Hands down the most subtle Shitpost Sunday I've ever seen.

Bravo, Sesc.

Just in case someone lacks a bullshit detector: This is, obviously, a regular thread, and the story to be reviewed accordingly. -Sesc

 

The prose is really awful. English clearly isn't the author's first language, and its really sad to see so little improvement after near 600 thousand words. (It actually seemed to get worse as the story went on, but that may have just been my mounting annoyance) The stilted, awkward sentences are bad enough, but it seems like every other sentence has incorrect word choice or punctuation, and they're jarring enough to ruin the story.

I agree that a lot of the plot is quite interesting and well done, but... It's not really that gripping. I think this is certainly due to the prose. The second year climax should have been an awesome series of events, but it felt lacking. Between the technical errors and lack of showing, I may have been able to get the same level of enjoyment by reading a simple plot outline.

I think Alexandra and her friends are good characters. Alexandra is the reason I finished the story. But I'd say this is a rare case where the one-dimensional caricatures are numerous enough and just annoying enough that a decent protagonist actually can't make up for it.

I could write about the adherence to canon's main events and the cliches, but I think Sesc represented them reasonably well. I will say that the author is really beating a dead horse with the Britain Is Backwards thing. It's one thing to have that be part of the story's premise, but it's quite another to dedicate an absurd amount of words to hammer in that each and every aspect of magical Britain is shit compared to the rest of the world.

Thanks for the rec; it passed the time.

2/5

 

Most times, when someone recs a story and then provides warnings, they seem to do it because they know how sensitive to that kind of thing a lot of our readers are, and it turns out to be not so bad after all.

This is not one of those times for me.

As garbage goes, this is HOT. If I had a dollar for every extraneous "most ancient/noble/blah house of blah" I could buy out Total Wine's gin section, and drink until I forgot this one. It's like someone just went down the old, tired tropes listing and made sure they had everything.

World building is OK, but that's about it for me. Glad you found something you enjoyed though, Sesc.

2/5, generously.

 

It's not On the Way to Greatness, but there's potential there. I wish I had the balls to just write, like Antony444, instead of agonising over everything. I'm making a few assumptions here, but as far as French people go, this guy has a pretty good command of English. Like Sesc said, it's a lot of Google Translate, but I'm not going to shit on this fic for that. It gets in the way of immersion, but it's hardly noticeable if you can find it in you to not hang over every word and skim where convenient.

I'm only eight chapters in, so I might get supremely pissed later, but I like what I've read so far. The writing has some measure of cheek to it, if you can spot it that is. If you're mad at the Google Translate, that probably won't happen.

I don't need every fic to be What You Leave Behind levels of good. Some mornings, I just feel like staying in my boxers, hotboxing my room and burying my head in a bucket of fried chicken. Proper nasty shit, and that's what this story is. It's not blazers, clean shaves and fine dining.

If I were to judge this story primarily on mechanics, then I'd say it's a pass. But I mainly consume stuff because of what it makes me feel, the capacity stuff has to generate affect, and this right here is my kind of poison.

The GT writing and old tropes don't bother me too much here. I also enjoyed Prince of Slytherin and Den of Snakes, though I haven't been able to stomach PoS since the third year prologues. I've tried a bunch of times and there's another half million words or so published since I last read it, but I just couldn't get into it again. I need me some trashy shit, and fuck I'm glad I got some.

tl;dr: If you're looking for quality, look elsewhere. If you can play make believe and trick yourself into thinking it's 2007, you'll have some fun. Thanks, Sesc.

Yep.

Tentative 3/5.

 

I read this when if first came out. It started out firmly guilty pleasure territory then I got bored of it.

I'd have preferred it if Fem!Harry's genre savviness was completely unfounded, like a cool subversion of the whole idea.

How completely it goes off the rails is good though. Not many stories have the ball for that.

I agree with the clichés thing. They don't feel like they were done because it's "cool". I'm not sure how to describe it. Part of me wants to say it's like the author has read no HP fanfic before and came up with the ideas themselves but that seems unlikely.

It was a 3/5 when I left.

 

I'm about 40% done with this and I've got to say I enjoyed it quite a bit. There are parts that I skimmed but that is happening less and less the more I read.

My favorite thing about this story is, that it doesn't take itself too seriously. There is very little useless drama & angst, which makes for an easy read. The prose, although kind of bad, gets massive points for not trying to be grandiose and especially for no grandstanding.

Wacky bullshit keeps happening, but it's entertaining wacky bullshit.

Realistically this is a 2/5 story, but because it tickles my personal tastes, I'll give it 4/5.

 

I love it. The plot is pretty great, and the language issues are banished about a fifth of the way in. It's pretty much flawless right now and then vampire / exchequer / dark champion concept and execution is awesome. There's a specific reason Alexandra is so OP, and it's pretty cool. It's an adrenaline rush fest and the plot twists and turns at every point.

Best addition other than the main cast / friendly OCs (Morag, Lyre, etc)? Crafty Dumbledore. The scene where

Spoiler

Dumbledore gets to pay four million Galleons to Zabini as rent for the Potters' invisibility cloak

made me cackle. And the entire thing where

Spoiler

light and dark are competing forces but both destructive

is also awesome. And

Spoiler

Ariana Dumbledore

is alive??? Oh ho ho, I can't wait to read that arc. Good thing the author has monetary motivation (he's making ~$1400 every month on patreon) for finishing the story.

And the goblins? Holy crap are the goblins well-written.

The story mixes the canon storyline with original sequences very well. Hogwarts is no longer the epicenter for every shitty thing that happens -- it's an isolated sanctuary with comparatively worse, but tame in-story events.

And the entire sequence in

Spoiler

the second book

where Alexandra

Spoiler

kills multiple death eaters, then two Basilisks, and using her Right to the Conquest to boost her magical stores between the fights

. All the while the "New Marauders" are fucking useless. James Potter is, of course, in Azkaban for betraying the Longbottoms. The scene where

Spoiler

Ron Weasley and Leo Black get expelled is also insane

. The sequence in

Spoiler

the first book

where Alexandra

Spoiler

goes down the trap door in December is also OP

. Biggest surprise after that was that Dumbledore

Spoiler

obliviated the Weasley Twins after they made it to the chess set

.

Fuckin' A. The biggest strength is that it doesn''t bash canon. It's separate.

 

I don't believe this for a second. $1400/month for a wildly uneven story with 2800 favorites? No way. Many professional writers don't make that much.

 

Per the author's Patreon account he is pulling in $1455 a month with an average pledge of about $3.17.

 

Is this their only project, though?

 

No they have a story they finished and three of four other stories being worked on.

 

We should make a different thread if we want to talk about patreon. I'll just reiterate that I don't buy it. He has to be gaming the system somehow. Otherwise he's making five times more money from fanfiction than TheSinisterMan and Noodlehammer combined, and those guys have actual popular stories and discord sites.

On topic, I only read a few chapters and it's not my thing, so I won't rate it. World-building is okay I guess, but it's clearly written by someone who is not fluent in English. Maybe he begged all of his facebook friends to contribute to his patreon?

 

Well with the new chapter that dropped last week I can safely say that things are going to get very interesting.

• The return of Regulus Black should cause all kinds of problems for our would be 'heros'.
• Another task another triumph for the future ruler of all of magical Russia.
• Poor Albus your tangled web is starting to slowly strangle you.
• And of course no year is complete without the death of a DADA teacher.

And now all the players are set for the exchequer's plot which no one knows the exact details of.

 

Oh, I thought I already posted here.

It's a weird fem!harry story fourth year stuff with the tournament is refreshing. But everyone just saying ooooh she's evil is weird. decent trash 2/5

 

Well so there is first and foremost the fact that James Potter is widely believed to be the Sirius Black of canon traitor so it would be a bit like if in canon Sirius had a daughter who showed up. Then there is the fact that she didn't die night one when half the house tried to kill her. Then Alexander Sykes disappeared after going after her. And then in year two she kills around 6 fellow students and 2 ancient basilisks at the tender age of 12. Then the battle on Halloween in year 3 where she slaughtered the bulk of the that 'Light' army. From a perspective of the average student it makes sense plus those in the know are aware that she is the Champion of the aspect of Death which is a 'Dark' aligned power.

 

And she was an apprentice to the goblins abroad after her first year on the recommendation of her head goblin banker. She finds something really epic.

 

Oh yah completely forgot to mention that she owns a 'cursed' sword.

