Title: Ghost of Privet Drive
Author: AndrewWolfe
Rating: M
Genre: Drama/Family
Status: In-Progress 83K
Pairings: None
Summary: "Fix it" said the Fates. "Fix what? With what tools and skills?" I asked. Being dead was only the first of the obstacles. And then I found myself in an understairs cupboard listening to a little boy quietly sobbing. Oh. Fix THAT. In which a sarcastic old git is dropped into the awful childhood of Harry Potter. SI, no ships. Rated M for foul language and canon-level abuse.

Link: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13436100/1/Ghost-of-Privet-Drive


I'm sure I'm in for some abuse for recommending an SI but hey its Christmas & I've actually rather enjoyed this one.

I'm not sure what the pacing is going to be but the story starts with Harry at 5 & goes from there. Its not your usual SI fic - by which I mean groan & ditch ASAP. I think its original, funny & well written but I doubt I've read as many stories as everyone else.

3/5

 

Agree about the pacing, it's a bit slow although it's working for now. Big fan of the super deep Brit deep dive stuff, like a salve for all the inaccurate fics out there. Main character is amusing enough, and I like the sense of the world. So far it's a bit "easy" but the author did say in a note that that's by design. So I can grant some leeway and see where it goes. And I definitely have read way too stories.
4/5

 

I'm really enjoying this.

 

Fair warning, there's a later chapter that includes Naked Dumbledore. Should be gettng posted early February, if you want to mark your calendars.

 

Rather my aim. Take the most self-indulgent, anus-clenchingly awful fanfic premise - the self-insert - and see if I could do something readable with it.

Mostly successful so far, I think, although I did get accused of being a commie, for reasons that no doubt seemed good to the reviewer.

 

Your own fault for including that "Marx was a secret alchemist wizard" side plot.

 

He could at least have waited until I'd posted the chapter about the Muggles Seizing The Means Of Enchantment.

 

The pacing of this story is terribly slow. After 14 chapters and more than 100000 words, we’re nowhere near Hogwarts. Worse, however, is the fact that after the first couple of chapters, there’s no real conflict. After a quick talking to, the Dursleys see the error of their ways, and don’t appear to have any problem changing. The rest of the story is mostly family fluff. The self insert is given magic in a potentially interesting way, but though the possible consequences are touched upon, there never seems to be a price to pay for the powerup.


It’s also annoyingly preachy, with rants about everything from class and politics to art appreciation, the proper way to raise children, and anything inbetween. Moral grandstanding and unshakeable conviction is seldom interesting to read about, whether you agree with the author’s stance or not. I suppose it’s competently written and mildly funny at times, though. 2/5 for that.

 

This. The Soapbox was strong with this one, and after the SI unlocked GodMode (with a dreamscape lightsaber, of all things) it gained mind-rape powers to add to the authorial ones. Clicking the X on chapter 5.

 

Story is complete now. It's really one of those that should have been put up for review when it was nearly finished rather than 1/3 of the way in.

A few of these reviews are accurate about the pacing early-on, and about the dominance of the SI character. It may seem like nothing is happening for the first four or five chapters, as 'Malcolm Reynolds' sets about fixing up Harry's life. But this fic is far more than that. It gets better as it goes, and by midway there are surprising developments with every chapter. They involve great interactions with Moody and Sirius, Azkaban jailbreaks, interesting magical theory, a fucked-up Bellatrix, etc., etc.

Whether you like the story will depend largely on whether you like the narrative voice. I loved it. It's wry, witty, and sarcastic, and some observation had me laughing out loud every single chapter. If you don't appreciate the references to British history, philosophy, and the frequent lawyer joke, I can see how it could become tedious. Still, a lot happens by the end of the story, and there's going to be a sequel where more of the focus is on Harry.

The fic's not perfect, but by my standards it's excellent. It's a smart, well-written story, and I was entertained the whole way, even if I skimmed the occasional passage of attorney-speak.

4.5/5, rounded up to 5/5

 

I've been enjoying this fic quite a bit, and while I know its position is permanently in the Almost Recommended thread, I think that there are some arguments to be made to elevate the story to the library. For one, the actual quality of the author's writing is fantastic, easily superior to a majority of the writhing I've seen in all my years reading fanfiction. Where Wolfe fails to impress is with his plotting and the way in which he portrays a majority of HP's characters, namely as idiots. Following the old 'make your own character seem more intelligent by dumbing down the competition' trope that's a tried and true method of most indy Harry stories I've read, the author does himself a great disservice. With some more forethought and consideration for JK's characters this could have been brilliant. As it is, I couldn't recommend it past the first few chapters.

5/5 for the writing and world building, 2/5 for the plot and the characterisaton, leaving us with 3/5.

 

This is actually one of three SIs that I unapologetically recommend. This is due entirely to the character inserted into the Dursley residence being a witty, intelligent, mature male who died after a decent life with lots of good family interaction and personal accomplishment. His inner voice is often amusing enough to make the reader laugh, and yet there is enough interaction to keep the plot moving. I also enjoyed the “logical and scientific” development of magical theory and abilities. It’s a fairly well-written story that I don’t regret spending a rainy Saturday afternoon reading. Is it Shakespeare? No. Then again, I hate Shakespeare.

 

• In one of the chapters, the protagonist goes out for beer with his neighbours.
• There he makes a sex-related imperialistic joke.
• The neighbours laugh.
• The author proceeds to bash and belittle the neighbours for laughing at his joke.
• For the next two pages.

The fic contains a lot of good humor, life wisdom, is written by an educated, mature, intelligent man. I myself picked up a couple of ideas I've never yet thought of - before I ditched the read. The author's blatant self-righteousness turns the excellent story into a dogmatic agitation pamphlet.

Sad and gay.

 

I read this story and quite liked it at the time. I recently tried to re-read again and found out the author removed it from fanfinction and while it still exist on Ao3 it is locked to logged in users, with the fandom changed from Harry Potter to "No fandom I am willing to be associated with any longer"

I wonder what exactly prompted this decision, but here is the Ao3 link if others are interested

https://archiveofourown.org/works/21500365/chapters/51243229

 

At a guess, JKR views on transgender. The author is on DLP so maybe they'll elaborate.

 

Lool, the sheer hubris.

 

Yeah, but I didn't think she did anything new on April, so I wondered what exactly triggered him.