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WIP Harry Potter and the Accidental Horcrux by the Imaginizer - T

Discussion in 'Dark Arts' started by Peter North, Mar 31, 2016.

  1. Peter North

    Peter North Dark Lord

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    Title: Harry Potter and the Accidental Horcrux

    Author: the Imaginizer

    Rating: T

    Genre: Adventure

    Status: WIP

    Library Category: Not sure yet maybe [Dark Arts]

    Pairings: None yet

    Summary:In which Harry Potter learns that friends can be made in the unlikeliest of places...even in your own head. Yes, Lord Voldemort killed his parents, but he was also Harry's first teacher, confidant, and friend - and you don't abandon your friends. A coming of age story that follows Harry from his cupboard under the stairs to...well, spoilers.

    Link: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11762850/1/Harry-Potter-and-the-Accidental-Horcrux

    Another Harry has a talking Tom in his head. The writing is generally okay, but chapter 20 and Harry just saw the mirror of Erised.
    I personally like the byplay between Harry and Tom, and Harry is smart but does not completely outclass his peers. I'd give it a 3/5 for now it's definitely worth reading if your bored.
     
    Last edited: Mar 31, 2016
  2. Lesath

    Lesath Second Year

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    At least beginning was a bit different than usually and Harry-Tom acquaintance is developing in convincing way. I've been following this for a while and it's pleasant reading material with regular updates. Characters are the best part of this story - unconventional, interesting and fun to observe.
     
  3. Peter North

    Peter North Dark Lord

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    So. . . what would you rate the story out of five stars?
     
  4. Alindrome

    Alindrome A bigger, darker mark DLP Supporter Retired Staff

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    Peter North : Did you forget to actually fill in the details of the story? You've left off most of the information in the OP.
     
    Last edited: Mar 31, 2016
  5. Lesath

    Lesath Second Year

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    3/5 seems reasonable for now. It's good but not exceptional. I hope it won't go down since author promised something like 200k words...

    Well, summary is awful, even worse than previous one. Readjusting could do some good for a story.
     
    Last edited: Mar 31, 2016
  6. KingRoger

    KingRoger Second Year

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    I have a personal pet peeve of parseltongue being written out with symbols and italics, especially for full conversations. It always reminds me of animorphs. But that's individual, so I'll abstain from rating this one.
     
  7. Atropos23

    Atropos23 Muggle

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    Review contains minor spoilers, although nothing past chapter 7 and nothing that really touches on what I would call a plot point. Put in spoiler tags to be safe anyway.

    The beginning is rough, I nearly abandoned the story after the third or fourth chapter. Certain scenes, particularly when Voldemort tortured and obliviated Dudley and his friends were too much for my suspension of disbelief.

    From a technical standpoint, the writing is adequate and improves as the story goes on. Some phrases seem out of place but it's certainly readable.

    For me personally, the difference between a 'good' fic and a 'great' fic is twofold- consistency, both internal and with canon unless a sufficient reason for the divergence is established, and a well developed magic system. This fic falls shorts on both counts. For example, the Trace is mentioned by name as existing, and because of that Harry can only learn 'simple charms' before he gets to Hogwarts-- things like levitating, banishing, summoning, and disarming. I'm willing to overlook that banishing/summoning are things that canon Harry isn't able to do until 4th year, but canonically the Trace can and did pick up on the levitation charm that Dobby cast.

    Later on in the story, we have Harry attempting to cast a memory charm, magic that is absolutely beyond an 11 year old, no matter how advanced. Little things like that are scattered throughout the fic, not deal breakers on their own but definitely enough to give you pause.

    The characterization is likewise not incredible but does seem to be improving. There are moments of brilliance to be sure, but especially in the beginning the characters are acting like characters rather than people. Harry's near immediate acceptance of Tom after he reveals himself as having murdered Harry's parents was very hard for me to swallow. I will admit though that while they may be acting like characters, they're at least interesting and reasonably unique characters.

    Despite all the criticisms, I did enjoy reading this fic. Once Harry reaches Hogwarts the author seems to hit his stride and improves on most of the flaws I've listed. Certainly not library material but a decent time waster and one that I will be continuing to follow. Being generous, I'd rate it a 3/5.
     
