Title: Shades of Grey and Darker than Black
Author: CrazedChakra101
Rating: M
Genre: Adventure/Romance (According to author)
Pairing: Harry/Susan
Chapters: 11
Words: 48,916
Updated: June 21, 2009
Published: April 22, 2008
Status: Work in Progress
Summary: Does salvation truly lie in the heart of the broken? A tale of the savior, and the one who saved him from the rest of the world. Harry Potter/Susan Bones. Chapter 9 is up!
Link: FFN

Well, aside from one of the shittiest summaries in all of fanfiction, it's a decent fic. Harry discovers his "specialness" before Hogwarts, and uses it to humiliate Dudley's gang--this increases after he finds a wand in an oddities shop near Number 4. He meets Susan in Diagon Alley when Hagrid takes him there, and is not concerned with what other people think of him (but also doesn't want himself announced to the world). The Sorting Hat has a modicum of actual intelligence and a less-cliched outlook on its job.

He gets sorted into Slytherin and doesn't give a shit about it, Daphne's a decent minor character--cold as ice, observant, and clever with words.

Harry has a connection of sorts with Miss Norris, which is kind of disturbing, and seems to have fair skills with wandless magic, particularly with coldness--he summons snow and icicles, and freezes a lot of water over some stairs.

The grammar and spelling are good, and the plot, if somewhat unoriginal, is at least done well thus far. Overall, it could go either way.

4/5


Checked by Minion, January 14, 2013

 

This does not bode well... I'll keep reading and edit with a review. But the prologue is horrendous.

On chapter 4: Harry is acting like an informed adult, not an ignorant eleven year old so far... but it isn't horrible so I'll keep reading...


Ice Princess is FAIL. I'm sorry but she's fucking eleven. Do people confuse being eleven with being twenty five now? Gah.

Can't go on. Too much shit.

2.5/5 rounded down.

 

People don't read a story because of bad summaries for a reason. If authors can't even write an good summary then that reflects on their writing level. This story is definitely not even up par to DLP recycle bin standards. Some stories are alright to read with mediocre writing but with a great plot, but this was neither. The plot is extremely generic with nothing special. The characters have little realism. 1/5

 

The summary was actually pretty decent, I thought, but the story's mediocre, and the plot is uninspired at best. 2/5

 

I could sense the author going for a universally-pitied Harry, which is often worse than a pussified one.

 

I...enjoyed it. But that could because I think Susan Bones is the most underused character in the series. If it was any other character I would give it a 1/5 due to the poor pacing of a story that will most likely never be complete and sketchy writing.

Susan Bones gives this a 2/5!

 

I managed to force my self to chapter 7 and it really isn't good.

Also how can you calmly enthuse? what does that look like..pretty retarded I would think.

 

I'm afraid I couldn't get past the second chapter, why do people continiously feel the need to have more than one person go to see Harry at the Dursley's, I personally believe that Dumbledore would go and see him just to see how he acted.

 

Gah. Read the first two chapters. Terrible.

First of all, there was no change in Harry's situation to bring on the magic. Without a point of deviation between cannon and fanfic the story feels only half thought out. Speaking of which...

The whole 'learns to use magic' line never turns out well, and always end up with Harry becoming a major player, scheming with the best of them.

The shop was just put there for the purpose of getting Harry a wand. To make matters worse, the wand had a Roc feather for a core. No where in cannon is a Roc mentioned. Authors should stick with the cores listed, but if they must have a unique wand for their uber character they should use a part from an existing animal.

After scanning the third chapter, I noticed that the characterization of McGonagall was really off.

2/5

 

2.1 stars. I was able to read through chapter 9, and Harry's friendship(?) with Miss Norris was a pleasant surprise if only because I don't recall seeing that done before. Otherwise, meh.

 

Yeah, the shop seemed to be based of Loralee1's shops which seem to come into quite a few of her stories, although most people don't take her stories to heard, just short and light hearted.

