Title: The Hunt
Author: Brown
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Crossover/Action
DLP Category: Alternates
Pairing: None
Status: Complete
Summary: A couple of years after Voldemort's death, Harry tracks Macnair - the last Death Eater - to St. Louis, and has to work with the law enforcement (and vampires) there. Anita Blake crossover.
Link: http://www.tthfanfic.org/Story-20238/Brown+The+Hunt.htm

Now, I'm not posting my story here because I think it's library material - 'moderately good', at best. But DLP is known for harsh constructive criticism, and I'd like some of that. So please, tell me absolutely everything I did wrong, so my next story is better.


The story is part of a series:

Series: http://www.tthfanfic.org/Series-1565


Part 1: Take A Walk On The Mild Side
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,181
Published: Sep 3, 2009
Summary: Buffy meets the Boy-Who-Lived one Halloween.
Link: http://www.tthfanfic.org/Story-20226/Brown+Take+A+Walk+On+The+Mild+Side.htm

Part 2: Intermission
Chapters: 12
Words: 11,726
Published: Sep 10, 2009
Updated: Jan 17, 2010
Summary: Short scenes set between Mild Side and The Hunt
Link: http://www.tthfanfic.org/Story-20287/Brown+Intermission.htm

Part 3: The Hunt
Chapters: 10
Words: 30,516
Published: Sep 3, 2009
Updated: Mar 10, 2010
Summary: Years after the War, the last remaining Death Eater resurfaces in St. Louis. Harry can't help but go himself.
Link: http://www.tthfanfic.org/Story-20238/Brown+The+Hunt.htm

Part 4: Just Visiting
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,886
Published: Apr 8, 2010
Updated: Sep 8, 2010
Summary: Harry returns home for information, and investigates a series of thefts. Someone's been stealing souls...
Link: http://www.tthfanfic.org/Story-21953/Brown+Just+Visiting.htm



Checked by Minion, January 6, 2013

 

I haven't read any Anita Blake, but according to what I've read about the series, it had two phases: one kinda like Dresden Files and one which is Erotica. Is this a cross over with the former or the latter?

It's part three of a series. Should we read from the beginning?

 

I don't have the time to read it at the moment, but I wanted to throw this out there:

If you want just constructive criticism, post in the Work By Author section (near the bottom of the main page). If you don't think it's worthy of the Library, then you shouldn't submit in the For Review section.

Decide which section you really want it in, and at that point Tinn or another mod/admin will move this post if necessary.

Edit: I suppose if it's complete and you don't want to change anything, then I guess there's nothing wrong with leaving it here as a Hail Mary and getting some feedback. Who knows, maybe it is good enough for the Library?

 

I enjoyed it.

I'd suggest starting from the first book in the series, but it's not entirely necessary. The first and second stories detail Harry's introduction and interaction with Buffyverse, while this third story is about Harry's introduction to Anita Blake's world.

Writing is solid, both coherent and clear. No real complaints in that department. Noticed a few grammar/spelling mistakes, but not enough to detract from the story. Wouldn't mind more description and details, but that may just be me.

I recall some of the chapters had minor formatting issues, making it a pain to read. I like my stories with spaces between paragraphs. Or maybe that's just how Twisting the Hellmouth is, I don't read many stories there.

Characterization is consistent and interesting. Harry himself is competent but not flawless. Harry seems a little ignorant of the muggle world considering he grew up and spent his summers until he was seventeen living as one, although maybe he completely cut himself off from the muggle world around then.

I've read the first five or so Anita Blake books but stopped when Anita became a blatant mary sue, the plots started disappearing or repeating, and the pointless erotica started up. To the authors credit, Anita Blake doesn't seem very mary sueish in this story, although that's no doubt partially because the Harry Potter magic system is so powerful in the hands of a skilled wizard.

Author has taken some liberties with the magic system, but that has never bothered me much. One of the most glaring was when Anita got injured and Harry said he couldn't heal her because the damage was caused by magic. That's not canon, if Harry knows the proper spells he should be able to heal damage caused by magic.

It seems like some important stuff happened off screen before the first story even started, which I always find annoying. It is Harry Potter AU though, so I guess that should be expected. Hopefully the author paints us a clearer picture of what happened back then.

