Title: Victoria Potter
Author: Taure
Rating: T
Genre: General/AlternativeUniverse
Status: WIP
Library Category: The Alternates
Pairings: Too soon to tell. Also, only goes to third year.
Summary: Fem!Harry. Years 1-3 of Victoria Potter's adventures at Hogwarts. Magic, friendship, and boarding school life. Mostly canonical world but no canon rehash. No bashing.
Link: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2866324

Taure is a powerhouse on DarkLordPotter, so I don't think I have to go with the hard sell for his (her? No clue, don't care) work. Victoria Potter is his update of Alexandra Potter, one of the few decent fem!Harry stories I've ever read. Victoria takes all the virtues of Alexandra, strips its vices, and gives the new version even more potential.

Though early, one of the things I already love about this story is its pace. Taure assumes we have some understanding of what the Harry Potter world is like and so uses description more as a tool for understanding the character (as it probably always should be) than to get a sense of the world (as it sometimes has to be).

But it isn't just pace, it's economy. Taure doesn't spell out everything of importance, he just gives you something and moves on. There's one comment McGonagall makes about Goblins, for example, that tells us a whole lot about her and about what Victoria is learning, and it does so with a single line of dialogue. Some stories would spend paragraphs on this. It happens again in the fourth chapter (the most recently chapter as of my writing), where some characters are interacting and Victoria notices one -- the odd one out -- throw a glance downward, away from the group. It tells us (and Victoria?) everything we need to know and does so in half a sentence.

That's just good writing. What really entices me about this story is the promise built into it at several levels. From Victoria saying in the second chapter about her math teacher "doesn't even care about how the numbers feel, being shoved together like that" to the fact that several things totally outside of Victoria's control happen differently than they happened to Harry, it all makes me wonder 'why?' and 'what is going on?' I'm sure Taure will answer.

I'm also sure Taure will handle early red flags with deftness. There are at least three bits of information we get about Victoria within the first several chapters that are often the root of ponderous, cookie-cutter, and ugly Harry Potter FanFictions. Having read his other work, most especially The One He Feared, I am confidant that Taure will turn these clichés into novelty.

4/5 right now. I expect in the long-run it'll be a 5/5.

 

I'm sure that Taure's going to make this into an incredibly good story, as usual, but this seems to be posted a bit, or way, too early. It's still only 4 chapters and 18,000 words long, and Victoria hasn't even been sorted yet. At this pace, this story will probably be around 200-300,000 words long. This is a bit too early to give this story a fair evaluation, at least in my opinion.

 

His previous fem!Harry was without a doubt my favourite of that genre.

The worldbuilding, magical whimsy, the development of a magical prodigy with Voldemort/Dumbledore level talent and a Dumbledore mentor hit all the right notes for me so I have no doubt that this story will be awesome.

The story also seems to have removed random interesting ideas in a AU HP sandbox and rather self indulgent magical theory stuff (which I actually really enjoyed).

I am a bit dissapointed that he has trimmed down some of her flaws in this, I really enjoyed how immature, selfish, arrogant stubborn and bitchy Alexandra could be which I found quite believable for a 11 year old with no close family ties very high intelligence and too much power for her age.

I really would have loved to see such a flawed character show slow steady change after fucking up as bad as she did and gradually mature.

Victoria seems a bit dull in comparison right now, which will probably change since it's still so early but I kinda miss Alexandra a bit. Also for my taste there seems to be a bit to much detail and desprictions on clothes.

Really looking forward to see the later years which will according to Taure have more adult tone as the characters age and have canon like yearly adventures not sure how many original ideas he has though for several year centric adventures since that is quite tough.

No doubt 5/5 still and one of the only 2 HP story I still follow.

 

Way too early for a submission on this, especially if it goes the way of all of Taure's other fics. It's a good start, but it could easily go off on a tangent, or just get abandoned.

 

I agree that it is way too early for submission.

That said, the story is off to a nice start. The world building is being done by a very subtle touch which is appreciated very much.
I will hold on rating it untill there is more.

 

A good start, I like the pacing. Hopefully we'll get some more soon, withholding judgement until then.

 

It's kinda short, but excellent beginning. I really enjoy her character, but to be honest, that was already true with Alexandra Potter. With Taure's tendency to rewrite due to self criticism (Georgia Potter coming next year, I'm calling it ), I don't actually expect him to finish this, considering that the estimated length of the story is like 200k+ words. We'll see, I might be wrong!

 

Something tells me that Elizabeth Potter comes after Victoria.