 

Nothing to recommend about the story. It has a ton of recycled stuff, and nothing particularly original. What is more, I am not sure it will ever be completed.

Score: 2.5/5

 

This was the review I gave on ff.net:

I liked this. I'm always a sucker for an intellectual Harry, and this fits the bill just fine, not to mention being quite well written.
There are a few things that got me, though. First, I think this Harry was much more suitable for Ravenclaw, but got sent to Slytherin because it has more 'street cred' in fandom. I may be wrong, and either way, the damage is done now, and it certainly isn't going to stop me from reading the story.
Another thing was how artificial the dialogue between the Slytherin children was. No one talks that way--the few Death Eater dialogue scenes we've seen showed that, while a bit formal, they didn't resort to the Chaucerian archaisms you had them spouting. And those were the adults, so I find little reason to think the children would be like that. I may be coming out a bit harsh here, but it's just a fandom trend that annoys me, because we're having eleven year olds talk like they are at some Renaissance fair.
Like I said, I hope I'm not coming out too harsh, because I did enjoy your story, how blase this Harry is about things and his contemplative attitude, not to mention his relationship with Susan. Keep it up, despite my reserves, this could become a classic. 4 1/2 stars.

 

I agree with Sesc, sometimes you hung up too much on the little things.

I am neutral to the "he is too mature" or "His vocabulary is not that of a 11 year old" stances. Really, we've seem so many fics in this forum that a few crappy things wont bother me anymore.

Still, I'm do think the plot and the friendships were a bit forced. And the ice tricks were cool, but using it to kill a full grow wizard was stupid. While JK way of killing Quirrel was idiotic I think thats a reasonable way that a 1st year would prevail over his teacher. No matter how useless Quirrel is, Harry would've never defeated him without the protection.(cannon wise at least)

And well, Its always nice to see a fic where Harry is not bitching around and crying cuz everyone thinks he's evil.
3.5/5

 

Meh.

I remember trying to read this a while ago, but couldn't get into it. I tried to read it again just now; still didn't work. All the flaws have been said before, so I won't repeat them, but they hold quite true in my eyes. It gets a 2/5, mediocre at best.

Not worth the bump, in my opinion.

 

I truly am intrigued. The obvious criticism of too much maturity aside, I find few flaws which would actually put me off the story. While the writing indeed is quite archaic (as Sesc called it), it does not bother me: The tone of the story along with the writing style creates a reading experience which is bordering on unique, at least in fanfiction.

The interaction between the characters is excellent, Harry saving Mrs. Norris just one of several interesting new takes on known canon situations - with the primary change sparking these deviations being nothing more and nothing less than Harry's personality.

Well, I'll just quit paraphrasing Sesc's review for now. He more or less covered all the relevant points. The only thing I would like to point out is that while it reminded me of a story by Fayr Warning as well, it was Reign of Power. There are few genuinely captivating stories and that is the one that set the benchmark for me (a long time ago).

All in all, 4.5/5 going on 5/5 if the author is able to keep everything up in the second year.

 

Ugh.

This story would get a good rating from me if only Harry's characterization wasn't so fucked. Everything else is good, but Harry is a pretentious asshat.

Forget maturity. No mature person speaks like that in real life. I know that its very hard for authors to write intriguing and realistic dialogue, but the author is definitely trying way too hard too make Harry (and Daphne) sound intelligent.

3/5.

 

It has a few original ideas, but it's painful to read. I'm waiting to see if it improves.

EDIT: my reviews of FFN and the author's reply.

for chapter 2:

for chapter 8:

for chapter 10:

Reply:

 

I personally highly enjoyed the fic as a guilty pleasure. I had no issue with the "young master" shit, so yeah.

Either way, this story gets a 5/5 from me, merely on a guilty pleasure basis. I do love reading mature characters, especially in this type of interaction, I enjoyed the dynamic between Harry and Daphne as well.