My only real complaint is that nothing truly important has happened so far, aside from introductions. But it looks to me as if the first three have just been setting up future stories, so I'm hoping more action and important events happen in the fourth story.

4/5

 

Huh . . . I didn't know the Anita Blake series took place in St. Louis. Never read it because I'm not into vampires and other stuff like was mentioned in the wiki article, but kind of interesting that something took place in my hometown.

Now I definitely won't read it for fear of screaming "THAT'S NOT HOW IT IS IN STL! FUCK YOU!" Ah well.

 

Don't associate that shit with Dresden, faggot. Anita Blake is nothing like Dresden. Necromancer Succubus sounds awesome at first, but then you realize the author is fucking retarded and mistakes the word succubus for absolute whore with an obsession for dick.

OP; Fucking Anita Blake.. You want a good female lead, go read Mercy Thompson instead.

 

Lol, I remember reading this a while back. IIRC, this story was the reason why, when I made the "Rules of Crossover" thread, I added a clause saying that Harry was allowed to cross to another fandom and brutally kill everyone there if it was Anita Blake.

Sorry, but Anita Blake = fail. I'm not even sure if it's better than Twilight. Anita Blake is what happens when an HP slash fangirl writes original fiction.

 

Hmm. Seven replies and only one of them really about this story.

Anyway...

In a nutshell, I saw this a while back and found it interesting enough to continue reading. I'm enjoying it and looking forward to more.

HP/ABVH crossovers that center around Harry but DON'T have him suddenly becoming a submissive (no matter how god-like his powers) gay who bottoms for each and every swinging, preternatural sausage in St. Louis are so exceedingly rare, that if I see one, I'll at least give it a try.

Spoiler

Imagine my shock when even the vampire who marked him turned out to be female, miracle of miracles. And Annalise is amusing too.

So, yeah, to an extent I was ready to enjoy it just based on the fact that it's an HP/ABVH fic where Harry isn't pulling a train for everything fanged and/or furry in Missouri. It's still a competently told tale, even without my determination to enjoy it.

I agree with most of your assessment and will go ahead and add a "me too."

However, the exact quote you're referring to (as far as I know) is Harry saying "Magic resists magic," in regards to Anita's shoulder.

The whole thing was pretty vague, so it could be interpreted the way you did, with Harry saying you can't use magic on a magically inflicted wound.

One could also read it as Harry saying that healing Anita specifically would be difficult because her own (very weird) magic would resist his effort to heal her.

If it's the latter, I guess I could buy it, though it is a tiny bit of a stretch. If it's the former, then you're right and it's a fairly bogus misrepresentation of HP canon.

The only wounds we've seen like that in canon are certain ones inflicted by particularly dark magic, and even some of those can be fixed, to an extent, with the right countercurse (like Sectumsempra).

Of course, the author could be setting these rules in place now so that later in the series Harry isn't just running around healing people of wounds that would, normally, be very deadly in Buffy and Anita's worlds.

As a method of increasing the danger level for everyone involved, and using the excuse that it's not as flagrantly awful as it normally would be since this is a crossover, I wouldn't find this explanation so unreasonable.

But, yeah, outside of a crossover it would be lame to suddenly restructure HP magic so you can't heal jack crap.

---

The idea behind Anita Blake is sound. The series started off really well, then turned into porn that was at a level of mindlessness that even I found stunning.

But this is precisely the kind of series that needs fanfic the most. It's the ideas/worlds which show promise, but are being written by monkeys hellbent on shitting them up, that are in the most dire need of being removed from the author's hands and placed in care of the fans.

Harry Potter, sadly, became a prime example of this, though many of the fans are as batshit insane as JKR.

I wonder why it is that, of the books out there whose author's have specifically asked the fans not to write fanfic of them, most of them are either being destroyed by the actual (batshit crazy) author, or were shit to begin with.

tl/dr: Don't automatically hold the rapidly increasing suck of the Anita Blake books against the fanfic based on them.

 

The early ABVH series really gets more flak than it deserves based on the awful latter half. Everything up until after New Mexico (Book 6?) was pretty cool, and it has the potential to be an interesting world to cross in, where things are dangerous enough that canon HP magic isn't quite an auto-win.

