I liked the story well enough to finish it, but that doesn't mean there weren't a bunch of problems with it. I'm still not rating it over a 3/5 for the thread.

I like Shezza's review. Granted it is a bit antagonistic, but given the fit this author apparently threw last time it came up I think it's cool. This is a good site for constructive criticism if you're willing to accept it.

Of course the author replied to your review politely, Wizardmon0073, if all you did was tell him good things what do you expect?

Snape was WTFPWN'd, yes, but it was handled stupidly. There are so many problems with that entire situation in a fic that is trying to take itself seriously that it's hard to know when to start. Snape was coming along decently as a character for the first 20 or chapters. We didn't see much of him, he picked on Harry in class, asked him hard questions, started to think that maybe he was more like Lily than James, etc. But mostly Snape was just portrayed as a teacher with an attitude problem towards the protagonist. He did try to read Harry's mind once, but Harry stopped it and got a charm from Flitwick to let him know if it happened again and left it more or less alone otherwise.

Then later (though the pacing in this story is strange, so "later" can both mean "next week" and "20 chapters later" at the same time) he tries to read Hermione's mind. Fine. She's Harry's best friend and knows stuff. But for some damned stupid reason, he can't just try to read her mind, he has to try to read it, then leave some stupidass illegal torture curse behind after he steals the memories he reads. WTF? Where did that come from? And there's no reason for it. Hell there isn't even an attempt to provide a reason for why Snape felt the need to do that instead of just try to read her mind.

So they pitch a fit, everyone tells Harry that Dumbledore will get Snape off for literally anything he does, they're right, so Harry steals his magic from him (PWNT) after provoking him into attacking another student with a possibly lethal curse in front of Dumbledore and several others. Then he runs around convincing everyone to pick on Snape when he gets back from being investigated/questioned by the Aurors, etc.

So yeah, he got PWNT, but the entire situation was just crap for a story trying to take itself seriously. Almost every aspect of it was handled poorly in my opinion -- but like so many other things in this fic, it did have potential.

"Flitwick is important" -- This, plus the interesting concept of Harry's magic to a lesser extent, is what kept me reading to the end. I think that the relationship between Harry and Flitwick developed much too fast in real time (I.e. it might have taken 20+ chapters, but I think that covered about 2 weeks), but I do think Flitwick is pretty cool in this one. Things just happen too quickly in some ways.

Characterization of Harry and his friends is decent. But while Harry started off more or less acting his age that went out the window for the most part later on. They don't act anything like 11 year olds except in a few situations.

Yeah there are some interesting ideas, but most of them could be executed a lot better than they are. There are some good characters who develop pretty cool relationships with Harry, but again, it could benefit from some polishing, a good beta, and some constructive criticism. Dumbledore is another example -- there are some parts with potential to him, like the "sharks" in his magical aura denoting how dangerous he is despite his outward appearance, but then he does some really OOC stuff too (too OOC).

So to sum all of that up -- yeah, I think it could make the recycling bin. It's decent. I enjoyed reading it, but I kept going "Seriously?" for a lot of it. So in my book, it's a rather solid 3/5.

The sad part is that it has a lot of potential (in my opinion), and if the author wasn't so opposed to improving (according to what folks have said here), it could be great. Mentor/Gaurdian!Flitwick plus a Harry who has very little magical power of his own (but can siphon it from elsewhere to supercharge himself until he runs out), sounds like something I'd really want to read.

Edit: I left a long review on the website. I was polite and left a very detailed review. I was careful to keep my criticisms (of which there are many) to as even a tone as I could, and made sure to add in various praises for things I liked as well. In short I left about as polite/gushing review as it's possible to give while also handing out a lot of constructive criticism -- I'm curious if it will be accepted or if I'll get a response like Taure's.

Edit2: And now I realize I left out at LEAST two other things that I wanted to criticize (namely that Harry has learned things too quickly and that there hasn't been a downside to his magical battery abilities yet) because I'm so damn used to being able to edit my posts on DLP when I review stuff, damnit.

 

His account is now called deleted92.

Also Taure, wtf is with your sig D: