After reading this, I give the first two books a 3/5 and the third a 3.5/5. The author's writing quality markedly improves and it becomes a much nicer and more interesting read as time passes.

 

I quite like it.

I give the first chapter or two about a 1/5, generously, but it rapidly improves, and is a pretty quality guilty pleasure type story. Just read all 3 in one sitting, and it blew by pretty smoothly.

Roll your eyes at the general premise all you wish, it is actually fairly irrelevant so far - the reason he goes back, I mean. If you treat it mostly just as an AU 'sorted into Slytherin' story it's a 4/5..ish.

It's not perfect.

It's not even amazing.

But I enjoyed it, and that has value. It's just fun.

 

Rated 2/5.

Harry's best friend is supposedly Hermione in his past life (who is not mentioned to be significantly different from canon), yet he still is violently anti-muggle. It's not internally consistent. These three things can't be true at the same time: 1. Hermione is not significantly different from canon. 2. Hermione and Harry are best friends. 3. Harry is violently anti-muggle.

Quote from Travel Secrets: Second (Chapter 5):

"I agree that muggles are nothing compared to us"

 

It is not so inconsistent. See what Hermione did with her parents in book 7.

 

Yet you forget that shortly after that quote, he mentions something about "not pushing it too far".

He doesn't hate muggles - he just doesn't want Slytherin to know that, as he is trying to aim for the top (politically).



On another note -

The fact that Harry is 30 years old kinda makes everything he's doing at Hogwarts seem a bit pathetic.

For a person that could supposedly battle Dumbledore and 30 Aurors head-on, his duel with Flint was surprisingly pathetic, and there's not really been any worthwhile action. I don't think the author is actually interested in writing action, else we would have seen at least some by now.

 

Well I spent the last 2-3 days reading all 3 of them and I have to say, apart from the early chapters the quality was more than acceptable and it's actually one of the best do over time travel fics I've ever read.

I really like how Harry treats people from his past in this one, as I've not seen it done this way properly before.

This is why I have this thread under subscriptions!

EDIT: Whoops I thought this would auto merge.

 

I pretty much agree with Taure's review to be honest, he nailed most of what needs to be said about it.

Honestly the early chapters, especially the first one, need to be rewritten. The first was so bad that had I not seen it recommended here I wouldn't have made it to chapter 2. But I agree with Taure that if you can ignore the ridiculous plot surrounding Harry's parents being alive the fic is extremely enjoyable. And honestly it's not that hard to do that as it isn't frequently brought up, so focusing on the actual content is much easier.

The sad thing is that I think if the first chapter had been written with the quality the writer is achieving now, and with a bit more thought, the premise might not actually be so bad.

Slytherin house politics are something I actually can't help but enjoy. Yes it's ridiculous that children behave and talk like this, but honestly I can't make myself hate it for it, it's fun to read.

I don't mind the Aura stuff either as I've never seen it done quite the way it's being done in this fic, and as stupid as they are I can't help but like power levels as a guilty pleasure.

One thing I do love about the fic, that I mentioned in the Almost Recommended thread, is how Harry is treating and thinking about people from his past. He doesn't try to manipulate them, force them to be his friends just because they once were, he's just happy they're alive. He also isn't your standard time travel pedophile which is always an uncomfortable read. It also means the fic isn't bloated with badly written 12 year old romance.

Of course, the exception to this is Dumbledore, who unfortunately suffers from the setup in the first chapter.

There have been a few moments that have been more than a little weird though I cannot remember them all, Harry kissing Snape is definitely up there though. I literally got up and walked away for a few minutes after that, it was so...out of the blue.

A slight gripe I do have is that I recognised a lot of dialogue as being pulled straight out of canon text. It's not a huge deal, but it was irritating.

I'm happy to give it a 4 since despite it's many flaws it managed to hold my interest quite well and I more than enjoyed myself while reading it. It is amateur writing after all and if I was to rate it as such I don't think much above 0.1% of the entire FF.net database would rate over a 3.

I have to bring myself to believe that he was holding back on purpose for the same reason it's repeatedly mentioned he's holding back on his school work. Because it's either that or the author is choosing to manipulate power levels to suit the situation, which is disgustingly frequent in FF and really makes you sit back and stare.

 

I need to suspend my disbelief with a few concepts, situations and motivations in the story/series but between them it's surprisingly enjoyable. Guilty pleasure with benefits.

 

Kissing Snape? Ew.

But Goblin friend?!?! Cannot read.

 

Yeah just ... ignore the first chapter, it makes it much better. If you push past the early trash it's well worth the read, really.

 

I've been following this story and the two preceding it for a while. It's not particularly good at anything, but it's entertaining all the same. There are some things that just make me scratch my head (kissing Snape although I think I understand the reasoning behind that one, this Slytherin Queen organization bullshit), but overall it isn't too bad. I'd probably give it a 3/5 if I'm being generous.

To be honest, though, I really have to consider my biggest problem with this story: The premise, and how it's been mostly ignored. The author should just fess up and call it what it is, a fucking AU Slytherin Harry fic. Yes, Harry is too powerful. Yes, he's apparently got future knowledge that he -- for some inexplicable reason -- barely uses. Apart from that it's as if the time-travel didn't fucking happen. He's going to school, playing politics with children, being nice to Snape. It's just so utterly mundane.

The author could have written a Wrong Boy-Who-Lived story. The Potters had twins, went into hiding with the real BWL and sent Harry to the Dursleys. Somehow Harry finds out and is now gunning for revenge and independence. I think you could easily apply this premise to the story and wouldn't even have modify that many aspects of it.

This just defeats the entire purpose of time-travel for me. I don't want to read someone applying slight changes to canon by interjecting here and there, and want to see the butterfly effect in action and pulling extra shifts. Shit should go wrong, the future needs to become unpredictable again in order to create tension.

As it is this story is just disappointing in too many ways. 2/5.