He really is.

 

@the Great Idea

I liked it, it is nothing superb but nice to read. Note that I really like Hermione and most of themes that appeared (technology etc), so typical person would rate it as mediocre or even worse.

And yes, it is too close to original - sometimes dropping into canon rehash.

 

--> "The Great Idea"

Well... I'm known around here as a Hermione fan, but this... I couldn't get into it. Why?

Simple:

Sorry, but I'm not going to read a story that plays loose and easy with historical facts. Yeah, people like the Grangers might've been using mailbox services and email in the early 90s, sure. But that's not the same as to claim that "email has taken over". Baah. Fail.

 

A/N from the second chapter: "Since this is a story about technology and magic (in the bigger picture), this does take place in the present day. However, since the Wizarding World views technology as simply a replacement for magic, they have not experienced the same drastic technological development as the Muggle World. I probably should have mentioned that earlier."

 

Lord Voldemort and the Intricate Plots


Well, a sane! Voldemort story where Voldemort kidnaps Harry in 1981. Don't start flaming just after reading the first few chapters, for every action of Voldemort is explained in excruciating detail in the latter chapters.

Oh and you'd love to know who the Durmstrang Highmaster really is.

Dumbledore and Voldemort are portrayed in an pretty awesome manner and they exist in a league of their own.

 

Huh, well I'll be damned. The first two chapters were decent, with Voldemort's thought process not being a pile of retarded bullshit.
There may be hope yet.

 

Found another story when browsing through an authors favorites.

Title: Harry Potter and the Deux Ex Machina.

Author: Karmic Acumen

Summary: It was a normal day, until newly turned 8 year-old Harry Potter decided to make a wish upon the dog star (even though he'd almost never actually seen it) and set off something in the Unlabeled Room in the Department of Mysteries. Turns out Dumbledore was wrong. Again. It wasn't love that the Unspeakables were studying down there.


Link: This

Features an awesome Regulus Black, equally awesome Sirius and lots of planning that goes into freeing Sirius from Azkaban. The trails in the ministry are done in a very detailed manner. It's over 200k words and Sirius just got cleared.

Spent the better part of today reading this and loved it. Especially the combat and the dueling stuff.

 

Alas, my hopes are dashed by chapter 8-9.
The damning thing was how it became completely, unconditionally boring as soon as Harry is about to go to Durmstrang, especially on his way and being there. I stopped midway chapter 9, couldn't bear it anymore.
But it wasn't the only thing. Voldemort is not really Voldemort. He doesn't do Voldemort things. I like this character more than Voldemort, certainly, but he is not Voldemort.
Harry has little to no characterization. He character is shown in a certain way at age 4, and basically stays the same, to the point where the only reason I realized there had been a time skip was Harry going to Durmstrang.

Well that was a bubble that got popped soon.

 

I agree Republic21. The first two chapters was a bit silly but I was amused. Once it got to the fourth chapter, it fell apart so hard that I got saddened. I know it would have been a guilty pleasure, but it have been fun to read.

 

I generally don't go for shorts, but this amused me mostly because of how plausible it was (lol Magical Britain), while being an idea I'd never seen done this way before. 3k words, might not be to everyone's taste.

One Traffic Light What could've happened if the Dursleys avoided one traffic light, and Harry arrived at Kings Cross Station just a few minutes early? A chance for Ginny to do something she'd wanted to do all her life.

 

Here is something even shorter (less than 300 words) but quite amusing: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/1931948/1/Forgetful

Multiple independent masquerades may be an interesting premise for a longer crackfic.

BTW, why so many people copy description, author etc into story text?

 

I wonder how many you could plausibly fit. MiB/HP are reasonably perpendicular, at least. It's a stretch to try to think of something else that neither side would notice though (and wouldn't notice either of them either). The MiB in particular is tricky, because I can't see getting an SGC/X-Com/Yeerk Invasion or something along those lines past them really. Maybe something else supernatural-ish?

