Spoiler

Started really well, you established the AU and relationships well and quickly.

I found I had to reread the last third as it did a huge info dump with not as much clarity. It was very good, but needed another thousand words for the last bit to properly work. Maybe to ambitious. [\spoiler]

 

Spoiler

We'll start off at the beginning with the first line. It's serviceable, but maybe not gripping? Not a lot of personality in it, and the most interesting thing is that it's Blaise speaking, raising questions of just how this world is different from cannon. That's splitting hairs, though. It has some punctuation errors as well, a trend that carries on through the piece.

This feels like an adapted excerpt from a longer story. Or an attempt that steamrolled into the word count and said 'shit, how can I work in the rest of this stuff?'. You spend a long time speaking with Blaise, introduce a strange action with Malfoy that never reappears (unless I've missed something, in which case my bad), and then blast through a lot of shit in a short timeframe. The corridor is cool, like that idea. Like Quirrel's presence there. Once you hit the office it leaves the rails. The revelation about baby sister/ghost/ghost baby with ghost nanny I had to read about three times to try and puzzle out, and I'm still not completely sure I've got it all down. You're also in desperate need of either an extra line break or an introductory phrase before the Quirrel line. As is, it flows from Harry's dialogue to that line as if the defense professor were in the room with him, making you have to reread it once you've processed the contents and realize the shift.

The biggest issue here though is a mechanical one, and one related to the phrase (which I dislike but is applicable here) "show don't tell." You seem to struggle with expressing the info you want expressed without outright saying it. This is present in the characters' dialogue, where they don't talk like people but like devices for progressing the plot, and in certain specific lines where you artlessly state it between dialogue lines that could easily have implied it. I'll show some examples of this in my line-by-line stuff below to hopefully make clear what I'm talking about.

Final summary: Novel ideas, too ambitious in scope, needs a thorough edit for content editing and punctuation errors.

Spoiler: Line by line Shizz

Elipses, quote marks, comma. You only need one or the other: ellipses or comma, and if it's comma it should be inside the quote marks. Also, you say afterwards that Harry "interrupts" him here. I'd recommend a dash for interruptions, more abrupt and less of a trailing off.

Just kinda clunky. You can very easily reword the last bit so as not to say Hogwarts twice in quick succession.

Comma outside of quotes again. The quote is the last punctuation every time, never should be a comma or a period or anything between them and the words.

cast, for grammar, but just saying he turned to his trunk followed by an incantation is clear enough and will help the writing to a smooth finsih.

This. This is the telling. Work into the dialogue right before this Harry saying something like "I know how accurate her visions are" and don't interrupt your conversation's flow with a clunky 'oh and this is a bit of background info'.

A quarter of an hour.

Missing period.

Clunky. Can just say he began navigating his way to the Headmaster's office, we all know where he is.

and yet implies that the final item contradicts the state of the others and isn't needed here. Just saying "others" or "others still" seemed to be inert is better.

This is what I mean about the dialogue problem. Say this line from Harry out loud to yourself. Does it sound like something someone would say in a conversation? Maybe a little kid, but I think even an eleven-year-old would be a few years past speaking like this. I'd recommend splitting it up, something like Harry exclaiming "This is the Phony Phantom's room!" and having one of the others question the name, then having him explain saying something like: "Oh, well, I stumbled across it one night. With the ghostly girl looking after a baby? She called the baby a 'ghost but not a ghost', and the room didn't have a name, so I came up with that one." It's a crap example cause I just pulled it out of my ass, but hopefully it shows what I mean still. Writing dialogue is (to me) a process, one that goes 'think of what you want expressed' to 'how can I get that info across while keeping the sounding like actual people talking to each other. At the moment, you're missing something in that transition.

 

Spoiler

Technical writing isn't very good. Look up the rules with regards to punctuation in dialogue, please.

Other than that - which, to my mind, is already a significant obstacle - you've basically dropped us in the middle of an average Slytherin!Harry fic at first. He's got a best friend who's either Draco, Theo, or Blaise. Things are different, yes, but in a way that I at least easily skim over what changes there are.

Later things get more interesting. The Girl Who Died being a ghost baby is wild and also, obviously, horrifying. How did she get the moniker, though? And why is Lily so blase in using it? What's this about getting someone 'back'? What's with these extra new protections? Why are you infodumping this all at once? The ending is so utterly bare that it does not intrigue me, it only really confused.

It feels like a scene plucked from a fanfic I'd have struggled getting past the intro to. 2/5.

 

Spoiler

Forging dialogue needs work, and writing some brushing off. I'd advise that if you want to continue writing.

The story itself struggles between frantic pace and a steadier one. The scene with Blaise, Malfoy, drags on slowly, sets new elements that are supposedly relevant for the story, uncloaks the AU you've put us in and when it ends, it's like the whole plot starts running.