  8. Nerdherder

    Nerdherder Squib

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    This started out rocky in terms of the story with Voldemort taking a very forceful approach to dealing with Harry's life. Once we got to Hogwarts though the story took a definite upward turn in terms of the story. It isn't the typical Harry has a horcrux in his head and he is now a genius diabolical wizard bent on ruling or destroying the world. Nor is it A Voldemort isn't really that bad and is actually nice or funny at times which seems to be the direction of most such stories. Thus far we can see that Voldemort is slowly twisting Harry into what he desires and is mostly devoid of grammatical errors. I am curious to see what the author will do for year two and will rate it 3.5/5 for now.
     
  9. Senna

    Senna Squib

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    I wasn't sure what to expect from this story since the existing reviews are kind of all over the place, but I tried to keep an open mind - and this story is seriously addictive.

    The changes in points of view throughout could be considered clumsy I suppose, but I attribute that more to the author's stylistic choices than to a lack of technical skill. Same goes for changes in language - I tend to prefer italics as opposed to either scrolling back and forth between the story and footnoted translations, or annoying repetitions of the word "hiss."

    I liked how the author kept the pace of the character development in keeping with the pace of the story. It wasn't so slow that you find Supporting Character A abruptly having an intense, personal revelation of Why-I'm-Having-A-Paradigm-Shift in the middle of a climactic plot point, and it wasn't so fast that the characters almost seem to be breaking the fourth wall.

    A few grammar and spelling issues here or there, but nothing that detracts from your enjoyment of the story. Enough introspection and psychological issues to keep it from becoming a bad parody, and enough humor to keep it from descending into awful angst. Honestly, this story is an absolutely fun read and I highly recommend giving it a go.

    3/5 stars for me up to chapter 24.
     
  10. The DarIm

    The DarIm Groundskeeper

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    Okay, I have to say I enjoyed this more than I expected to. Voldemort/Tom remains unapologetically evil and Harry doesn't get overshadowed. I also loved how Harry's attempts to be kind and show remorse make him seem increasingly dangerous and terrifying from the outside.

    And this is the first fic in a while where I actually care about Hermione despite years of fandom bastardizations of her character, not helped by the last two books, having left me apathetic to her.

    I especially loved chapters 7 and 8. And the closing line for Hermione's interlude (Ch24) - I'm not sure whether that was funny or ominous or both, but I liked it.

    Grammatically, I didn't notice any big issues and the dialogue and flow felt fine.

    I was a bit surprised by how okay Harry was with everything in the first Snape interlude, but again, Ch 24 clarified how skewed Harry's perspective has become.

    I'd rate this a tentative 4/5.
     
  11. Skykes

    Skykes Minister of Magic DLP Supporter

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    Updated. Looks like the summer holidays will all be covered in "letter"chapters.
     
    Last edited: Apr 27, 2016
  12. Reign

    Reign Fourth Year

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    Why hasn't anyone mentioned the magical cores...

    I'm not fond of the beginning (pre-Hogwarts) but it picks up. Rating 3.5, rounded up for now.
     
    Last edited: Apr 29, 2016
  13. Skeletaure

    Skeletaure Magical Core Enthusiast ~ Prestige ~ DLP Supporter

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    The best thing about this story is what it doesn't do. If that sounds like faint praise, it is not intended as such. Moderation and restraint are qualities absent in most fanfics and its presence in this story elevates it above the vast majority of HP fanfiction. So it is, for example, that Harry is not some crazed dark wizard who is completely Voldemort's puppet, but nor is he some luminous bastion of virtue who will redeem Voldemort. The author has struck a delicate balance on Harry's (and Voldemort's) moral characterisation that feels genuine and believable.

    A similar restraint is exhibited in Harry's magical skills, which are impressive without any suggestion of super!Harry. Indeed, one minor criticism of the story is that despite Harry's many advantages and the way Tom and others refer to him as the next wizard of Voldemort/Dumbledore/Grindelwald calibre, he's too often depicted as a peer of Hermione, a couple rungs down the ladder of magical talent.

    The story is let down by a number of small but niggling irritations: the use of unimaginative and simplistic magical cores, the way the author inserts Muggle scientific notions into magical theory, the approach to Dementors which has Voldemort afraid of them rather than in command of them, and a rather Star Warsy light/dark magic distinction. None of these irritations prevent you from continuing with the story but they do detract from one's enjoyment of it. A lot of the magic feels like it has been imported from the standard fantasy canon rather than embracing the original HP approach to magic.