Wizards are pretty oblivious; maybe something like Neverwhere from Neil Gaiman? You would probably have a hard time hiding Magical Britain from the Neverwhere-verse though.

 

Well, depending on amount of crack in crackfic "plausibly" may be ignored. But Illuminati secret society and Cthulhu-style beings living in oceans/remote places may be reasonable separated from other conspiracies.

For additional hilarity it may be crossed over also with something like "The Chronicles of Narnia" (world as-we-know-it, no interaction with our world, they may be overlooked by everybody, high potential for amusement).

 

I read only the first chapter and somethings were really off-putting. For start, that wandless bit was rather too convenient. And not entirely very original.

The behavior of new DADA professor was entirely too much like canon Snape.

And that scene with her pulling out the wand on Snape's throat for a simple remark when her own friends are giving shit to him, was poor. That girl Emma, it has been two days and they have weird nick for each other. If their friendship had been older, one could have believed it. But when it has only been couple of days, for me, it reflects poor bit of character development by author. As a matter of fact, the entire interaction between the bunch of them was too convenient for me. Just felt, that the author was going for the canon marauder thing entirely too forcefully.

But the most negative thing, imo, is that after seeing the first chapter itself, I am inclined to believe that Emma is going to be the protagonist(?). While I don't care about OCs that much, even a hint of Marysue in them is terrible for me. Another thing, why the fuck add new people to the group. Original marauders are awesome enough. :awesome

There are some pros:

It's the Marauders.

It's fucking long, with writing not too bad, grammatically.

All in all, as Cheddar said, potential time killer. Maybe guilty pleasure, right in home at Almost recc thread.

 

Huh, I'm sure I've read a long Harry/Ginny story with this premise, though.

Or, I read this oneshot a while ago and mixed up stuff.

As for the fic itself, it's amusing, but just barely enough. An Almost Recommendable, truly.

 

Harry Potter, Rise from Dust - If Harry's baby brother, Daniel, is the Boy-Who-lived, then what of Harry? What is his role? Is he destined for greater? Or, is he to play a much bigger role in the future? Follow Canon's plot, with much bigger AU's plot as the story progresses.

Thought I'd give a almost recommendation to a story I very much enjoy, but am divided over whether or not it deserves a library status. It does uses some cliches, but uses it's own spin on them. It sorta borrows part of the premise from Harry Potter and the Veela(the idea that Harry is the older brother to the Boy-Who-Lived, and later becomes a Quidditch Superstar), however I really enjoyed it. The big thing people might not like is that that are a lot of OC's(usually people in Harry's year age). The story does have one of the best portrayals of Merlin, and while Harry is a bit too superpowered, the story does explain why. Another thing to note is that in this story, Harry is NOT the Boy-Who-Lived, but he does have his own destiny. The best thing in this story is that while it does use elements from the WBWL plot device, it gives a reasonable explanation later in the story to explain why James and Lily neglect Harry that does have to do with Harry's destiny and is something outside his limits. The other great thing is that Daphne Greengrass is a main character, which I suppose to anyone who likes her character, is a plus.

If I could rate it, I'd have given it a 4/5.

 

"Follow Canon's plot" - is it suffering from canon rehash?

 

I just read the first scene and the inaccuracies of the birth of a child is really bothering me.

Update: The child's speech pattern is also badly done. The writing isn't exactly stellar, either. I'm not sure as to what it's lacking, but I feel that, somehow, it is.

On the other hand, the plot is reasonable.

Edit: And, by plot, I mean the technical details. By reasonable, I mean not terrible. And I'm only at the second chapter.

Edit II: Obviously this was a crossover with BBC's Merlin, as the Merlin within the story is almost certainly that one. I'm still not sure as to whether this is decent or not. It's far better than most things on FFNet, but that's not saying much.

 

The technical aspect of this story goes down as the story progresses. There are so many mistakes that I had to read twice to understand what the author wanted to convey.

Still, it's a decent read that hasn't been updated in a while.

And the romance quadrilateral is just a bore. Too much fluff if you ask me.