 

Thanks for the recommendation, Sesc. I spent the last couple days reading this fic. I agree with many others here: the prose is difficult to read at the beginning. It picks up eventually (although it still isn't great). Like Villanelle said, this is trashy shit but it's still kind of fun.

I like some of the ideas in the piece, in particular the inclusion of different mythologies and traditions from Britain (Merlin), Scandinavia (Loki, Fenrir), etc. It is a kind of nostalgic indy!Harry read but with more originality. This makes me wish someone with a better hand picked up some of these ideas.

The idea of Light and Dark magic and champions is a bit one-dimensional, at least in so far as the characters express their understanding of it (such as Dumbledore and James Potter's fierce hatred for Dark magic, this even after Potter has the chance to reconnect with his daughter). Alexandra sees that the Light can be destructive, but that is the extent of the subtlety to the positions. Neville seems somewhat ambivalent, which I think is the point (or was the point and may eventually be the case again) of Fate and her champions. I do like how some of the champions aren't necessarily inclined towards working with each other a priori though (e.g. Condé will let Fleur do her own thing, Romanov will kill anyone who gets in her way).

I get what you mean that Alexandra comes from nothing and then gains power, but imo she gets a lot of power and pretty early in her career (not in the story since it is quite long). By second year, she can accomplish a lot and is already the most powerful witch in the school, let alone her year.

2/5

 

So I've binged through this in a week or so and wanted to drop my review. I ran into this from (I think?) an ASOIAF rec that mentioned the author. This seemed fine, then I kept reading, then I was all caught up. Then I tracked down this review thread to post my opinion.

Short version is: I'm following this for updates. It does a lot of things really well, and if you're hankering for something new, this is a guilty pleasure that is close to upgrading above that. If you separated this monster of a story into its separate books, I'd say that I'd give book 4 a 4.5/5. It still has issues, and those issues would normally subtract several points, but what it does well it just does SO well that it makes up for it and creates a really enjoyable binge.

Long version? It's painful to get started. Year 1 is really bad, and the stakes get raised but not very well. The exchequer comes off as kind of silly, uninteresting and 14-yr-old-angsty stuff. Year 2 gets a lot better, and the power ups seem reasonable-ish, a lot of luck and cleverness to overcome obstacles. We are still a bit on the rails, but it's interesting at least (super spoiler here)

Spoiler

Ginny gets subsumed by an alternate personality the diary creates using several blood rituals (complete with murders!). Then, as the 'herald' of slytherin, she recruits several other slytherins to her cause and while Dumbledore is ousted from Hogwarts they stage a coup, getting McGonagall to place the school on lockdown, locking out any reinforcements as well. Alex straight up murders some wannabes, then uses a giant blind hunting magical bat from South America to take out the eyes of the basilisk. She then casts an overpowered lumos (which she discovered accidentally in class and then practiced against flitwick, rarely pulling anything out her ass this one) and just sprints at Diary Tom and runs him through, then punches Ginny in the fucking face and lastly has to cast one spell at a first year, not pulling any punches to cut him down immediately. Of course then Tom has another basilisk, and Ron (with broken wand) accidentally blows a hole in the roof, starting to flood the chamber. It reads better than my summary.

The whole scene was actually a pretty unique and interesting take. You have people who retread cannon by having Harry kill the basilisk with a blasting curse inside its mouth and call it fresh...this actually felt fresh. And that's the case for the story moving forward as well. We go off the rails pretty fast after that. Voldemort is just straight unimportant, but that plays really well. There are a lot of really interesting takes on plot lines here, and honestly they do feel really creative. Does it exist somewhere in mythology or fiction? It's fair game for the author to pull from.