    The sole major criticism of the story is an overabundance of what I generally think of as "psychodrama": overblown and unnecessarily long/rambling descriptions of characters' emotional states, and analysis of the reasons behind those states, occasionally featuring such established fandom horrors as emotional/mental breakdowns, periods of extended angst, emotional issues being left unresolved only to pop up repeatedly in largely the same ways, etc. It's melodramatic, it's repetitious, it's frustrating, and it undermines your ability to identify with the protagonist and indeed to even sympathise with him. In some cases it is also poorly justified - Harry will occasionally have an emotional reaction that feels causally disconnected to the events that we are to believe set it off.

    It's the one area of the fic where the author fails to demonstrate moderation and restraint, and it is on its own sufficient to knock down what would have been a 9/10 fic to a solid 6/10.

    Oh, and one last thing: whatever you do, don't read the author's notes. They almost uniformly spoil the contents of the chapter you're about to read.

    Edit: I forgot to mention something that's extremely minor but I loved: Daphne Greengrass' characterisation, which seems to be modelled on Cheryl from Archer. It's hilarious. I'm just waiting for her to sploosh over the idea of Harry strangling her to death.
     
    Last edited: Oct 17, 2016
  14. Jon

    Jon The Demon Mayor Admin DLP Supporter

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    My one major issue with this story, is the sections where the author takes directly from the books. I had to physically stop myself when suddenly Harry does a 180 and acts completely at odds with everything he's done before hand.

    Examples that come to mind are the Dursley party, where Dobby shows up for the first time, and when he decides to happily tell Draco that they totes need to follow that voice! Or the fucking dueling scene.

    They ruin an otherwise mostly enjoyable read.
     
  15. Dicra

    Dicra Groundskeeper

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    The first chapters of this one, where Harry's magic was described as "white and pure" did a lot to trick me into thinking that this was going to be just another Piece-of-Voldemort-gets-redeemed-story, but luckily, that is not the case.
    Nevertheless, I think these first chapters to be very irritating in that regard. Apart from that, some scenes in this story are just ... strange, especially when Harry, who is normally calm and composed, completely overreacts (e. g. Lockhart or when he thinks Tom has died).
    The good things about this story are the indeed funny humour (at least in my book), the characterisation of Hermione and Draco (as for Theo's devotion, I'm not entirely sure what to make of that) and the fact that it keeps being readable despite - and now we get to my biggest problem with this one
    -being an almighty big canon rehash. Not entirely, no, but the general plot of canon has been there throughout and I'm not sure if I can endure that for another 100,000 words (because it's not bloody likely that the author bothers to think of a new plot for GoA).
    So far, the author hasn't really tried to insert own plot ideas, and I'm not entirely sure that, if he finally does so, I'll a) still be around and b) it's going to be worth reading.

    So, tentative 3/5. Could go up when the story finally gets its own plot.
     
  16. Dicra

    Dicra Groundskeeper

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  17. iamnotreal

    iamnotreal Second Year

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    Wow, I just read the last chapter posted. I can't copy the particular paragraph but Dumbledore's final words when he speaks to Harry about power and the nature of its corruption in those who wield it over the collective will of humanity for their purpose and desires is absolutely fantastic I feel, magnificently captured what I feel would be Dumbledore's character and voice in canon.
     
  18. Ghosthree3

    Ghosthree3 Unspeakable DLP Supporter

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    Just found this last week and was immensely pleased. Easy 4/5 for me, possibly better. Chapter 50 was extremely refreshing too, if for no reason other than to read about a Dumbledore who seems true to character and not a retarded evil genius. That said I do feel he was more than just that, very well done.


    Haha, I absolutely loved this element of the fic too. Haven't seen it done before and find myself wanting more of it despite the fact it'd probably get ruined.

    EDIT: And then I read Taure's list of complaints and feel insecure about my rating again :(
     
    Last edited: Nov 16, 2016
  19. Dicra

    Dicra Groundskeeper

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    I know that feeling :D
    I've had it two or three times already that I read a story, thought it to be at least in 4/5 area - and then Taure came up with very valid and justified criticism that almost always made me feel quite dumb not to have noticed it before.
    "A Cadmean Victory" was like that for me, at first, before it went downhill completely.
     
  20. Peter North

    Peter North Dark Lord

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    I feel the same way with Taure's rating system and after years of contemplation over this conundrum I have the answer: Do you like what your reading and is is it entertaining you? If the answer is yes then it doesn't matter what Taure says.

    However if Taure recommends a fic 9 times out of 10 it's going to be a pretty good fic.
     
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