Title: Harry Potter and the Headsman's Hostage
Author: Mantis FA
Rating: M
Words: ~76,000
Status: Complete
Pairing: Harry/Cho
Genre: Romance, Summerfic
Era: Post-GOF
Summary:
What if Harry's fifth year at Hogwarts had begun not with a dementor attack and a trumped-up charge but with a birthday party and a ransom note? In this AU, the Order's decision to pull Harry out of Privet Drive on July 31 has far-reaching consequences.
Link:
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4259161/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_Headsmans_Hostage

Overall, a very pleasant story.

Well written, and the sex is tastefully done. The characters are interesting, and the author managed to get me to like Cho, so points are gained there: she's a character that I'm usually apathetic towards. I liked Sirius' characterisation too. It was spot on in my opinion: he was light-hearted and fun, but when a serious situation arose he lost all semblance of the fun-loving man.

Rest of the review is spoilerific:

Spoiler

If I were to pick at anything, I would say is is the pacing of the story, which is very odd. On the one hand, you have the romance. This travels extraordinarily fast - confessions of love within days of even admitting to like the person. I'll tell you that I didn't tell my girlfriend that I loved her until several months into the relationship. Saying so early cheapens the concept. The speedy nature of the romance is also made to feel unrealistic by the fact that Cho gets over Cedric so quickly. Any normal girl who had had her boyfriend killed wouldn't be able to date for a long time - like Cho in canon.

The rushing of the romance is especially peculiar (and noticeable) when considering the pacing of the rest of the story: extremely slow. Several chapters in, all that's been achieved is a picnic and a bit of flying. I think you see what I mean, if you look at the way the story pans out. Part of this is due to the fact that the story is confined to a part of the summer, but I've seen summer fics go into hundreds of thousands of words, so that's not the sole reason.

Anyway, other than the pacing, a very good story indeed.

4/5

 

Pretty sure I read somewhere that the author is working on it. He's one of those guys who doesn't start posting until the story is completed.

This is, honestly, one of my favourite Harry/Cho fics. Mantis's take on the Post-GoF genre is pretty good, the characters are spot on, for the most part. Action was excellently written and very suspenseful.

I round this this one up to a 5, due to the extreme lack of good Harry/Cho material.

 

This one was unrealistic, but decent for all that. 4/5

 

Harry/Cho? Harrry/Cho!!? HARRY/CHO??

Quite surprised to see one of my fav pairings in a fic rated pretty highly. I could of sworn I could count the number of decent H/C fics with a single hand.

Goes off to read. Will be back with a review.

 

I was very pleasantly surprised by how nice of a read this was; it wasn't the fastest moving, nor the most exciting or smutty fic out there, but it seemed to stand on its own very solidly. I really enjoyed the characterization, and enjoy how the author doesn't overdo emo-harry like many post-GoF stories. Very well thought out and put together, even if Harry is a bit more mature than I would expect. Well worth the time to go read.

4/5- very good, but pacing was extremely verbose at times. Well worth recommending and reading, but not a holy grail by any means.

 

Painfully slow... I can't get past the third chapter. I won't review it now, perhaps later if I read more, but in so far it's a 2/5 at best. A fic in which nothing happens is an essay, in this case, an essay displaying a possible pairing.

 

To chapter three, the writing seems to be of a high quality, with a smattering of nice details that smooth out the universe, but there are a few things that bother me.

I don't like the idea that a fourteen year old can out-duel both Sirius and Lupin. That doesn't work for me, it's like this is going to become a Super!Harry fiction.

It does seem a little fluffy in parts, but it's good enough to continue.

A tentative 3/5 for now, we shall see what happens.

 

I like it somewhat for being tolerable. The romance has me cringing though. It was good at first, then started being so cliched with the undying instant love stuff. A lot of these authors need to go back and remember how shit was like for them as a teenager. This seems really unrealistic to me.

3/5

 

Well written overall, certainly, but got a bit too fluffy towards the end for me, peaking with Harry brushing Cho's hair. I don't know why that bothered me so much, but it did. Decent overall.

3/5

 

What?!?! You've never been in undying eternal love-at-first-sight!?!?

You poor, poor soul.

 

Lust-at-first-sight was more likely when I was a teenager.

 

It was well-written, but overall an uninspired story. Weak abduction attempt and rushed Harry/Cho. 2.1/5

 

Which teenagers often mistake for love.

 

Teenage girls, not dudes (more often than not).

 

At first glance I thought the title was the Headmaster’s Hostage, and wondered to myself what Dumbledore was up to now. At second look I simply wondered: a what? And then my brain cells kicked in the realisation and I decided to try and read it. ​

<o>
</o>​

The start is boring and slow. It feels too much like it’s trying to stick to canon, which I can’t really understand. What’s the point of rewriting if you’re keeping most of it? At several points I stop and start to reach for OoTP, thinking that’s something has been simply copy/pasted in. Obviously the information is more or less the exact same, with the different author feel to it. ​

<o>
</o>​

This is another one of those stories that has me looking out the window, or drifting of in my own imagination; perhaps I should have pizza tonight. ​

<o>
</o>​

The conversations come with an air of: “We’re clearly saying informative things here, and it’s not just for the benefit of the reader.” It’s not very subtle at all. ​

<o>
</o>​

The rehash of OoTP in new clothes is getting old rather quickly and is starting to irritate me thoroughly. I read the text and hear my mind go: “yada yada yada, scroll past this, I beg of you!”​

<o>
</o>​

I’m almost falling asleep trying to read this. ​

Because only a “dark” wizard would use a raven. Sigh. ​

<o>
</o>​

Harry is being a brainless twat, and while that is in keeping with canon, it still pisses me off. There are some rather glaring plot holes in this, the portkey among them. Why doesn’t Sirius or Remus take a drop of blood from Harry to activate the damn thing and leave the kids behind? And why are they saying “portus” when activating it? That’s the charm for making one! I can’t keep going.​

2.3/5 I just can’t keep my concentration on this story. It’s not so much boring as it’s numbing. I’d recommend this story to anyone who has trouble sleeping and now, I’m taking a nap. ​

<o>
</o>​

 

Quoted for truth. Don't know many guys who would go for love at first sight as a teenager. (Other than the less....experienced ones anyways.)

 

Really well done. It's related enough to canon that you can make the very small leap of imagination. The sex was tasteful, the little action was done fairly well, and I like the bringing back of some humor for what we'd call a haunted man. On the other hand, parts of Harry and Cho's relationship fits what I'd term a summer romance. Near immediate passion that gets dubbed love. It happens, true, but yeah. A little too fast with the depth of emotion. Overall, it's still a decent read. 3.75/5

 

The romance was far from well-written, and the action scenes were quite pathetic, to be honest. There seems to be nothing hinting that Harry was anything more than an average wizard in terms of skill, yet he somehow manages to outduel two Order members, something which the author never really explained why. Reading through the chapters also sometimes felt like a chore. The grammar and pairing are pretty much the only redeeming factors in this story.

3/5 would be an appropriate score.