First story in months that has actually managed to keep me reading. 4/5.

 

It went horribly wrong when he took the Japanese chick as his vassal or whatever the fuck he called it.

Smelled too much of a cliche. And then... well what we have now...

Logic. Wizards. LOL.

That said I agree it was kind of "lolwut r u srs?" moment but I think it might have been attempt to be more like the books in which sometimes there were very strange leaps in logic.


Some how I get the feeling that the fic will end will a lot of people... "displaced"

 

I would have posted this in For Review, but it is too early for that. I'm actually surprised noone has recced this one.

Jamie Evans and Fate's Bitch » reviews
Harry Potter stepped back in time with enough plans to deal with just about everything fate could throw at him. He forgot one problem: He's fate's bitch. Mentions of rape, sex, unholy vengeance, and venomous squirrels.
Harry Potter - Rated: M - English - Chapters: 5 - Words: 20,831 - Reviews: 58 - Updated: 11-12-11 - Published: 10-14-11 - Harry P. & N. Tonks

Gross, graphic, and slightly humorous story. Meet Harry Potter, the fate's bitch. Old time-travel cliche: Experienced arse-kicking Harry goes back in time into his younger body. I'm not saying anything else. Grammar could be better, but nothing that a good beta can't fix.

Just five chapters so far, but it looks like the author has written a bunch more and releases a chapter once a week.

***

Edit:

I have read another story by this author, Elsewhere, but not Elsewhen. It's not a Library material I my opinion. It's way too angsty, Harry Potter has had like a dozen emotional breakdowns since arriving in another universe. Also, it feels like Harry Potter is the bloody centre of the world! I mean, for example: the Potters have dealt with Peter (and a few days later Peter even ends up dead). He was a close friend of them for the last 30 years or so, his betrayal and death should have caused a fair share of emotional breakdowns, but the Potters just continued living their lives like nothing happenned.

Anyway, I think the story is still worth mentioning in this thread. First, there are sane Voldemort scenes, which are entertaining. Then, the match up, HP/OC, was intriguing enough to keep me reading. The premise is, Voldemort sends Harry away into another Universe where he meets his not dead parents. There are even two versions of Harry Potter running around .

Comparing with `Jamie Evans and Fate's Bitch`, the characters of Harry Potter, Sirius, and Dumbledore are very different from their counterparts in `Elsewhere, but not Elsewhen`. I like this, as it's indication enough that the author is worth his mettle.

 

^^^^

"Jamie Evans and Fate's Bitch" is readable, sometimes even funny, but it's not good enough to have a chance in "For review". There are too many stupid cliches, like Rapist!Vernon and Manipulative!Dumbledore, plus annoying plot devices like the "get rid of the horcruxes and Voldemort in one chapter" stupidity. The writing is decent, there are some good ideas in the later chapters and the hints at Jamie/Tonks femslash are mouthwatering, but it's still only a 3/5 at best.

 

Just read it all. I thought it was a good romance story, and did well with the epilogue. That being said I'm not sure I would vote for it to be in the library based off of the later chapters (though the very last ones are getting better.) I really feel that Harry is way to obsessed with Hermione, and there just isn't enough about him as a character that stands out. We get great depictions about Hermione and why he's so obsessed with her, but at the same time I think it goes a step too far with Harry being unable to get her out of his mind completely.

I did like his determination to set everything right with Ginny (something that would happen in a marriage of that long), but he seems to give up on it too easily. Overall, just nothing that really can make me empathize with Harry, or really relate to him since there isn't much character building with him for most of the story. Still enjoyable though, and easily a 3/5, possibly higher if it continues to improve.

 

I've followed both of these stories and the writer has this talent to write against sane conventions combined with some boring cliches. I don't think he thinks through plots if they are good for dramaturgy reasons. He just does it for kicks because they appear to be different or whatever his criteria is. In the end the story plots annoy and not entertain me.

 

Fate's Bitch doesn't even reach "Barely Readable" for me.

 

I could only describe that story as horrendous. 1/5, at best.

 

I'm only a few chapters into Unlike a Sister, but I really liked what I've read so far. The plot is interesting and original, the writing is smooth and relatively free from error, and the characters seem pretty well done. From what I've read so far, I'd say it's definitely worth going into For Review.

There's two small things in particular that irk me though. The excessive use of "darling" is one. I have a hard time believing that Harry/Ginny or Harry/Hermione refer to each other as darling every few sentences. The author also has a bad habit of overusing italicization for emphasis. It's fine when it's used sparingly, but it's employed way too much in this story for it to have any real impact.

I want to give this a 5/5, and I'm sure for some it will be, but there's just something about it that prevents from giving it more than a 4/5.

 

Similar feelings here. I looked through the rest of them, and the basic formula amounts to that pureblood bullshit combined with Harry immediately marrying/bonding with whoever is supposed to be his wife for that chapter. 1/5

 

I thought I was imagining that but it really is jarring. At first I thought it was just to highlight a fondness for the term that Harry and Hermione had in common, but fucking everyone is using.