They aren't always executed super-well, and sometimes they are only explored at a very mediocre surface level,

Spoiler

like were-rats, wtf? Then we go into were-everything but never really a purpose or reasoning for any of them

. But taken as pieces of a whole, they all add to a world much larger than Hogwarts, Alexandra, Voldemort, or Britain. Dumbledore is poorly manipulative, Leo and Ron are comically stupid, etc., but it's still a pretty solid guilty pleasure read. The exchequer starts to get fleshed out a bit more, the plot starts to evolve in many directions, and Alexandra, despite her many powerups, seems to still be facing enemies that pose serious challenges. Neville, the BWL stand-in (and real BWL in this fic, not a mistake or manipulation) is quickly left in the dust and is one of the better characterizations in that he feels pretty true to Neville raised in that circumstance. He leaves most of the stupidity to Ron and Leo, the 'let's bash gryffindor' stand-ins, and even grows past them. And eventually, to keep him relevant, he get's a deus-ex-machina to help him 'compete' against Alexandra in the triwizard tournament--and he doesn't compete well, get's creamed actually, but doesn't get bitter about that as a glory-hound or anything. The deux-ex-machina though makes a ton of sense within the established story and in no way overpowers Neville

Spoiler

fuccboi becomes the 'champion of fate' to counter Alexandra's 'champion of death' powers and kind of super-lucks his way through a bad situation, but can't control the power or turn it on at a whim

/

Sure, she may get the mythical

Spoiler

hydra

animagus that starts bleeding powers into her human form, but it's also a difficult thing for her to master and she doesn't use it to steamroll everything. And as we find out, she's not the only one who gets the mythical animagus form. You see it where Harry and Voldemort both get forms, phoenix vs Basilisk or some shit, to level up the opponent and keep it interesting. But here, we learn that there are many people in the world who get those mythical forms and they all have the potential to be huge players in the grand scheme...or they can be shit. And we actually see multiple times that others use their forms too freely in situations where they aren't optimal, and pay the price for it.

I'd say that's exactly where this world building and original plot development really does well: Alexandra is important, but she's not the MOST important. She's significant, but she's a titled character in a room full of titled characters. She's no more important than anyone else. Sesc's love of "having to earn it" really showcases itself in the Triwizard tournament. I've seen a lot of really poorly done triwizard tournaments. Prior to this, my favorite was jbern's in The Lie I've Lived because it fleshed out more rather than attempting to find ways to do 'dragons but better.' Now, this is easily my favorite triwizard tournament and we aren't even halfway done. The non-spoilery spoilers:

Spoiler

It's a quad-wizard cup, hosted in a new country with a new school. Everything about it has been blown up 1000x, including a 100,000g 1st prize, more tasks, more champions (4 per school with 12 backups to have runner up replacements for deaths or dismemberments), and more interesting tasks. It's also the subject of a complex plot by the big bad for a really contrived method of starting something big by means of rituals triggered by criteria in the events. It's not well-explained (purposefully) because it's kind of something Alexandra isn't completely aware of, nor able to stop. But even in this, it makes sense in universe because of how its explained.

I find that it works really well. The tasks are actually surprising and interesting to read. They aren't absurd and created a unique way for Alexandra's OPness to be tempered (sure she can fling battle magic around because that's what she's trained and practiced on, but she hasn't really practiced her transfiguration enough for the tasks as they require them). The characters get a little hard to follow, the friends get a little less time than they should and get into 'minion' territory a bit, but the sheer scale of the story and uniqueness being created still make it enjoyable to read.

What I'm really enjoying about it is this take of "dark and light are both destructive, etc." is that Alexandra isn't the deciding factor---she's a character in a play who can still make a measurable difference in the outcome, but is clearly not the key issue for so many more powerful big bads who could simply kill an unruly 14 yr old. Case in point: circumstances put her in a position to cause problems for the big bad's evil schemes. They approach her and the conversation is basically "well we'd like for you to go along with our plan, and can guarantee you and your friends' safety, and here are the other reasons you should...but we're a millennia old organization and all of our eggs are not in this basket so it's fine, w/e, just know it'll all go to shit for you if you don't, and you won't make a difference in the long run"

All that being said, this still feels a bit more like an alternate histories kind of read where the suspense and drama never quite hits as well because nothing ever truly goes wrong for Alexandra. She doesn't always win, and a lot of victories are snatched away from her. Many of her victories are also then minimized by the increasing scale of the story as well. Her plans are thrown awry by escalating circumstances or enemies' trap cards.

But there isn't really any loss. Alexandra doesn't suffer, doesn't lose any allies or friends, etc. You don't really feel the bitter pain of defeat here. Alexandra feels a bit hollow for those reasons.

Solid 3.5/5 for me, rounded to a 4 because of how much I'm looking forward to where this author goes with the rest of the triwizard tournament.