Title: Out of the Night
Author: Raining Ink
Rating: T
DLP Category: Dark Arts
Pairing: Unknown, though Slash has been ruled out.
Chapters: 32
Words: 132,229
Updated: August 20, 2012
Published: May 25, 2009
Status: Abandoned
Summary: Between 5th and 6th years, Harry is ready to take his life into his own hands. He's making decisions that will change the course of the war, and he's determined to learn the truth about Dark magic. Independent!Harry eventually Dark!Harry, no pairing yet.
Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5087313/1/Out_of_the_Night
Link (downloadable html-file, ch. 1-32): https://www.dropbox.com/s/s4ww9xm0o9zsllu/Out of the Night.html
Link (text-file, ch. 1-31): http://onj1.andrelouis.com/hp/Out of the Night.txt

I have got to admit I was surprised by the story. Sure, it has the usual cliches of the Indy!Harry stories, but the author manages to have a surprisingly refreshing and realistic take on those cliches. For example, the Potter vaults only have 25,000 Galleons as opposed to the millions/billions in others stories. Harry also claims a lost inheritance, and it's not from Lily, who is still a muggleborn. The inheritance actually sticks with canon and is fairly important to the story unlike other fics where they are just last names to make Harry seem more impressive.

What really made this story for me is Harry's slow descent into becoming a Dark wizard, a concept which is highly expanded upon in the story. Basically, Harry claims the inheritance of a Dark family, and he goes about wanting to learn more about the darker aspects of magic. From there on out, he mingles with several Dark Wizards and assimilates into their society. A lot of the Dark Wizards are Purebloods, so there is a lot of bias towards that side. I happen to support Pureblood superiority, so this was an added bonus for me. The author spends a lot of time giving the details regarding Dark Wizards and the Pureblood, a fact that I was appreciative of.

As for the pairing, I was a bit worried when I saw that the author is a college girl, who has slash stories in her favorites. Thankfully, she is not making the story slash, Harry/Hermione, or Harry/Ginny.

There are some problems I have with the story.

Spoiler

Harry seems a little too ready to be friends with Draco. He also has a too much of an indifferent attitude towards Malfoy Sr. The guy attacked him and his friends a few weeks ago, and he is fine with him walking free. That brings me to another two points, I didn't like. The portkey out of Azkaban and into the library is ridiculous. Azkaban isn't much of a formidable prison if people can just go into a library for a break. Malfoy Sr's freedom also annoys me. I'm sure Malfoy's has a lot of money and excellent lawyers, but he was caught at the scene of the crime. There is not much else proof needed.

I give this one a 4/5.


Edit by Minion, July 26, 2013
Raining Ink abandoned the story and deleted it.
Beonid provided a html-copy for downloading via dropbox (ch. 1-32).
I added another link to a text-file (ch. 1-31)

 

Harry Potter - Rated: T - English - General/Supernatural - Chapters: 20 - Words: 68,930 - Reviews: 468 - Updated: 7-30-09 - Published: 5-25-09 - Harry P. & Draco M.

Think I'll pass on this one

 

I've been reading this as well and think it might turn out pretty good, I'm going to wait to rate it until I have a more firm opinion on it though. But thus far it looks like it may be quite decent.

I do share most of the same problems with the fic as stated in the first post, especially the portkey business.

Though, shouldn't cell phones in the nineties be like, huge monstrosities? I think sometimes people forget this is the 90's and not present day. Or did the author say it was a 90's style one? Dunno, been awhile since I'd read that part.

I'll be interested in seeing how things go when he gets back to Hoggy Warty.

It's not slash, and their friendship is okay, imho, so far...

 

I specifically said in my post the she wasn't making it slash. She has mentioned it over and over again in her response to reviewers (they are at the end of chapters). Trust me, if there was even a little chance of Harry/Draco slash, I would click the X button quicker than Usain Bolt. There is no way in hell, I would read or recommend a slash fic.

Yeah, I forgot to mention the cellphone thing. That was another minor annoyance that I had. Cell Phones weren't half as accessible as they are now. Besides, wouldn't the magic in Knockturn interfere with the cell phone?

 

Maybe not as accessible, but my dad - who's a small business owner, not a corporate tycoon or something - has had one since the early 90's. They've been around.

One million cell phone users in 1987 in America alone.

And Hogwarts is the only place ever mentioned that nullifies technology, which is, if I recall correctly, due to the 'concentration' of magic. Hundreds of witches and wizards learning magic every day is probably as many or more spells than a typical day in the Alley. There's also Hogwarts' vaunted protections ("wards" in most stories) that might have something to do with it.


Now, getting on to the review!

I like this story. It's not the most canonical bit ever written, but neither does the author go out of her way to contradict canon...there's the bit about "internal" vs. "external" magic that might make Taure go apoplectic, but other than that it seems like it stays pretty well within the confines of what we see in the books.

Harry's progression...well, he's learned a few more spells, but he's not too much more advanced than he was when he started - we'll see how it keeps up, but I'm impressed, at least.

There've been several authors that have attempted to do something similar in the past - each one that I've read has failed pretty hard. There was one about Voldemort/Quirrell teaching rituals and whatnot to Harry and a bunch of first years...I think that one was a harem story or something, and wasn't that great. There was another one where I recall Harry going with Daphne and the Malfoys on Beltaine to Stonehenge or something (from that Ravenwood girl maybe?). And there've been several with "Family magics", and a thread of the same content here just recently, that this story brushes on at the beginning as well.

