Title: Harry Potter and the Unexpected Friend
Author: CaskettFan5
Rating: Fiction T
Genre: Drama/Romance
Status: In-progress (126,046 words)
Library Category: Romance
Pairings: Harry/Daphne
Summary: During Chamber of Secrets, Harry finds a friend in someone he'd never thought about before. That was the beginning of an experience that opened his eyes to what he had been missing.
Link: FFN

I've been following this story since it was 5 chapters long, and I've got to say it's one of the better HP/DG romance stories I've found. It starts when they're in second year. Harry's browsing the library in his invisibility cloak when he's spotted by Daphne Greengrass. They talk a little, in which Harry finds his mother and hers were good friends back in school. The following day, she passes him a note which asks him to meet her, and that's when their friendship begins.

The romance is hinted at quite openly. There's no pretense as to who's gonna get together with whom. They're kids, and so there's no outright kissing, holding hands, whatever. In fact, 120,000 words into the story does not see them together. At the same time, her fancying him is written very adorably. It's extremely cute, how things work between the kids. Character motivations are explained well, and their personality progression is also nicely done. The kids don't seem to be very adult-like, though they're not very kiddish either. Daphne's infamous "Ice Queen" moniker also exists in this story, but it's not a widely used epithet.

Where the story does falter is in more serious topics. Dealing with Lucius Malfoy, for instance, had me shaking my head. It's not that it couldn't happen, no, more like it could have been handled much better. Dumbledore's not a grand puppet master here, but I don't really like the way he's written. It's not bad per se, in fact he's done better than most other fics (i.e. he's neither a bumbling old fool nor a cartoon villain); he's just got a lot more potential in this story.

The writing's very readable – no obvious grammatical errors pop out. The writer updates regularly and hasn't taken any breaks since (s)he started publishing. I'd give the story a 3.5/5, rounded up to 4 because it's one of the best HP/DG fics out recently, of decent length, and updated regularly. Even if it's not library material, it's definitely a high-level guilty-pleasure.

 

The story bored me out of my mind because it was all so predictable. Like painting by numbers and that in a forced way which made it so unbelievable. Dropped it after a few chapters.

 

It would have been better if the author didn't employ every single trope in Daphne fics.

Potions sellers, promuggle house, house alliances, friends with parents... everything.

 

I saw this story a week or two ago and immediately clicked out of it as soon as it relied on the "Daphne's mother was friends with Harry's mother" trope. It's a red flag when it comes to Harry/Daphne stories, and almost without exception, none of them are worth reading on from. It's an indicator that it's not going to do anything that hasn't already been done a million times.

 

It comes up quite a lot, yes. It's on my list right next to "Harry has spent multiple classes every year for 5 years with the same 20 people and somehow doesn't know who Daphne is."

 

It most definitely isn’t library material (though with the current quality of stories people seem to like these days that’s debatable), but I can see it as a guilty pleasure, for those that are so inclined.

The long list of cliche tropes aside, read this story if you’re looking for a fluffy piece on a Harry/Daphne pairing. The interactions between the main pairing are (to a degree) believable enough that I was simultaneously fondly reliving/cringing through the awkward and bumbling moments of my first girlfriend. If you are looking for/can tolerate the fluff then give this story a shot.

Of course, much like how that first relationship ended, I don’t foresee the author keeping this up. I’ll be following this story, if only to watch it crash and burn.

2.5/5 (rounded down to 2, as per the rules)

 

As mentioned by previous reviewers it rehashes a lot of tropes and well, isn't very original. The writing is decent (though that's the baseline for a story anyways) but the plot isn't really leading anywhere.

2/5 for me.

 

Don't get me wrong, I HATE this in fanon...

But, it's canon. In book 5, Hermione (of course) tells Harry who Theodore Nott is.

Edit: As to story itself, 3/5 if you're new to the HPDG, 2/5 if you're not. As people have said it's not awful but everything is stale.

 

Though this story is generally well written (grammatically speaking), that does not mitigate the fact that it relies too much on overused tropes and clichés. The one recurring thought on my mind while was reading the story was "what's the point?"

Even worse, the author falls flat when it comes to show don't tell. Instead of tastefully allowing readers room for interpretation, the author instead drowns the reader in heavy handed adjectives as well as overly explicit exposition. This causes the story to become not only extremely cringe worthy, but also leaves no imagination space left at all.

A barely 2.5/5 story to me.