This is EXACTLY what I am saying. Three adults who all know Voldemort is alive and can potentially tell Harry he has been lied to for years when he gets his body back. Yet they still decide to keep it from him that is why this event seems so forced to me.

THIS here is what I am talking about. Dumbledore keeping it from Harry seems like a plot device in order to further down the line make Harry into a more jaded dark wizard.

So your saying it seems smart to keep a Ravenclaw in the dark about what happened to their brother. A Ravenclaw who is known to be curious and would probably do whatever it takes to find out how his brother is doing. A Ravenclaw who is a 11 year old who doesn't care about any of the kids in the school. Yea that sounds more like a kid about to pick a fight with whoever knows what happened to his brother. When you add in how far Harry went to find out how his brother is doing when he was injured, it made it surprising how quickly he gave up on figuring out Quirrells motive. I thought he would keep trying to find it out into the next school year and asking his friends for help.

Also aaltwal I said I would keep reading. However if the author is going to put very overt plot devices in, in order to make Harry a dark wizard who doesn't trust Dumbledore or his family then this simply won't be one of my favorite stories anymore.

People pretty much proved my point by figuring out that keeping Harry in the dark must be a plot device to make him distrust his family and Dumbledore later on down the line and turn him into a dark wizard. I didn't even mention the dark wizard part in my review the first time in the hopes others would see how obvious it was in order to prove my point.

 

Well, as stupid as it is, I can imagine Dumbledore doing it. I strongly disapprove of the decision, of course, but the line of OOC-ness hasn't been crossed, imo. It still does look lame, though.

 

If Harry hates his family and wants to kill them all with evil dark magic because they didn't tell him a possibly inconsequential piece of information, then I'd be unhappy. But as it is, we don't even know how Harry is going to react, so jumping to conclusions is stupid.

Liked it, but it was short. Go kill everyone you know Santi, and then come back and write 24/7.

 

This.

<filler>

 

Not a bad update, but I'm a bit confused about the Potters' concerns about Harry skipping a grade of Dark Arts.

Now I understand that they don't like the Dark Arts, but they knew that Harry would be taking that class when they sent him off to school, didn't they? Shouldn't any arguments concerning that class have been made then? The Potters were under the impression that Harry would be completing all seven years of all of his classes, weren't they?

It just doesn't make much sense for a parent to be upset about their child excelling in a subject when they were already forewarned about what that subject entailed. Why should Harry learning the material a year earlier upset them?

The conflict here seemed a bit forced to me.

 

Look at it from their perspective, they've just learnt Harry was tutored by Quirmort, then BAM!, they learn Harry is skipping a grade in the Dark Arts. They would be more concerned that for Harry to skip a grade, he has to show interest and the will to excel at the Dark Arts. Coupled with Harry being potentialy taught by Voldemort, I think it's fair for them to be worried.

 

I agree with this, fine as Fardeki pointed out they have some reasons to be concerned but that's beside the point. The whole scene seems wrong and in places ooc.

As far as I see it Harry was Good at a subject, too Good, for his current class really so he skipped one. This should be no surprise and has already been dealt with between Harry and his parents, which is why I think its so irritating.

I think Harry would have worked to skip the class once he fingered out why the professor hated him anyway, even if he wasn't worried about other students. The Harry Santi has created really wants to excel and hates being held back. The extra reasons for skipping the class are perhaps part of why he wanted to skip but not the main reason. This makes both Harry's arguments for skipping the class rather ooc and Lily's completely irrelevant as being in proper classes was a huge part of why he went to Durmstrang.

Of course Santi might been trying to make Harry (and us the readers) irritated at his parents, but as it stands I just get annoyed at Santi for writing it that way. Of course he gets points for making me care in the first place and for having created characters that have definite personalities.

 

Well I can't believe I just found this fic but I have really enjoyed this fic so far, I've always had a weakness for these sort of fics and I have to say this is one of the best OBWL fics I've read and I'm very interested to see more.

@Jigokuno-Jesus Christ is there any thread where you don't bitch for half a damn page? When your bitching is longer than some of the authors updates I think you probably want to rethink things.

 

Knowing how 11 or 12 year old kids are generally given the - "we're your parents", older and therefore more wise treatment (which in fact is true), the scene felt absolutely natural.
However bright or curious they might be, in the end they are that, kids! And in case of more attentive parents, they'd sit and explain in basic terms to their children the reasons behind their worries, but they won't share the full story behind what ever has happened in case they think that it might be harmful for their child/ren.

Besides we need a reason for Harry to turn from his family at some point and going down that path, away from a loving family that he equally loves back, should have some solid ground, and what better than the rebellious teen who is "sick of being treated like a child" ...

If there is a part of the scene that could use some improvement, simply nitpicking here I must say, would be to add a bit more explanation on why they are worried so much of him skipping a class.
"The dark arts corrupt, and there is a reason why certain type/branch of magic is taught after certain age and not from the beginning. Basically the child, however young he might be, would still have more experience with magic and hopefully harder time falling for the temptation the dark arts are supposedly offering." ... or something of the sort.

