i'm not great at doing good critical analysis of fiction, but i know excellent writing when it beats me over the head and makes me read it all in one sitting when all i originally intended to do was casually peruse an lj.

In my books, if something makes you stop and read, especially when you don't have the time to do it, that's when it's a good story (or you're really bored and procrastinating. *g* Both are possible).

the pacing was terrific, the phrasing was witty without being over-glib, and both jack and ianto (and everyone mentioned, really) were delightfully in character.

Thank you! I have to put a lot of that done to my beta, especially the pacing, becuase there were whole new sections that needed to be written and whole sections deleted, but the final result was well worth it. (yay betas!)