Crazy, didn't see that coming. By far the best mystery/crime story I've read.. ever

 

So here's the update for Chapter 47 on fanfiction.net and PatronusCharm. As always, read, review, and enjoy!

And the epilogue is posted here and here. If a mod could update the thread title to show this fic as completed, it'd be great.

Thanks for reading, folks!

 

I've been reading this for a little over two years now, and I was very happy with how it finished. Silens is one of my favorite authors on here, and this is the best of his stories.

Looking forward to the sequel.

 

This is less review, and more list of my grievances with this fic, but whatever.

Initially, Renegade Causes didn't have high priority on my to read list, but after seeing it being mentioned as an inspiration for Lesser Evils, I decided to give it a shot. And finally I've finished it today.

It wasn't what I initially expected - aka another indy Harry story that is about him getting stronger and then killing Voldemort. Actually it could use more of showing Harry getting stronger - as it was he sort of got more skilled in the background. It didn't feel like a natural progression. On the other hand it would bloat already long fic, and it wasn't a focus of this work.

The focus here after all was plot and that was the fic's biggest strength and biggest weakness at the same time. The strength, because the plot was actually interesting, with some nice foreshadowing. The weakness, because everything else was sacrificed for a sake of it. The best (worst?) example here is the whole plotline with the attacks where everybody acted like a complete idiot.

Draco was a decoy so people won't focus on Nott, but he was constantly around Nott.
And the talked about their plans in the damn library (because it's not like the castle have like a million secret passages, etc.), and didn't even protect themselves from being overheard.
And when Hermione, Ron and Ernie followed them to see if they're up to something, instead of actually following them to see if they're up to something they shouted at them.
And the Hermione and Ernie masterfully painted targets on themselves, because it makes so much sense to tell people who you suspect of horrible crime that you suspect them of horrible crime or that you will go to report them.
Let's not mention twins being useless at following Malfoy, despite Nott acting more and more crazy and Malfoy still meeting with him.

Another great example is Azkaban and the Spire.
"We have this cool giant super-wand and we know that Voldemort is coming and Dementors will help him. Let's do nothing with it!"

There are other problems, some arbitrary changes to magic system like not being able to cast other spells when using shield or disillusionment in the middle of the big action scenes which destroyed their flow due to character decisions initially seeming stupid.

I'm getting lazy so I will just point out the rest:
- While relation between time and possessions was established the link with metamorphagi in simulancy was never satisfactory explained and was too obvious of plot device to have Tonks being important to plot.
- While we are at the matter of Tonks, it's funny how Dumbledore's mindraping her into falling for Harry is mostly shrugged away as "they would fuck anyway" while Voldemort's double rape is a big thing both in the story and author notes.
- The pacing was sloooow.
- And it got terrible at the end with everybody suddenly having a need to explain their actions and opinions. Which was bad in its own right.
- The ending was generally disappointing, there were distinct lack of build-up to confrontation with Death Eaters and characters who outlived their usefulness to plot just killed themselves.

On the plus side, the technical side of the writing was good (at least as far as I could tell), and the characterisation was solid (excluding elements mentioned above).

Planned on giving 5/10, but the disappointing ending made me give it 4.5/10 so two stars in DLP scale.

 

Biggest problem is Logic is sacrificed for plot. Silens had a plot he wanted to tell and he left all logic for that.

Kemester is the most pointless character in the series. And there are 100000 words for him.

Voldemort is uber powered and everything goes his way.

Contrived plot everywhere.

If you leave logic and read it its an awesome fix but if not its a complete waste of what could have been a masterpiece.

Still the second best fix I have read after TLIL.

 

If I may offer an opposing view, I thought Kemester was a well done "mini-villain" for Harry. I agree that his "100k words" are stretched, but that's a general issue with the entire fanfic, not just a Kemester-specific problem.

 

Harry is too ooc for me. He becomes an asshole and justifies by saying "I have to be an asshole to survive." It's like after he almost got arrested he turns into a completely different person.

I also couldn't handle Peeves being turned into an ultra powerful demon/ghost/spirit that starts manipulating everyone for some reason.

The thing that annoyed me the most was the insane hit wizard that wanted to kill Harry because his brother died while chasing Harry. No one at the ministry really cares that he's insane. They go "Yep, he's insane" and carry on with whatever they're doing. At one point he grabs Harry apperates away, beats the shit out of Harry, then leaves Harry and he doesn't suffer any consequences from it. A bunch of people watched him leave with Harry and not only does he get off scot free, no one mentions it again after several paragraphs.

All in all, regret I read it.

 

Agravaine quickly hit the red x. "All the dialogue is written like this," he observed exasperatedly.

 

Title: Speak Softly, Love
Author:Silens Cursor
Rating: T
Genre: Tragedy/Romance
Status: Complete
Library Category: Romance
Pairings: Antonin D.
Summary: Antonin Dolohov hadn't always been a Death Eater. He once was a champion. He once had a family. He once had a wife. This is the story how he lost it all.
Link: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/7400212/1/Speak-Softly-Love

 

When you put a fic up for review please give us your own thoughts on it, rather than just the barebones summary and related info. We can all find fics and post them, but the why of your reccomendation is what we care about. It doesn't even have to be anything above a three, either, almost reccomendable is just fine. Just don't slog us with the 2 or 1 of 10 crap you don't want to read yourself or that you doubt will find purchase here.

This is also in the library. A little thing called search is a wonderful tool.

 

Sorry, I'm new to DLP. :v

 

Well, yeah.

Uzunami, please read the the stickies before you post. Look here, right at the top of the thread list.


I merged the threads.

 

At the risk of necro posting, I think this was merged with the wrong thread.

 

The first post literally says this:

That being said, I do think there is a legitimate discussion to be had over whether sequels, prequels, and associated stories should get separate threads from the main story. The approach to this has been somewhat inconsistent, but I would argue that the dividing line should be if the story stands on it's own, which in my opinion, Speak Softly, Love, does.

 

Apologies, I jumped straight to the most recent posts, forgetting that this was a thread for more than just the Renegade trilogy.

 

Fantastic novel. This was quite the Order of the Phoenix AU experience. There were some moments that were a bit dull, confusing... but that doesn't matter. Great story.
You killed off a canonical character - tragic but understandable. The Voldemort story's quite interesting, can't wait to see what'll happen to him. My heart broke for Hermione, but I really do hope she comes back WAY stronger in the followup. There's much room for improvement, but hey, we'll see what happens with your spin on Half - Blood Prince.
4.5/5

 

There's not a single likable person in the story. Harry is just as painful to read about as Kemester. Too much pointless talking and stupidity and Harry keeps trying to run and everybody keeps accidentally dying.