Haven't read the OP yet though I read through both prequels: I found them to be decent but not great, though I don't really like shortfic much so I'm hoping to be pleasantly surprised here. If the Harry vs Faith spar was anything to go by the combat sequences have some potential at least. I also liked the comparison between BtVS and HP magic highlighting that the BtVS version is better for long distance effects (how many times has some nutcase with herbs and a book totally incapacitated all of Sunnydale from his/her dorm room?) In terms of that cross simple magic like Stunners and Vanishers are way more impressive than something big, slow, and unwieldy like a Fidelius.

EDIT: Read it
I liked this better than the two proceeding stories, and am interested enough to keep reading the sequels. While action scenes are few and far between the ones that exist are of exceptional quality, and the rest of the fic varies from acceptable to good. Possible Harry/Femvamp(s) interaction in the future could be interesting, as is this fusion AB/HP/BtVS verse in general. 4/5

 

Okay. I read it. No egregious grammar errors that I noticed. The story doesn't work for me though because there was no conflict.

Everybody is a good guy except for Macnair, and he was easily taken care of. What with there being vampire masters and human servants in this story, I expected Macnair to be the human servant of a vampire which would create some conflict among the vampire masters. I think that would have made 'The Hunt' a better story, but as it stands 2.5 stars for good grammar and an additional .5 star for a non-cliched (to me) crossover for a total of 3 stars.

 

Huh.

First the obvious. The formatting blows. Brown needs to place spaces between the paragraphs.

That said - this story left me fairly conflicted. On one hand - AB is a storyverse full of potential - that has been twisted into slashers paradise. I'm not sure if I fear AB or Twilight stories more. There are however exceptions. I even once found a Btvs/Twilight oneshot I liked.

With this story, I liked it when it focused on Harry. The Anita parts were tolerable because it helped the story, but I doubt I'll ever truly enjoy reading about her character simply due to the large number of male lovers she simultaneously takes on. Thankfully that was downplayed here - although I did skim the sections where she was talking to Jean Claude Vandamn. What I really liked about this story is how it took post-DH elements (where Ginny was apparently killed) and has him chasing down well, bad people/things. Even though there wasn't much action - I liked Harry interacting with the other characters as he tried to maintain the veil of secrecy of the wand-wizard world where other types of magic are public.

The story did leave me with wanting to know more about the Harry/Annalise/Olivia possible relationship. On one hand, I liked that it was kept vague. On the other hand, I do really like Harry/OC stories - so I wouldn't mind if that part was expanded.

4/5

It's nice to see an unique post-DH universe that looks like it will be further developed by the author. Thankfully, the author looks like he/she is avoiding taking Harry to the slash side.

 

Okay, so, areas for improvement:

1. Fix the formatting. I think I have figured out the problem, so the next story should be more readable.
2. Less Anita. There will be less of Anita as a character, but I quite like the AB universe, and there will be some shenanigans with the treaty between the wizards and the vampires.
3. Action sequences are decent. Okay. Write some more action in, so I can practice those and get them a bit more polished.
4. More of Harry actually Doing Things. Well, the next story should tick that box. I've got it mostly plotted, should start writing it soon.

I did kill Ginny off in the backstory, and quite horribly too. Fair warning for you guys, there will be some Ron in the next story. I'm not going to write him as an idiot (which means that he's OoC, ha).

Thank you for the commentary. Hopefully, you should see the effect on the rest of this series.

 

Formatting issues aside...

To understand this story properly, one needs to know the AB universe significantly. Since there is very little explanation as to the characters, other than their name and position in the universe. The AB universe has far too many characters to integrate properly into the plotline of a story this short.

Given that I'm very familiar with AB I think it was a pretty good story.

Anita was a little OOC, but that's not all that bad. I always thought she was too much of a hard-ass bitch in the series anyway, well, before she turned into porno-queen!Anita.

If you plan on staying in St. Louis in the future, I would suggest opening up the characterization of whichever person you use. ie: Make Jean Claude more Machiavellian, Anita bitchier, Jason playful, Richard a pain in the ass, etc. Since I don't know who you are going to use, I can't make any suggestions.

