An idea for a HP/Dresden crossover that I can't decide if it's fail or win.

Anyway...

The Dresden world is the real world. In the Dresden world, the Harry Potter books have been published, as in reality.

In the Dresden world, an HP geek with some small amount of talent casts a spell. This could happen in two ways:

1. Person is evil, and the spell is is to bring Voldemort out of the book into reality, but the spell goes wrong and HP arrives.

2. The person is a fangirl and the spell is to bring HP to life out of the book so that she can have her way with him.

Either way, we have an adult HP in the Dresden universe.

This could then go in a variety of ways. One way would be to have Harry escape the practitioner that brought him to life and eventually run into Harry Dresden, possibly becoming his apprentice so that he could learn about this new world and its magic.

The copy of the book that was used to summon him could be like a horcrux to Harry as Riddle's Diary was to him in CoS - his life force depends on it, and to destroy the book would be to kill HP. Naturally, once HP figures this out he wants to find the book. Maybe have it so that some other people (Black Council?) are after the book so that they control Harry P - a very useful tool, especially considering what the HP magic can do which the Dresden magic can't.

Another interesting aspect of the story would be Harry coming to terms with the fact that he's not real.

Finally, to add a final twist, you could make it so that the Black Council was behind it all along. They wanted HP, but wanted to summon him through someone else for security reasons - thus they used a small time practitioner as their pawn. Harry Potter is in fact not Harry Potter at all: he's an Outsider or something of that sort, with the fictional personality of an adult Harry Potter as a construct placed upon the Outsider in order to gain access to HP's talents.

The story could be from either Dresden's or Potter's perspective.

Alternatively, you could take the humour route. HP could go kill JKR for putting him through so much crap. Or he could make fun of the HP series, talking about how it didn't happen that way and how JKR has got it all wrong and it doesn't even make sense etc. Or HP could discover H/D fanfiction and go on a mission to kill all fangirls... so much potential.

 

Harry meeting a Fangirl would be great. ;o

 

How would a geek without much talent perform such a spell? Since, after all, it involves not only conjuring the body, but the sould and memories as well. And, you know, creating all of HP magic.

 

Two answers:

1.

You're not creating it, you're summoning it, out of the book, much like you'd summon a demon out of the Nevernever.

2.

 

Answer 1 does not make much sense. The Nevernever is a place and so demons can be summoned from it , you can go there etc etc. However how can you summon something for somewhere that does not exist. If that were possible then why would not every two-bit wizard summon entire armies, dragons, knights, !uber lazer guns, space marines and whatever else they find in books they read?

 

Magic. (filler)

 

I'm sure the author could come up with something. I mean, it's not hard.

Two possibilities:

It works with Harry Potter because so many people have read it. Magic comes from emotions, life etc. What's to say it doesn't come from ideas as well? As an idea, the idea of Harry Potter is a strong one, in that many people possess it. Thus, it's summonable where nothing was before.

OR

Magic and belief are linked strongly. The HP geek is such a geek about HP that he's convinced himself that it's all real to the extent that he truly believes it. Thus he can summon HP because he honestly has faith that HP is real, whereas other people that may try to summon CHAOS SPACE MARINES are trying to summon a fictional concept which they know to be fictional.

"Exist" is such a flexible term. The HP world has no physical reality, but it certainly exists: it exists in the books, it exists in the minds of the readers, it exists as an idea.

 

I think there's some potential here, but you should be careful to consider all the potential big plot holes up front. For example, you seem to thinking about the problem with this spell idea in the first place - that maybe it was the Black Council leaking the spell to the small timer in the first place. Additionally, some thought would be needed to decide exactly what magic Harry Potter would be capable of, and if he's an Outsider - exactly what that would mean.

But I think it could be done.

 

I honestly don't know what to say about this idea. It's definitely one of the most original ways to bring the two worlds together.

That would be the most likely way to make this idea work as it has a firm grounding in canon. Another thing to remember about belief in the Dresden Verse is that the more people who believe in something the more power it can have.

Another idea that you could possibly use would be that since we know that powerful enough dreams can form there own region of the Nevernever (Grave Peril) perhaps there are enough people who truly believe in Harry Potter and his world that they gave rise to it in the Nevernever?

No matter which one of these ideas got used it would definitely take a very good author to make it worth reading.

 

I think this lies far too close to the traditional "Author and Friends get transported into (insert book here)".

Of course, as soon as you get past the rocky start the rest of the Idea becomes interesting, but a HP geek practically willing Harry into being?

Thanks, but no thanks.

 

2. The person is a fangirl JKR and the spell is to bring HP to life out of the book so that she can have her way with him.

JKR is never identified by name to the reader. The ritual is performed by a blonde middle-aged woman in a Scottish castle. Smart people will clue in. AFAIK, JKR doesn't actually own a castle, but it's a common misconception and is one of the myths about her.

Using JKR also gives you a larger range of materials for her to summon Harry with other than a store-bought book. Otherwise there might be dozens of Harry Potters (and Snapes, and even Gandalfs) running around the world thanks to other obsessed fans. I favour using the notes and scraps of paper that she first sketched Harry's character out on, and the fountain pen that she wrote it all with.

It makes some sense that an older middle-aged woman would summon an adult Harry Potter, her literary creation, as a part of her wish fulfillment fantasies. It's not necessary to explore her motivations too deeply.

Instead of the book being a horcrux, make the fountain pen his link to the real world. Whoever has the pen controls Harry Potter. HP is under JKR's control until she either dies or he tricks it out of her. Once he has the pen he's paranoid about losing it. He keeps it on him at all times like a luck charm and life line. It can become a very useful plot device to motivate him.

If the pen is broken, then Harry would be 'unwritten'.

Keeping Harry stuck under JKR's control for years will allow him to adjust to the world and perhaps its magic systems/rules for a while without any apprenticeship with Dresden. I'd rather get Harry chucked straight into the plot rather than be forced to dick around training with Dresden.

Yeah, that is essential, but without becoming boring and introspective. I've seen it done with AI's and with fictional characters like Harry is here. I thought of having Harry be some kind of supernatural entity or spirit like Bob, who's been imprinted with HP's personality, but I don't like that. I'd rather that Harry be a construct, created purely from JKR's imagination, writings and ritual.

I can't help but draw parallels between Harry and the numerous literary characters of the Dreaming in Neil Gaiman's Sandman. Because of Harry's nature, how would that change how he interacts with magic and the spells cast on him compared to a normal mortal. Does magics effects on him differ depending on how much he accepts that he's fictional?

That's all just to set the scene for Harry's character. I don't have any solid ideas for an actual plot. Infact, there is so little plot here that this setup will work equally well for many crossovers, not just Dresden Files. As long as it involves modern magic in some capacity, you can probably fit this in.

Hmm... plot. I'm leaning towards having it being a ploy by the Fae. Now, why would they want a creature of the imagination running around on Earth? Is Harry's driving motivation to become human, ala Pinocchio? And if that's his aim, should he fail or succeed? There's plot ideas bubbling away in my mind now. >_<

Ideally, most of this setup would be either untold or used only as required. I wouldn't want to bore the audience or the writer. Get to the exciting parts as quickly as possible.

 

Well, Harry could get "dark" for some time, question his morals, decisions, motivations and just do what he wants to do, like this world isn't real/ he isn't bound to the world.

Dresden and Harry could meet while Harry is having a little tour in Chicago (blow things up, whatever), they don't have to be on the same side at first, if ever.

You would need a very good author for this