Basically what the others have said is pretty much correct. This story is too flat on the emotional level. Harry as a character is not "believable" he has the emotional range of a tea-spoon and that hurts.

Dumbledore not noticing he has been poisoned is also stupid beyond belief, come on... he has fought dark wizards for nearly a century, one would think he has adopted some usefull habits by now (e.g. checking himself for the obvious reactions to poisons every morning), also he is a famous alchemist, so he obviously has some understanding of the subject, therefor it is just silly to assume he wouldn't notice those symptons.

I have no problem with Amelia adopting harry or bringing a Hitwizard to train him in general, but in all honesty, if it is THAT easy to get an exemption for underage magic, then Dumble would have gotten Harry one after his 4th year just so he can protect himself better.

In closing, i like old-crows work a lot, some of his older stories are brilliant, this one is not.

 

I wouldn't say I like old-crow's work. Usually she (is it he? For some reason I'm guessing 'she') spends too much time on the romance and the realism and in ways that make me stop reading.

And the majority of the stories end up coming off really similarly. It's almost always a semi-competent Harry who draws his strength from whichever strong, understanding caring female is going to be his love interest. And we almost always get to watch his progression as he comes into his own, starting from the hardships of the Dursleys and bringing in some sort of family structure and stand-in parents who help teach Harry how to care, love, show affection, and promise to be there for him. Or if not 'parents' than adults in the Ministry who had no idea how bad it was and become determined to help him and make his life better.

It's a pretty generic formula, but her style makes for easy reading you can just whip right through.

As for this one? I think it may be one of her best. Or maybe we just haven't gotten to the parts that'll turn me off of this story. Whichever, so far, it's been far better than the average fanfic, and even better than the usual old-crow. It's not strayed from her typical themes and style of handling, but I like this Harry better than many of her others, and I don't remember having to skim and skip over an excessive amount of romance scenes.

For now, I'll give it 4/5. And I can see this getting better, but I'd put the odds on that it's not going to improve or maybe even get worse. We shall see.

 

Nonjon: I'm pretty sure old-crow is a he. But I agree with the rest of the review.

 

I too believe that it's one of his best. I've been around him for a few months, and I happily followed around one of his stories, either "No Thanks" or "Tom and Harry" until I suddenly realized that absolutely nothing bad had happened to him. I think that he honestly listened to my review, because before the end of the story, people started dying. His writing is getting progressively better, undoubtedly, although, yes, this was a bit dry at first, he's making an effort to make it more interesting, using words like "babbled" instead of ones like "said". (Id est, said=boring, babbled=colorful) I'd probably give it 3.5 out of 5.

 

I dont usually like to disagree with the heavy hitters here on dlp but what the hey.

I've followed this story for a while and it just seems to be getting worse. I've liked some of his other stories (No Thanks brought me into the indy stream), but Harry in this story is just too much of a yes man for me. A yes man in respect to the readers that is.

I say that because it seems (to me atleast) that OldCrow is trying to hit all the fandom 'yay' buttons; Phoenix, escape dursley, training, political power, generally awe inspiring magical powers...

Also its the small things in this story that make me pause to cringe.
I particularly hate it when Harry continuously makes it clear that its his phoenix's choice whether he(?) will transport anyone or do anything for that matter. I get it and im pretty sure that everyone else gets that the bird is a free agent... but harry just keeps on saying it as if hes trying to prove to everyone how great a guy he is to consider a meagre phoenix a person with rights... its like the Goblins got a name thing.

I'm no great writer myself... pretty crappy if i say so... but I'd like to think he could still come up with a few new ideas. Or less cliched ones.

I'm giving him a 2/5 only because I'm hopping the story will pick up during the school term.

Alright start taking away my rep points now

 

Overall, I think it is an OK fic, which is better than at least 95% of the stories we can find in fanfiction.

As mentioned in other replies, the writing style is a little dry, making the reading a little tedious. The characters appear a little wooden, and the relationship between Harry and Susan has nothing of the dynamics displayed in jbern's story for example. Another negative point is that Harry uses his phoenix so much that it becomes ridiculous.

However, a story of Harry being adopted by Amelia Bones is rare enough that it gains some points for originality. The training is done in a realistic way, you don't see Harry using a Time-Turner or gaining power instantly by using some random ritual. Finally, I like the pairing, so I give this fic a 3.5/5.

 

Agree about the phoenix. In this story, she's more like a Knight Bus, then a living breathing creature.

I'm very sceptical about phoenix's ability to jump around carrying people all day long. In canon, Dumbledore had used his phoenix for transportation only a few times, in great emergencies. Time and time again we've seen Dumbledore running through the castle or using floo powder, instead of calling Fawkes and asking for a ride. Whether it's taxing or dangerous, we don't now, but fire-traveling with humans is certainly not an everyday thing for phoenixes.

That's why I said old-crow's stories have skin-deep logic. On the surface, everything seems well researched and thought out. But when you a bit dig deeper, you come up with stuff like this, that the author obviously hadn't even considered fleshing out.