Anyways, very good update Santi.

Thisthisthis ^

 

Not a criticism of you, but I think the author would be well advised to be very careful if going down this direction. While rebellious teen who is "sick of being treated like a child" might appeal to some of the younger members of the forum (those still in high school or maybe still in college), there are a lot of adults on this forum who would not bat an eyelash at putting a petulant child like that right the fuck back in their place if worse came to worse - rebellious teen is exactly why he is "treated like a child".

It would turn a lot of us more mature members off - especially the forum members who are themselves parents.

I myself am a little skeptical of Dumbledore asking that Nathan withhold such information from Harry. In canon, Dumbledore knew Harry would share whatever he told Harry with Hermione and Ron - Harry even said as much - and yet Dumbledore shared information with him anyway. In this story, he knows Harry is flipping his shit over Nathan getting hurt, and he's concerned over Harry's having been tutored by Voldemort. It seems to make more sense to me that he would sit Harry down himself and tell him as much, and let him know to be on the look out for any future manipulations. Share his concerns with Harry and whatnot.

Instead, I can only foresee disaster coming of this. It leaves Harry vulnerable to more of Voldemort's machinations, and drives a wedge between Harry and his family that, if left to fester and be filled with more, similar actions, could become irreparable. When that sort of trust is broken, it makes Nathan less apt to listen to his apparently wiser brother's advice - "You're just a dark wizard, just like Ron said!" - and and it makes Harry more suspicious of his family's own warnings - "You're just trying to prevent me from reaching my full potential!"

To me, it seems like Dumbledore would be wiser to try to ensure that Harry and his family were closer than ever before, rather than drive a wedge between them.

 

This is all I see.

 

Absolutely right, which is why I hoping it will stay the way it is and Santi can use it for whatever purposes he wants later on in the story. It actually adds character to Dumbles, seeing him make such a mistake.

 

While i wouldn't say it like that, i agree to a point. Keeping Harry in the Dark is just stupid because it's been shown that either Voldy or one of his minions manipulated Harry by taking them under his wing. He should have been told just so he'd know he'd need to be more wary of trusting people.

If he knew that Voldy and/or his minions were trying to sway Harry to the "Dark Side" he'd probably agree Durmstrag wasn't safe for him and the whole story would go kaput since he'd go back to Hogwarts or transfer somewhere else. He seems to genuinely love his brother and knowing how trusting he was to Voldermort or if he just thought Quirrel was a deatheater i'm sure he would've been horrified to know he was learning from someone that wants his brother dead and how easily he was manipulated to trusting him.

 

"his quarter's for anything" - quarters

"Harry in the Fall", "stone in the fall" - capitalization

"I still don't understand why shouldn't tell Harry the truth." - a pronoun is missing in this sentsne. Either "I" or "we".

"Kings Cross, London" - King's

"Dan, it's good to see you again! Tell me, what is the purpose of a spark plug?" - Feels really forced. Also, the purpose of a spark plug is obviosu from the name. A rubber duck is mysterious because it has no useful purpose.

"Activation word is ‘Minsk.’" - The name of a city with a population of over a million, a capitol city of a European country, is likely to come up in conversation, especially if you live nearby. They should have chosen a word that is less likely to be uttered accidentally.

"Youdidn't have to test" - missing space

 

Yeah, cause it's totally unreasonable for parents to want to keep an eleven-year-old kid in the dark about the fact he may have been manipulated by a psychotic mastermind.

I'll be annoyed if it comes out that Harry's motivation later on is this being kept from him, but I don't think this will be the case. And while we can argue the merits of their decision to exclude Harry, the decision is not unreasonable. There are points to be made for both ways.

 

Maybe what I didn't like about the Dark Arts scene was Harry's own argument. Saying that he needed to move up the ranks quickly for intimidation purposes is so much more convoluted than simply reminding his parents that they sent him to school to learn this stuff and they shouldn't be upset with him succeeding.

You don't send your kid off to school and get angry when they bring home A's. Perhaps if Lily and James' concerns were voiced a bit differently it wouldn't have rubbed me so wrong, but as it stands it doesn't seem like either Harry or his parents made the most reasonable arguments here.

If I had to make a suggestion, I would focus more on the Potters' concerns about the Dark Arts in general than how Harry is performing in class.

 

I thought Dumbledore hiding shit from people who aren't "need-to-know" is perfectly in character. We know its dumb, but could you really say you'd make a different decision knowing only what Dumbledore knows.

It's a delicate subject for James and Lily, it's also perfectly natural for an argument of this nature to be generally unreasonable. It makes sense that Harry doesn't make the clearest or most persuasive of arguments. He's smart, but he's also only 11.

 

If that's the case then there needs to be more depth to this confrontation. It's bit of a stretch to assume the reader has filled in the gaps to say "they are all really emotional, so I'll disregard the discrepancies in both their arguments."

A build-up to this confrontation is required for us to swallow this, I think.