Then comes the massive expo dump, five new characters, and then baby ghost Potter. It's ambitious for five thousand words, and if I can say so, unmanagable for meagre thousand and a half. I'm not completely unsold on your AU elements, and the way things play out, but I just think that you didn't have enough space to do them all the justice they deserve.

The characters you introduce are already done, fleshed somewhere in your mind, but to me they all come across as new and what little of their traits you've showed us isn't enough for the story to make sense in the scope as it is. It would really do well as part of one of our larger competitions where you'd have enough space for wiggle all those loose ends into something productive, meaningful, entertaining...

Because of this shortcomings, I feel the story's punchline comes off as short too. There's a merit to both AU and the idea but I just don't think this little piece of writing is acomplishing it. Good effort.

 

Spoiler

I honestly think this is just too ambitious for the specifics of this competition.

So, positives. Feels like a genuinely bold and original concept - dead baby sister is still around as a baby ghost! It's a reasonable set up to the AU - you quickly establish that Harry is in Slytherin, that things are different in the wider world and at Hogwarts, that kind of thing. There's some cool stuff like the Endless Corridor - not exactly 100% original, granted, but cool nonetheless. If this had been posted as the first chunk of a longer AU, I might have been intrigued.

On the other hand, I might not have been, because technically, this is a bit of a mixed bag, although in fairness I feel like some of that might be to do with the amount of information you're trying to convey within a limited wordcount - see my first comment. The emotional stuff doesn't really land either; beyond thinking the Girl Who Died stuff is bold, I didn't get invested in it.

 

Spoiler

Too much, too fast, I think.

The punctuation and grammar has been covered by previous reviews, so I'll leave that alone with just this mention.

It feels like Harry's manner is a touch off, calling his friends by their surnames, but addressing his dead sister as 'sis.'

I was gobsmacked by the abruptness of:

Interesting idea with the dead baby Potter, nonetheless.

 

Spoiler

I love the endless corridor, what a great idea! This is a fun little fic, it starts off very light and then takes a massive turn at the end. I'll echo what others have said and say that you would have needed more words for this, AU's are a bit difficult that way. But I think it sounds like you have the makings of a really good story. Language could use some polishing.

 

Spoiler

I copied this into a Google Doc and fixed all the punctuation, so I could read it without distraction: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Mo_TpzpaQs0ozlh1G4FDtFdU8EY5Thh9InQa4Zraveo/edit?usp=sharing

I liked the plot a lot. I just wasn't a fan of the execution.

Since I've fixed the punctuation issues, I would recommend that the author fix three additional issues: 1) This story has too many boring interactions, 2) the author over-describes what the characters are doing, and 3) the ending is clunky.

Issue #1

When you tell a story, you have to tell it in an interesting way. Each moment needs to have a purpose, such as educating the reader about the characters or moving the plot forward.

Some of the interactions with Quirrell, Lily and Dumbledore were pretty pointless, and the author spent so much time on it. "What are you doing here?" "Could you please guide me?” “There you go, Headmaster." “How have you been?" "You've made some friends?" "He has been performing admirably." “If I may take your leave.” "Very well."

No dull small talk allowed. Not in flash fiction, not ever. It is so boring.

Now I'll admit, the Endless Corridor was pretty cool, and I did like the solution for it. But the whole moment would've been a lot more interesting if the author had instead used the opportunity to introduce a relevant character.

Who better for Harry to encounter in the corridor than Matilda? I recognize that Quirrell plays a crucial role at the end of the story, but I guess because I don't really understand it, my urge is just to cut him.

Issue #2

Drastically reduce the adverb use in this story.

Harry doesn't always need to nod briskly or speak frantically. Quirrell doesn't need to nod reassuringly, and Lily doesn't need to wring her hands anxiously.

Let the characters' emotions shine through their dialogue and actions, rather than over-relying on adverbs.

Issue #3

OK so, again, this plot is pretty creative. AU Harry's sister was killed by Voldemort... or so we thought. And our story begins when Lily tells Harry that his sister actually became a ghost and when Dumbledore tells Harry that he thinks he can make her human again.

But the phrase "baby ghost" is kind of comical, and the fact that it's revealed in an info dump at the very last minute is a little ridiculous. Blaise literally mentions the Phony Phantom at the very beginning of the story. Why not have Blaise and Harry discuss Matilda and the rumors of her "child" at the beginning of the story?

And, forgive me, but I just don't understanding the ending. Is Quirrell seeing an AU in the mirror, or is he just going after the stone like normal in this AU?

 

Spoiler

This is so wildly AU and at first it was a bit off-putting. Everything's been said already regarding the punctuation mistakes. The end of it kind of made up for all the AU differences once we know it's because Lily and Harry survived and his twin didn't but it felt like this was way too short to introduce all of it. If the word limit had to stay the same I would cut a lot from the beginning and tamp down on some AU aspects but if you continue this I'd say a couple hundred words would make this a nice short AU oneshot. It's an interesting concept and there are a few neat lines.