This story, however, has yet to fail hard. Don't get me wrong - there's a danger.

The Draco characterization, particularly, is way off - unless he interacts TOTALLY differently with Harry than he does with "Hephaestus", then this is a major point of contention for me. Most of the other characters are well-done, though. Even if Daphne is an Ice Queen (though the phrase wasn't quite used), which made me roll my eyes.

If it goes to slash...and I'm not saying it won't, though Harry has had promising interactions with Astoria, notably...then this'll suck and fail. But if not, then this could be a rare gem, and an example that could make others like it not suck.

So far, this story is a 5/5 for me - there are things I don't like about it, but I'd definitely call it pretty excellent. I'll hold off rating until I get a blood oath that it isn't going to be slash, though. It's been added to my favorites and alerts, and I recommend that others do the same.

 

Well, remember, Draco thinks that Hephaestus is an up and coming dark wizard. He's somebody that all the other dark wizards are immensely interested in so naturally he's trying to keep on Hephaestus' good side. There have been times when Draco's obviously held back on saying things simply so that he didn't piss on Hephaestus.

 

Wait a minute--wasn't Hephaestus the name of Alexander the Great's gay lover? >.>

 

Link

Hephaestion not Hephaestus apparently. Pretty close though.



I've only read the first few chapters so far, but it definitely seems to be one of the better Indy!Harry fics out there.

Will update with a rating/review once I've read more.

 

It doesnt seem too bad. Granted I havent gone too far yet.

She's handled the "Inheritance" cliche in what I believe is a unique way. Nothing too fancy or bloated to the point of breaking suspension of disbelief.

4/5 is my vote.

May change once more is read.
Edit: Lol. I like this story.

 

This story exudes pointlessness. It takes way too long before presenting the first instance of originality, which is not enough to counterbalance the blandness. Removing the extremism of the cliches just cuts out the extremely from ’extremely bad’.

The most obvious cliches and overdone shit are redressed in different wording - ’the strained atmosphere in Vernon Dursley’s new company car’ is still describing the car trip to Privet Drive. There’s the bizarre decision that Knockturn Alley will be the last place anyone will search for Harry.

2.5/5. Writing cliches in moderation is not in itself an interesting twist.

 

The story doesn't outright contradict canon as many such fics tend to do. It does, however, seem extraordinarily unrealistic with its characterisations at times. Hermione, Draco and Harry (the three main canon characters dealt with till now) seem very dissimilar to what canon tells us.

The author takes a long time (~60,000) words before actually letting Harry mark himself as "dark". This was obviously an attempt to show his descent into darkness. Unfortunately it's hardly a descent when Harry seems more than willing to embrace darkness the minute he's told about the Peverall heritage.

That said, I still, somehow, manage o find myself drawn towards this fic. I managed to go through the entire thing thus far with nary a break, wondering why the hell I was reading it. For that, and the reasonable writing style, I give it a 3.5/5 - rounded up.

(The mods can always pull it out of the library if it turns out to be slash)

 

It is decent, but probably not library worthy. Not at this point at least.

3/5 for now.

 

I ship Harry/Robin. I'm more than halfway through this story and I enjoy it. It goes the cliched-Independent!Harry route without boring you to death. I dislike the serious lack of conflict thus far, but I'm willing to keep reading.

I'd say it's a 4/5, but not much more than that. It lacks that spark of creativity that makes it a truly great fic.

 

Some facts I didn't like, but I thought there were some pretty good ideas behind it- definitely worth the time it took to read.
Still, it's more something for the recycling bin than the library-
3.2/5

 

This.

The story has it's fair share of cliches and little things that would bother most people, but once you get past that it's engaging in a way. Its sort of a guilty pleasure in many respects.

I'll rate it a 3.5/5, rounded up to 4/5. But, as Averis said no more because it lacks that special something.

 

I made it to chapter 16ish before it bored me to tears. The writing is good, and I didnt notice any grammatical errors, but there just isnt anything to the story to keep me hooked.

And despite the authors insistence that the story will not be slash, I have this feeling in my gut... Both the fics on her favorites list are slash.

2.5/5

 

I like it a lot. Draco scenes were a little gag worthy, but it keeps the standard Indy!Harry fresh enough to continue reading. I think it deserves a spot in the library. 4/5

 

This was just too OC for me.
I mean, this is the kind of stuff slash fans would love to read, about how Harry is becoming Dark and friends with Draco and all that.
Now I know author said no slash for Harry, but that still doesn't change the characterizations. They are exactly what I would expect in a slash fic. Even that wasn't the worst point of the fic for me. Its just the whole Rituals and stuff to become Dark. The way author believes that people are born Dark, and of course Harry had to be the exception being both Dark and Light.
2/5 for me.

 

I read all of the chapters posted. I have a good feeling about this story after the introduction of Astoria Greengrass. Hopefully that will be the pairing, (even better if it's Harry/Astoria instead of Hephaestus/Astoria) sparking a shit ton of Harry/Astoria, which will soon overtake the tons of shitty Harry/Daphne that are out.

But to be honest, I'd just be glad if she doesn't make it slash.