Title: Harry Potter and the Elemental Changes
Author: Peeves' Best Friend
Rating: T
Genre: Adventure/Humor
Status: Work In Progress
Library Category: I don't know, sorry
Pairings: Harry/OC
Summary: AU of Harry Potter, Harry's twin is the supposed BWL. Harry raised by Dursleys. Elemental!Smart!Ravenclaw!MindArts!Harry. Harry/OC. Story starts in first year, will move quickly to fourth, where the story really kicks off.
Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7863744/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_Elemental_Changes

I recommend this story because I think it's an original take on a well known plot. Although it definitely has some negative aspects, I think it's a nice blend of Action, Humor and descriptiveness. It moves pretty fast through the earlier years, but its a realistic Strong Harry instead of those stories where boom! Magical Inheritance and Harry kicks everbody's asses. All in all 4/5

 

No, this is shit. Here are some ways to tell that this is shit
1) The title. It's got the word Elemental in it, and nothing good ever come's from that.
2) The summary. What (bad) cliches do we got? Well, the author laid them all out with exclamation marks. nonBWL!Harry, check. Elemental!Harry, check. Mindarts!Harry, check. Ravenclaw and Smart!Harry, check (as if you need to state both). Harry/OC, so you know it's going to be Harry/MarySue.
3) Starts first year with all of the above. Right, so I'm getting an extremely contrived superpowered first year Harry feel
4) The person (you) who recommended this story has one post. While that doesn't necessarily means this story is bad (99% of the time it does), it sends off warning bells. I'm surprised this forum doesn't have a post count minimum yet.

Ok, so on to the actual story. I open it up, and am immediately hit by an Author's note saying that this is their first story. Lovely. So, I can predict what is going to happen. The author has read tons of bad fics on ffn, and decides he wants to write his own fic with the same idea. The author hasn't discovered what a good fic actually is yet, so his story falls into the same pitfalls.

Onto the first scene. Max Potter is the BWL. Harry is sent to Durseys for some reason (sounds like the Potters are still alive?). Harry is abused from the start. Right. Then, Harry threatens Vernon and they come to arrangement. When this is the start to a story, nothing good ever comes from it.

Next scene is four years later. Author puts a note in the middle of the chapter (FUCK THAT) saying that he won't be posting what the Hogwarts letter says. You know, there's a way to write a story without actually copy and pasting it, but hell, saying in the middle of your story that you are not going to do that is even worse than actually doing it. Holy Fuck.

Then, there's something about Harry having felt a strong magical pull last time they were in London, or rather, Petunia states that Harry felt it. What The Fuck. You think that's a good plot setup?

There's a golden line a few minutes later when Harry is talking with Flitwick.

It's all tell and not show, and all very bland, and on top of that, it's an awful premise fulfilled awfully.

NOW IT"S DIAGON ALLEY CLICHE SHOPING TRIP TIME! YAYYYYYYY! WHAT KIND OF WAND WILL HARRY GET? IF YOU GUESSED FROZEN BIRCH REINFORCED WITH PINE, 12", UNYIELDING, WITH THE CORE OF AN ICE DRAGON FANG, THEN YOU WOULD BE RIGHT.

Yeah. This story is awful. Every part written about it fills a checkbox on the 'Do not write this in an HP story if you want it to be good and original' list.

[x] Bad Story

Go back to lurking. There's a thousand of these stories on FFN, and they're all just as bad. You can dress it up however you want, but that doesn't change anything. If these are the kinds of stories you like, then I feel for you, since you haven't gotten past the infancy stage in fanfiction yet. If you can't tell the difference in quality from stories out of the DLP C2 and this story, then I feel for you. I pity you.






You've got one post, lurk more.

 

No. Just... no.

It's just full of bad, old and overused clichés, which were never even good to begin with. Anarchy beat me to the punch with those, so I won't bother to list them again.

But I will comment on the writing itself. The author says outright that English isn't his first language, and that is very obvious. It's not that it's illegible, but it's not good at all. There are frequent typos, and some all round bad grammar.

