Title: Harry Potter and the Darkest Vindications
Author: Xarkun
Rating: T
Genre: General
DLP Category: General Fics
Pairing: No Pairing (WIP)
Status: Work in Progress

Summary: Harry Potter’s life is forever changed when Professor McGonagall tells him he is a wizard. Because Harry was never told Dark Wizards come from Slytherin, he allows himself to be sorted in to that house. Will this merely serve to strengthen his resolve as a hero, or will he end up more evil than even Lord Voldemort?

FFN Link: Here



Darkest Vindications is fan fiction work by Xarkun completed to the end of the first year of Hogwarts. With the authors plans for the story to span over the seven years of Hogwarts, so far it is an interesting read of an eleven year old Harry Potter ending up in Slytherin and others actions and reactions to the sorting and their effect on Harry.

To start off with, besides Professor McGonagall being disappointed that Harry did not end up in Gryffindor house it does not bother the staff of Hogwarts about Harry being sorted into Slytherin. The story goes on throughout the year with the main focus on Harry, how he reacts to the others (in and out of his house) and how he changes because of his placement and other peoples influences. Not him suddenly becoming evil, not him suddenly proving Slytherins are misunderstood, but the fact that an eleven year old child was placed in one group and he starts to adopt those group values as his own.

The quality of Darkest Vindications is way above the norm for a fan fiction writer, personally I would say very high quality. But I will let that be judged by people who know what they are talking about.

All in all a realistic interpretation of an eleven year old growing up and how the simple fact of who you are around can change who you are personally and your perception of others, both good and bad. Whether or not that is what the author planned when writing the story, that is what stands out the most. An entertaining read.

For now I rate it 5/5 and eagerly await the new chapters.


Edit: I should state that the first year of Darkest Vindications follows cannon closely as far as events go. The major aspect of the story is Harry and how his view has changed just from being in Slytherin and a friend of Draco Malfoy before any other people could influence him. So if you are looking for a AU story that does not follow cannon, so far this is not the story for you.

The author however did state he plans from the Chamber of Secrets deviating from cannon events more. But for now, it is just a cannon rehash focusing on group dynamics. As the story grows, so will the events.

 

I'll get back to you on this one, it sounds good. I'll probably post a better review when I have finished reading the entire fic.

 

I've been following this lately, and it's been a decent way to spend time. It's not perfect, but it's above average for ff.net, for sure.

The review Dareycow gave is a pretty good one, and I don't think I can do better when I'm barely awake.

There are some small grammar and spelling errors, but nothing major, really, and nothing to make most people x out on sight. I'll give this a solid 4/5, and admit I'm curious to see what he'll do with the second year.

 

A major problem with this story is that it's boring. Booooring.

It's almost as if the author has taken all the major events of the first book and ticked them off one by one on a shopping list. Unfortunately, he doesn't have Rowling's easy and entertaining style of writing to pull it off.

That said, his punctuation and grammar is mostly okay, so that places him a cut above other authors.

3/5: Bland, though technically correct, writing means that this story is tolerable for the desperate but definitely not Library worthy.

 

I agree somewhat with trilingue, but part of that is I think just down to Philosopher's Stone. I mean, there really isn't a whole lot to change about unless you want to go with an entirely different plot or just ignore the stone.

The author has said, I believe, that things will diverge from canon a lot more for Chamber of Secrets and beyond. So I'm looking forward to that.

The story isn't perfect as is, but it's certainly better than many 'Harry sorted into Slytherin' stories. Dareycow's review is pretty accurate.

I hope and believe it will get better as we get deeper into the story.

Right now I'll give it a 4/5.

 

It starts with a below-average rehash of canon events with very minor changes. With such slow pacing I didn't think I'd like it, but fortunately it got much more interesting as the plotline diverged farther from the canon.

Writing is pretty good, I've been able to spot only one 'weak' instead of 'week'. I wasn't looking for spelling errors, though, so there may be more. Aside from spelling, author's style is pretty good too, especially in later chapters.

Plot, while nothing special at the beginning, is rather interesting as the story goes on and there are some ideas I haven't seen before in fanfics.

Spoiler

Like Harry thinking that Hermione is out for the PS and that she's using Ron and making up shit about Snape

Overall, mediocre beginning and rather fine later chapters. 3.5/5 rounded up to 4/5 from me.

 

I agree 100% with this review, I read the entire thing a few weeks back and I have no idea why, I guess I was just waiting to get to something interesting. The author may say he will divert from canon in CoS but at this point who cares? he hasn't grabbed my interest yet so I doubt year 2 will change my opinion. To me this is just the generic "Harry sorted into Slytherin" fic.
3/5

 

This is a complete waste of time. The plot follows the same events of the first book, only that not only Harry but every first student act like idiotic incompetent morons.

The dialog is lacking, consisting mostly of malfoy speaking something against mudbloods. Every slyterin appears to act without a single drop of wit or cunning, while harry goes around getting punched or locked on a closet.

You can expect the usual I-luv-Snape-and-like-to-learn-potions on the sequel, since the only idea Harry was able to come up with to get revenge on his peers was to dose them with love potions of his own making(of course, it could be found on his first year potion book).

Ron is the usual antagonist of slyterin fics, acting like a idiot to everyone, and we can also count with the incredible knowledge of We-dont-have-wood-Granger.

I wont even go into Harry getting bullied and having no time to study any spells to defend himself, while the author never explained what he do with his time.

All in all, another failed try at Slyterin!Harry

1\5

Is it just me or anyone else gets pissed of by: “But I can’t be a wizard. I’m… just Harry.”

 

Oh god. I just said it was pretty good and there are two updates full of pussy!abused!Harry.

I change my rating to 2/5 because it wasn't terrible enough to grant 1/5 rating.

 

Yeah the new updates look pretty sad. I'll just have to go away for a couple weeks and come back when he is more into the story, hopefully it actually moves along.

He did say in his authors notes he wanted Harry to be abused so it will push him over the edge to go Dark. We'll see how it turns out.

 

There must be over nine thousand similar fanfictions. This one has no originality - the characters are either stupid, retarded or simply bland.

Maybe it will get better in the future, but so far it doesn't deserve to be in the library.

2/5

 

Ok, I'm in the "I said it was good and then looked at an update and wanted to kill myself" boat with KrzaQ. On the other hand, I do think the new shit was bad enough to go to 1/5.

 

I looked at the summary thinking was going to be awesome and I got the exact opposite. This isn't a terrible fic beyond words as some of the stuff I've here but in my books it gets a 2/5.

 

This is a pile of stinking drivel. Its pathetic, nothing remotely interesting happens. Only change is he is friends with Malfoy, and is more tolerant of racism.

Worthless. 1/5.

 

What he said.

 

I couldn't get into this one. That I couldn't quite grasp the concept of Crabbe and Goyle being Harry's main antagonists. Seriously, Crabbe and Goyle? 3/5

 

It isn't bad, but it isn't great.

The author needs to have their chapters beta edited. I noticed errors that a word processor would not catch because they were correctly spelled, but wrong words. Such as "word" for "work" and such.

The characterization is pretty good and if this is to become a dark!Harry fic it will probably be more believable than most of them where Mr.Goodygoody suddenly become Jr.!DarkLord.

The tolerance of pureblood supremacy is believable too--Harry never gotten anything decent from muggles would eventually come to hate them.

Over all I would say 3/5.