Other than that Harry's character is a little dull. Hermione is portrayed extremely well, and I'm actually invested in her goals and struggles because of how well the writer has shown her passion in the case. Harry on the other-hand seems a little pathetic in comparison, more along for the ride than showing any vested interest in anything but wanking over Hermione. As of the later chapters this seems to be changing somewhat though, particularly with his interaction with the Muggle doctor.

4/5 as it stands, and could easily become 5/5. Definitely worth going up for review if it hasn't yet.

 

Unlike a Sister is pretty great. It's a bit too harmonian, though, a bit to cutesy, for it to be 5/5 material. Ron is very well written, as is Hermione, and the legal case plot is fascinating. We'll have to see how the paring shakes out, but it looks like it should be library quality in the future.

 

I only found this today, reminds me a bit of Cauterize - I'd liken it more to cauterize than the usual 'angst' fics, at least.

 

Saw the twist coming a mile away but it still hit me pretty hard.

 

Warnings for character death irritate me if the death is not at the start of the fic. It's basically spoilering your own work, which takes a lot of the edge off the death in the first place.

 

Jamie Evans and Fate's Bitch:
Was a good read for me. Of course it might have been the lack of sleep, but I had lots of laughs out of it.
It has a bit too rushed feeling about it, but otherwise moves with a quite fleshed out steps. The best part was perhaps the lies that are told to Lilly and James about Jessica and the marker Holly tree.

Perhaps the only bad thing is that it kind of shifts the mood too quickly sometimes. The general idea and some plot elements read like a full blown humor fic, but then it talks about serious issues that make you pause.
Sometimes it's kind of annoying. You get parseltongue speaking, poisonous and fanged rabbits, and then Jamie shows the nightmares of Jessica to Lilly and James and proceeds with showing of her ghost called by the resurrection stone, which is a really creepy image.

I, for one, will be waiting for updates ;D


Luna Blinked:
I dunno, after saying that it was both moving and predictable, there seems nothing to be added.

 

I have tried to read that fic before but I really struggle to get into it, it just rubs me the wrong way.

 

Maybe it rubs you the wrong way cus' its rubbish? Doesn't even fit into this thread tbh...

 

You've essentially hit the nail on the head. I'd entertained ideas, once upon a time, of becoming an author for profit, but am well aware I'm not good enough to do the job. I very rarely outline anything, and am more the "follow the string where it leads" type of writer. I make up for it by writing a long ways ahead before publishing, and revising/retconning the early stuff to fix it, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm not all that good to begin with.

I'm good with settings and world-building, my weaknesses are character interaction and forming a comprehensible plot. Hell, forming a plot at all, and keeping to it, given the number of early drafts the idea of "Aged, worldly kick-ass Harry jumps back and time, and finds himself a girl" threads I slogged through before I really hit it off with this one.

If you take a poke through my Terrible Ideas Bin, keep in mind that those are some of the better ones. Trust me, I have ideas kicking around my hard drive that are to stupid for the goddamn short bus.

Elsewhere/Elsewhen has the (rather major) failing of James and Lily as these flat people that haven't shown a single reaction to Peter's betrayal (nor have Harry and Azalea) beyond binding him with an Unbreakable Vow and sending him to his death. Another failing is how easily Harry trusts the OC love interest.

Oh, and someone else in this thread said that Manipulative!Dumbledore is a cliche. I would argue that it's canon, it's just a matter of how much of a dick he is. I personally subscribe to KafkaExMachina's "Will he be Happy" on the matter.

Alright, that was my two cents. And why the hell does vbulletin still not allow longer user names? I know I typed in that "er"...

 

First let me say that your username makes me chuckle.

Now, on to the rec. There were parts I liked and parts I didn't.

While the parts where Luna blinks and the scene changes were handled decently, that device is used far, FAR more expertly in nmb's WBA piece HP & the Forests of Valbonne, or whatever the title was/is. The way nmb wrote that almost spoiled me for future uses of it, so again, it was done well enough here, but I've seen way better.

The "character death" spoiler was not only unnecessary, it was stupid and redundant. Any post-DH story is going to contain character death, unless the author is rewriting the entirety of DH as a Disney remake. It occurred to me that perhaps that was intentional and then

Spoiler

showing that Remus had died was supposed to lull the reader into a false sense of security so that Neville's death was unexpected,

but I really doubt the author was trying to be clever that way.

The characterization of Luna wasn't bad, and I'm giving the author the benefit of the doubt in how things like the PC and being in a Muggle hospital were included, assuming that was another attempt at distracting the reader from

Spoiler

Neville's

part of the story.

I'll say this: It kept me guessing, but not in that heart-wrenching sort of way that I would have expected. It was more confusing and as I look back, I was more interested in finding out the "twist" than caring about who was supposed to be dead. That it was

Spoiler

all just a fever dream or nervous breakdown on Luna's part but at St. Mungo's instead, sort of like Luna-ception

did not have any emotional weight for me, and I suppose that's partly because the two main characters did not have any sort of relationship like that in canon.

As I wrote, it was done well enough and I'm not dogging it, but it wasn't an emotional kicker for me, and it certainly pales in comparison to emotional masterpieces like Cauterize.