The whole Audeur thing wasn't necessary since it didn't play any part in the plot. It was just thrown in there for no purpose, unless you plan on her adding Harry to her harem later... ugh. Try not to introduce plot points that serve no purpose. Your time can be better filled with expanding on characterization or backstory.

Harry-wise: I like him. I don't know about the Magic resists Magic thing, but the explanation above works for me if it's needed. Annaliese looks like a winner to me. Must have more fun with that.

 

I've never read Anita Blake and I didn't get confused at all. The grammar and structure of your story are both good, plus all your characters are well written. People have pointed out that its a bit slow, it hasn't been a problem at all, for me, yet, but you will probably have to eventually pick up the pace a little. So a 4/5 for me.

 

I went into this story very very skeptical, and I am quite pleased to say that I was very suprised with the outcome. I quite enjoyed it to be honest. It's well done, fast paced, and engaging. I found myself disappointed when it was over.

I Don't give 5's but this is the fourth story I have every seriously considered giving one to.

4.5/5

 

This is big. Usually if a story has formatting issues I don't even bother reading it, but I'm glad I endured.

Eh, I'm actually fine with Anita in this story. I think most people just dislike the way Hamilton writes her... which is as a mary sue. As someone said, the premise of a succubus necromancer is actually fairly interesting, it all depends upon how you use her.

Yes, action is good.

Good luck with the next story.

 

It's been a while since I've read the AB series or AB fanfiction. This is a rare piece amongst the terrible fandom that is out there.

This was light, emoness/angst was very low for an AB verse story, both things that I enjoyed.

Anita was less herself which in my opinion is good. One can only handle so much 'I'm a bitch because I'm complicated and can't handle my feelings' character that Hamilton has written. She was more easy going than she usually is, so that makes her ooc but I like her that way so good on you.

Harry's characterization was interesting, he seemed more like the boy we would expect to come out of the OotP book than the last two books. Despite our general dislike of the last two books here Harry had evolved in a stronger person. Still he was engaging so if that is how you continue to write him that'll be fine. He just might not fit in very well in the super dramatic "hard core" Anita Blake world.

The magic duels/battles need more work, tbh. I was tempted to skip them. Beyond seeing light flashing back and forth there really wasn't much to it. Anita vs others was better because she could tell what was happening to her. The misdirection spells were shown well but beyond that the scenes didn't really tell you what was going on other than laser beams going back and forth.

Harry not being able to heal Anita was odd. In all HP stories magic is being used to heal magical persons and magical injuries/curses etc. The only exception is when one of the Weasley twins loses an ear to some particular dark magic. So that made no sense.

Harry having taken the first mark...interesting, I'd like to know more background, don't have an opinion on it yet. By the way you gave very little description of Olivia's third. Is she a young woman, a child? I suppose she has a cute button nose but what of the rest of her?

So things I liked were the light tone, Anita not being quite Anita, Harry's characterization. What I didn't like were the fight scenes, the healing magic bit, and lack of description of your original characters.

Post up in work by author when you have more. Would like to read more.

4/5

 

A tiny bit more on my "can't heal Anita because Anita is different" idea.

1:

Spoiler

Anita carries strains of a small busload of different were-creature species, including wolf, lion, leopard...

2: It's always been a pet idea of mine that HP werewolves might be classified as dark creatures, not because of the prejudice that runs rampant in the British Wizarding World (though I'm sure that's part of it) but because of the wounds they inflict.

Dark Magic often = wounds that magic can't completely heal.
Injuries from Werewolves = wounds that magic can't completely heal.
Therefore, Werewolves = Dark magic.

(That's not even touching the fact that contracting it leaves you with an incurable and expensive to medicate condition that causes the infected to lose control on a regular basis.)

That might add a little difficulty in healing someone who carried or was infected with a strain of lycanthropy. Not to mention that the necromantic abilities Anita was born with are based on the power of death (plus any healing/durability she has gained via association with vampires and their powers), while one could consider healing magic to be based on the power of life.

Just thought I'd throw that out there, to provoke thought more than to provide any explanations regarding this particular story.

 

Warlocke....did you just pull a Taure on me?

I'm strangely let down.



(And cool idea on the reason Werewolves are 'dark')