 

Another chapter dropped. And besides the introduction of an interesting new (or rather, old) character, there were a series of fascinating ideas that popped up, as is par for the course.

 

I am enjoying the worldbuilding so far. It makes sense to me that a young Riddle would enchant his seat so only he could sit in it just like a young Grindelwald enchanted the walls of Durmstang to forever bare his mark. Overwhelming skill merged with arrogance. I wouldn't be surprised to see more things from Riddle scattered around Slytherin. I really liked how Slytherin cheered at Victoria's sorting. No whispered hatred or incredible dislike from these children. Just joy at getting a celebrity. It seems a more honest reaction.

Also, Taure completely ignores the hidden Stone plotline by having Flamel teach himself. Could be a very interesting class. I am really looking forward to an indepth view of transfiguration and charms as well. I feel like too many writers ignore or downplay the actual magic in HP fiction, but I believe that Taure will give it justice.

 

Interesting. I wonder how Lord Voldemort got it out that it was his chair without letting the fact that he was Tom Riddle get out.

 

People always knew. He made the Diary so Tom Riddle could take credit for it.

 

Introduction so far so it's very difficult to objectively review.

Nobody's character is really explored so far except for bits of Victoria but those are likable so far. Right now we only see the face value of everything around us in her world but we're definitely getting some dropped hints regarding future plot points like Flamel as a teacher and other supporting characters. Slytherins don't all appear to be homogeneous so far but then again, we don't really know them yet. What's clear is that house Slytherin isn't a den of genius Machiavellian icons. There's nice people and assholes but more importantly, they're all inexperienced kids so far. Good technical writing skills as usual.

Worldbuilding will obviously be important and I confess learning about different robes could just be fun. Hopefully we'll see more so I can update this review

 

There's far too little to give a real review of this, but I like it so far. Not going to bother giving a rating until it's at least 50k words though, as anything before probably won't be that far into the school year. Hopefully it isn't abandoned before that point.

 

I'll be eager to see how this pans out. I liked Alexandra Potter, and so far this is excellent. It's encouraging to see it has received an update as well. As other users has remarked, I will wait and see.

 

There is one thing about Taure's writing that always takes me into the world of HP and its the magic. He includes all these little things that other stories ignore that makes the world feel lived in. Feeding plants quicksilver, logical reasons why transfiguration is so dangerous, etc... It really elevates his work over many other fics because it reminds me of Rowling's work. She included all those little touches that brought the world to life. I am really looking forward to see where Taure takes Alexandra.

I am also excited since the author's note suggested that time skips were coming up. One of the main killers of good fics is they get bogged down in the minutia of first year whereas Rowling finished all of first year in around 40-50k words (the other 20-30k words or so were with the Dursleys). And yet people still write 200k words only in first year. I would rate this at a tentative 4.5/5 right now with a more solid review coming after first year finishes. Though I still love the Slytherin students still acting like actual children unlike basically every other Slytherin story out there.

 

Another excellent chapter! It's exciting to see this fic updating.

 

I found this much more enjoyable upon rereading into the latest chapter with a bunch of caffeine and a clear enough head to read without skimming. The pacing can be slow, but it's deliberate.

Each chapter seems to develop the world more and more, instead of serving as a dry, linear progression of plot. It's delightfully immersive with all the tiny details, like No-Squeak chalk, classroom group discussions and being nearly late to class.

Then there are little moments of dramatic tension like the Sorting and chair sequence that elevate this beyond the worldbuilding wank that we know Taure for.

The characters are well grounded in reality and the dumb snotty little kids actually talk and sound like dumb snotty little kids.

5/7 would continue reading until it's inevitably abandoned like a redheaded bisexual stepchild.

 

Received a review on FF.Net which is worthy of preserving here:

With my response:

In many respects I agree with the points of the review, if you proceed from certain assumptions/values. If you just want a quick and easy bit of entertainment then yes, the fic is definitely too slow paced in terms of "getting to the action", though I think getting to Hogwarts in 20k words is fairly good as these things go (compared to eternal summer syndrome etc).

But this is a case of the reader just having a different set of "fanfiction values" to me. I judge fanfiction by the same standard as I judge an original published work. It has to be intelligible, in theory, to someone who has never read the original HP books (or in the case of a later year divergence, intelligible to someone who has not read any of the original books after the point of divergence). This will necessarily lead impatient readers to feel frustration. It is, however, distinct from rehash, which is about events not diverging. Explaining and describing things in full is not rehash, it's doing your own legwork.