Like Anarchy said, this is a story written by a checklist. It's taken the template laid out in hundreds of bad indy and Super!Harry fics, and thrown in some bad wrong!BWL as the icing on the cake. It's not a new or original take on the old tropes, it's a bad and uninteresting take on bad storywriting. It's fics like this that make me want to stop reading HP fanfiction

 

You really need to lurk more if you're going to be posting stories that are complete bullshit. Go read some better crap, you obviously don't even know what good fiction is if you're reading garbage like this.

 

I'm with Anarchy here, although more resignedly disappointed than vitriolic. The fic is basically an amalgamation of bad cliches, with decidedly average writing, poor characterizations and stupid plot. I read to chapter six, and then skimmed some of the later chapters. I felt like dropping the fic around chapter two. There's just too much bad cliche stuff.

2/5.

 

No this isn't my story, a friend (and yes I am aware that that sounds suspicious/clichéd,) is writing it. I like lurking quite a bit and I'll return to that after this reply. Anyways, he doesn't have an account here and I decided to post to get some opinions. On FFnet he gets pretty positive replies so I thought, well DLP is way more critical so let's see if he survives the crucible over there as well. Unfortunately for him, it doesn't seem like it. Thanks for the honesty. I don't think I'll be telling him about this though.

 

The only reason why he's getting positive reviews over there is because the average FFN reader is an idiot and doesn't even know what a good story is. Why do you think there's so much filth ridden slash stories in the HP section?

 

True enough, still, it's appreciated.

 

Why? So he can still live in his delusion of grandeur and ego stroking done by retards at ff.net and their idiotic reviews?
Show him this thread and DLP, and maybe he will learn something about writing good stories.

 

He's a pretty naive guy and although I don't have a problem with critique, he isn't that good at handling it. So I'll let him hold onto his delusions if that keeps him happy.

 

You might want to suggest to this guy to read good books. This is what every published writer says when asked for advice for aspiring authors: read good books.

 

I got to the scene of a six-yar-old Harry threatening Vernon. Veron, who is quite a bit larger than him, with a lot more power than any six-year-old. And I went back to check the summary. It said Smart!Ravenclaw!Harry. I then decided that I would not scar my mind anymore with bad writing and come read the rest of the thread.

Now, I agree with most of the posts before mine that critiqued the story. Then, I came upon the fact that this was the work of a friend of the poster. I decided that I should start reading the threads before reading the stories, despite whatever influence it could have on my perception of the story. I might not have wasted my time, and therefore might not have felt obligated to post here.

While I understand why you wouldn't want to show this to him, everyone needs to grow up and face the fact that the world does not, in fact, function for the sole purpose of making them content. He needs to realise that, however many people seem think that he is amazing, there are probably more people to polite to tell him the opposite. Here, there be truth, here, people aren't afraid of pointing out perfectly logical indicators of why the story is, actually, horrible.

I'll forever regret that you can't vote zeros here. 1/5

 

Okay question to the OP- Can you list 5 of your favourite HP fan fics? It doesn't even have to be your best 5. Just 5 great fics that spiring to mind.
I am always curious when people post absolute crap whether they are actually capable of recognizing a good story. I mean the most basic way to develop any skill is to emulate what you admire.

 

The line which made it for me was:

He has a long, white, sparkling wangd.


I think I'll give it a week and remove the thread then.

 

Based on the summary I thought this would be some type of parody fic.

 

CHALLENGE ACCEPTED.

 

No. It's not.

Is... Is this one of those weirdfuck science experiments where people go to Detroit or Compton's "ghettos" and start spouting racist bullshit and telling everyone they meet to go back to Africa? You know, just to find out what will happen? Cause we know the answer to that.

Him, he, his... We don't really need to tell the author, since he is posting it. (unless you're a fucking nutjob with MPD that somehow is friends with himself... Of course, no fucking way I'd claim this either.

I'd like some photographical proof that this ...other... exists, otherwise you are forever shamed as the author of this piece.

 

OP, to be blunt? You just jumped into a tank of ravenous sharks with half of a freshly slaughtered cow glued to your back.

 

I'm not sure what this says about me that I'm now craving a burger.