As far as rainy day reading goes, it isn't too bad. I'll volunteer this one for the Recycling Bin until the author corrects most of the spelling and grammar mistakes. I'm not fond of the clichés the author used, but that's pretty typical of his work and can be overlooked in comparison to the rest.

A little cleaning up and this fic would be a nice addition to the Library.

3/5 for now.

 

While I don't think anyone can say there are no cliches used here, or that there aren't any errors at all, I'd still say it was a pretty fun read.

It didn't take long to read, and a lot of elements are fun. I had a smile on my face during most of the story, so that doesn't hurt. I'll give it a 3/5 for pure fun, though it would have been a 4/5 if there had been less errors.

 

That's pretty much why I said...

I'd like to think I'd do better than MS Word, though. A spell-checker is okay for pointing out possible mistakes, but somewhere along the line you really need to employ human brainpower to weed out the lame mistakes that a spell-checker either misses or adds, itself.

Yeah, at least when an author consistently makes the same mistake, you can open the story in a text editor and do a find/replace.

I did like the general plot of this story, though I say to anyone who thinks Daphne's presence makes up for any other shortcomings: If you changed her name to Romilda Vane and all instances of the word Slytherin to Gryffindor, the story wouldn't change one iota.

 

I enjoyed it all the way to the end, when he completely missed the obvious and got captured. It was an unforgivable oversight on the part of the author, and it's obviously a setup for the "rescue" scene. That dragged the story rating down. On the up side, the Weasleys were perfectly IC, and it's such a nice change to have a Ron that isn't traitorous.

4/5

 

Liked it. Didn't like that Hermione was portrayed so stupidly - I know she's a rule follower but Harry is more of her friend than shown here. Besides that and, as said many times already, the errors, it was a fun read.

3.5/5

 

It's not exactly the most brilliant piece of literature I've ever read, but it was enjoyable enough for me to read it straight through. If you strip it all down, it's an Azkaban!Harry without the whining, and that's what makes it good. It's missing that extra-something to make it 5/5, but I'd think it deserves a spot in the Library.

4/5.

 

I thought you said you would let little things go?

So I don't proofread my forum posts thoroughly. Meh. I would like to think that I do a halfway decent job.

And yes I know that it would take more brain power, you showed it by correcting something that would have been overlooked by spell check. I was referring to the fact that most good beta's give their author feedback, and in some cases a smack to the side of the head. It helps the author sound out what ideas he/she might be unsure of.




On topic, DobbyElfLord has joined the forums and is most likely typing out a response at the same time as I am, so I would love to hear his reactions to our thoughts. Hopefully some fruitful labor becomes of it.

 

In defense

Hi,

I had to sign in just to reply to some of your comments.

I never had HPM edited. So all of the errors / typos are mine. I can't push that off on someone else. I cleaned up some of the errors today and reposted the story. I don't claim they are all gone, but a few.

I started writing Merc as an straw-man for a full length story on business trips and between chapters of Destinies. I may go back and do that later but I enjoyed it as it is.

Many of you have complained about Hermione. Yes, I know I didn't flesh out her motivations. In my head, she had to believe Dumbledore when she and Ron met with Dumbledore. I can see Hermione then wrapping herself in her belief in adults and deluding herself. Her time at the Ministry would have magnified her buy-in to the Ministry's position. Before Harry and Ron corrupted her in canon, she was a mini-Percy. (I loved the Hermione/Percy pairing.)

Some of the other plot holes are there either so I can go back later to flesh it out or to answer in a sequel.

The important question for me is did you enjoy the story? I write solely for my own enjoyment. Knowing the readers enjoyed it just adds to mine.

Rick
DobbyElfLord

 

As I said in my review on FFN I rather enjoyed your Hermione. Obviously she was taking to an extreme but a lot of her characteristics were definitely canon. I'm guessing without Harry in the picture and Ron giving up, her sense of fun and relaxation got squashed by her know-it-all authority complex.


I guess it makes sense that you didn't have a beta for that story. It's one thing for an author to make mistakes, you're caught up in the creativity and direction that the little things get bayou (bad pun). It's another for a beta to completely miss said mistakes.


I enjoy your work and look forward to reading more of it. Keep up the good work.

 

Nothing revolutionary, but an enjoyable read; yeah, it needs a final pass for spelling, grammer, and word choice, but the idea in and of itself is much higher quality than 9/10ths of the shit out there currently.

It wasn't perfect, by any means, but well worth the time to spend reading it; I enjoyed how Unspeakables weren't these uber-black op soldiers that could take 10 or 12 aurors, but more like secret service to your typical SWAT team. I was a bit disappointed in Dumbledore, but I can't see how you could fix him while maintaining this as a oneshot. Regardless, 4/5 for above average execution and conclusion of the idea.

 

I would just have closed the window early on, and given this thread a low rating, if I hadn't enjoyed your fic. I'm not a big fan of the Azkaban genre myself, so that is a rather big compliment to your writing skills. The general outline for those kind of stories is flawed, not sure if it's possible to do better with it honestly.

Welcome to the forum, hope you extend your stay.

 

Pretty good. I've got to say, I have real trouble getting past any fics written in the first person, let alone the present tense on top, but it got easier with time. Although, if someone with access to a spell checker and some diligence went over it I'd have enjoyed it a lot more 3.5/5

 

Harry killed people to get in. I liked that.

4/5

 

Good stuff, one of my favorite pairings to boot. 4/5

 

Meh. A bit too long and drawn-out. Nothing very epic or particularly impressive. But then again, nothing very weak either.

It ought to go in the library, because it isn't bad enough to be in the recycling bin, and we need new stories anyways.

I love this line, though:

3/5

 

Well written and executed. 4.5/5

 

The story was a decent read. Nothing fantastic, a number of cliche's that could have been avoided easily, Hermione...

Honestly, this shows a lot of the problem with oneshots in general, especially with Hermione. Unless you're prepared to write a massive story, you've got a minimal amount of room to work with, and depending on your plot, a lot to cover in that time.

Hermione and Percy, in general, are the biggest kills to this story for me. They don't seem even remotely human or reasonable. Excuse me for being picky, but I just prefer when a character flaw isn't magnified to the size of Texas.

Add in Dumbledore and his hugely transparent and obvious scheme, and moving a muggle to Azkaban, let alone Dudley, and no one flipping their shit? Dumbledore can probably get away with a fuck of a lot, but that? I think not.

In the end, its a decent thing to waste time with if I was bored, but nothing I'd invest time in. Three out of Five.