He's not going after Voldemort, he's using his knowledge to alert authorities of imminent attacks, thereby saving literally hundreds of innocent lives that had no part in his current predicament.

It doesn't take a huge messiah complex to do this. One just needs to not be a pitiable shitstain of a human being.

 

I think you're overestimating the amount of people who would rush to do all he did. I'm certain I'd be trying to find out how I got there and work out a place to live/money/necessities/who would likely be sympathetic to me before it even occurred to me, let alone spend my time compiling a list of attacks and risk myself going into the Ministry and exposing myself before even thinking about it.

In fact I'm dead certain that I at least would happily and vindictively watch the whole world burn, but in that regard I am probably just an asshole.

 

I refer you to this part of my post:

 

Iris is a good name for a female Potter. It's funny because her name is Iris, but she can't see.

 

Dont really get a lot of the complaints here. Its well written, and the cast remain in character for the most part. Im enjoying it.

My only issue, is of course, what happens now? There are a dozen great "Harry goes to an AU" fic that sort of pitter out after the reactions have settled down around the point the story really ought to begin.

For that reason I wont be reviewing just yet.

 

Narf: I am in awe of your rant review.

 

I'm sorry but if you think the cast remain even slightly in character then you either haven't read the books or you haven't read the story.

The only one even slightly in character is Moody, and a very, very extreme caricature of his canon self at that. You realize the Order here is torturing and threatening a verifiable hero with methods and punishments that amount to worse than anything they did to all the Death Eater's combined in canon?

Honestly, who do you really think is in character in this story?

 

Yeah, I managed to finish reading it, it's pretty shit. Narf's objection at how the Order is portrayed rings particularly true.

It's like everyone is going out of their way to make Harry's life shit, because reasons.

2/5 at most.

 

They havent tortured him. They found themselves in an awkard situation that they couldnt win and pulled out a spell that they hoped could change the tide. Dumbledore did crazier shit in canon. Recall that they have no idea what Harry is, they seem to think its possible he may join the Death Eaters, Dumbledore is keeping him close for that reason.

I agree with narfs point about the rest of the order being static and not doing anything during discussions.

 

2/5.

Solid technical writing, but a disaster in execution.

This is another of those stories where things just get worse and worse for the hero, to the point that in the end you're almost grateful that the story is over.

Spoiler

Someone mentioned the theory before, but the real downer is going to be when Amanda is revealed to be Tonks

Sorry, but I have better shit to do with my time than read about a dude getting shit on for 150k words.

 

Lol how is Dumbledore keeping him close? The only thing preventing him from contacting Voldemort is his morals, while Dumbledore is doing everything in his power to drive him to them. If he can get to Ollivander's and meet Amelia Bones without Dumbledore even having a clue of it, then he could easily meet Voldemort. So it seems like the Order has a very good trust in the fact that he won't join them, which is a moot point given that it was established in their first meeting.

I would define what they're doing to him as torture. He's been disfigured heavily, they knew the process used to call him in would be extremely painful if he even survived it, and now they're blackmailing him while he has to deal with the fact that he will never see his loved ones again.

I cannot think of anything crazier Dumbledore did in canon, unless you're prescribing fanon interpretations such as Dumbledore intending the Dursleys to torture Harry so that he would look up to him as a mentor and be willing to give his life for his friends. Unless you truly think all of Harry's misfortunes were some kind of master plan engineered by Dumbledore then nothing is even near this level, and even then that's not as bad because Dumbledore actually intended a happy ending for Harry (the happiest possible ending he could have, in fact).

 

Wait, what?

Dumbledore's plan was for Harry to die (And stay dead). Plain and simple. The end.

 

Read to chapter 3 -- 'Lack of food in his childhood had left him short and perpetually skinny' :facepalm

 

Go read the book.

 

yeah, but that was accidental.

Im not talking fanon, he had an elaborate plan that involved, among other things, Harrys death. Seems you are doing something similar here, assuming this is all Dumbledore's fault. All he's done so far is 1. cast a spell to summon a hero, 2. Question him (for which he apologized) and 3. force him to take a job in hogwarts. Dumbledore in this reality was pushed into a tighter place than in canon, his canon plan would now no longer work.

 

Wasn't Dumbledore's entire plan based on Harry being hit by the Avada Kedavra ,getting rid of the horcrux but leaving Harry alive? Also, how exactly is it accidental if they know for fact that all previous summonings either left the victim dead or gravely injured?

 

Oh yeah, Im just saying it was a pretty desperate plan. I didnt think they had summoned anyone before?

 

I'm late to the party. Sorry for any spoilers in the following:

Narf: nails much of what's wrong. There's really nobody worth Harry's saving in this cuntish world and we the readers are given no sense of why he should even try. The OC is iffy and inconsistent. Iris is distant. Even fucking Dobby is irredeemable. Worse, Harry seems incapable of holding a civil conversation with anyone, even a magical portrait, that doesn't devolve into tedious, antagonizing bullshit.

What bothers me about the Order is that nobody in this world seems to have any morality whatsoever, yet they don't act consistently. Even if we take the contrived crap du jour thing at face value--Harry hasn't any rights, fine--even if he were just a magical creature in their eyes, a glorified Kneezle who happens to be able to hold a wand and the occasional angsty conversation, sane people with a shred of decency don't treat animals that horribly. They'd feel at least a twinge of sympathy for the other party.

And this matters. If the Order really are so horrible as they show by how they treat Harry, then why even bother with the pretense, the lie detector and affable conversation? Screw it, just mind-rape the non-entity, rip every last secret from his dimensionally challenged skull, dose him to the gills with Veritaserum, torture and wring out every last useful datum, and then pop a hole in his head, bury the trash, and repeat the ritual with some other unsuspecting nobody from another of the infinite universes.

Because they can. They're either a bunch of sociopaths or they're not. Pick one. The author hasn't.

Look, I get the Butcher formula: pile a ton of shit on your lead. Once he swims up and gasps half a mephitic lungful, dump a larger pile. Make him suffer, then make him suffer some more. But you gotta give some hint of a payoff down the road, a sense that fighting fate is worth the trouble. Shit is tolerable when there's a hope of a decent (much less 'crowning') moment of awesomeness to come, a zombie tyrannosaurus, whatever. Otherwise, it's just torture porn.

Harry's motivations in this story are inconsistent and all over the map, which is another part of why I (and I suspect many) can't identify with him. He doesn't give a shit about the Order or Dumbledore, risks himself to stick it to Dumbledore, then goes out of his way to rescue the latter from a horrible fate? He doesn't care about the Wizarding world, yet devotes hours to learning Divination solely so he won't suck as a teacher and so he can do right by the students in a subject he doesn't even really believe in? Why? He saves Amelia ostensibly to have Dumbledore and the Order arrested (removing the most strident opposition to Voldemort in the world), yet rages when she won't go out and arrest all the Death Eaters tout de suite?

Until the author figures out what Harry's about and starts cluing the readers in on same, then I think the story is going to languish in the 2/5 to 3/5 DLP space. It's too bad, as there's potential here. The author clearly has decent command over technical aspects of writing, a fair hand at writing dialogue, and a good bit of originality--just not a sense for how to craft a good (and internally consistent) story.

 

Pers, I don't think you're entirely correct in saying that he doesn't care at all about the world. He clearly goes out of his way to warn Bones about upcoming attacks, helps his counterpart, and gets upset when the first attack isn't completely stopped. That said, I agree with most of what you and Narf wrote. The story is kind of all over the place, but it's at least entertaining enough to waste a few hours on.

I am going to hold off on rating until the school year actually starts, but for now I am leaning towards 3/5.