is set not long after the episode "Shootout" (the one where Starsky gets shot in the Italian restaurant) and has Starsky trying to make Hutch face up to the fears the incident brought by making him return to the, as it were, scene of the crime. The second longest story in the zine, it's a strong closer for the zine.

So, to sum up, two strong, long stories that open and close the zine, an interesting piece from Rosemary in the middle and a couple of middling stories which, while not great, are nothing to really detract from the zine. Worth the price.

[zine, unknown date]: ...this zine is well worth buying, if you're lucky enough to find a used copy at a con or online. Many of the stories are now online at the S/H slash archive, which is a blessing, as they're terrific. The zine is nicely edited and a great sampling of some wonderful authors.