I pretty much agree with Noxed on this.

 

I'm with everyone on the fact that this massive AU is far too much canon rehash. I even agree to a degree on the Hedwig thing, but really it's irrelevant.

This however, was stupid. Buying an owl or any other pet is not akin to buying a shirt in a retail store. At a kennel, or pet store, they do not replace all of the live stock every day. They don't even replace most of the live stock every day.

Let's take dogs as an example. In the US, around 400,000 puppies are sold each year in pet shops. There are 3,700 pet shops that sell dogs. That's 108 puppies sold per year, 0.30 sold per day. And that's in a nation with >300million people.

The population of wizarding Britain is considerably smaller than that. Even in a huge world like in Taure's fic, there are only 2.5 million wizards, that's 120 times smaller. In most fics (and in canon) the British wizarding world isn't even close to that large--it's usually placed in the tens of thousands.

Even assuming the sell proportionally more owls due to their utility, and because it's Hogwarts shopping season, it's absolutely ridiculous to suggest that Eyelops turns over it's inventory every day. It's not even close. Owls could very well sit in the shop for weeks or longer.

Sauce for dog stats.

 

The only thing I'll weigh in on is the idea of Remus "training" Harry early, which has me firmly agreeing with the OP. That shit is absurd.

 

This was updated earlier on.

I liked the update. At first I thought the stone was going to do a unrealistic cure for Remus- especially with the mirror scene and later the bit where Remus told him it could cure anything- but I'm glad it didn't.

It seemed a little crammed and canonish, but diverging to far away dosen't work in some stories, and in others it does, I think the Grey Maiden and Unknown Relations (which going back, I can't believe I read...) turned myself off following canon right through. By the fact you stated in your author notes that twists in COS to be happening.. means COS will be happening.. means I'm probably going to stop reading it.

 

Thank you for your input. One of the major purposes of this fic is to practice my writing. Did the dialogue seem better as the fic went on?

Also, I'd hope you check out chapters 5 and 6 at some point. I feel as if the story improved, especially with 6.

 

I didn't read the story, only looked at chapter six, so I won't rate it. That said.

The writing is pretty basic. Restating what the dialogue already implied. Harry did this. Padma did that. Etc. Also Neville stutters. Writing isn't a checklist of what people do, it has to flow from one one sentence to the next. The dialogue was alright in that last chapter, still felt forced, though.

I think you should submit a few chapters to WBA just to get some better tips at writing.

 

I'll do that with the next chapter once it's finished. Thanks iLost.

 

You're trying to argue that the butterfly effect is a "purely romantic" concept? What the hell does that mean? Certainly its namesake example "a butterfly flaps its wings and causes a tornado across the world" or whatever can lead to a significant misunderstanding of the term. But in essence, it means that miniscule deviations in initial conditions lead to massive changes compounded over time. We can model this in a simple system (with certain other mathematical assumptions that I don't remember), but it sure as hell holds (approximately) in a more complex system. Basically, it means that given enough time, everything affects everything.

The butterfly effect means that if Harry takes a dump that lasts 3 minutes in one universe, but lasts 30 minutes in another universe, ten years down the line, things will be different. Perhaps after his dump, Harry walks to dinner past 3 people who notice him in Universe A, while he passes 2 different people in universe B and proceeds to tell one of them about the long dump he just took. That's 5 discrete changes right there, and those people will all interact with everyone after that point slightly differently. Harry A gets to dinner with plenty of time to eat and has an interesting conversation with 4 friends and incidentally, learns about something Malfoy is doing later and decides to play a small prank on him. Harry B has no time to talk and gulps down his food. Harry A's 4 friends go talk to others about the things they learned from their conversation, and one of them sends a letter to his brother in France about something Harry Potter said. Suddenly, just a few hours later, you have a hundred people with slightly different mental states in universe A compared to universe B. This example is silly, but the ideas are valid. The changes are small, but they ripple in every fucking direction. And even if you can't envision the rippling effects of so many moving pieces, you better believe that in 10 years, those slightly different mental states will translate into significantly different events taking place.

Everything everyone does makes a difference, not because of any bullshit about meaning or purpose, but because that's how complex causal systems work.

And even if you have such a bizarrely myopic notion of causality that you totally disagree with all of this, there's another reason not to repeat canon with only the slightest deviations: it's boring as fuck.

 

That's a pretty good/clear example of the Butterfly Effect.