Hi, Vittoria. It's been a long time since you posted this story, but never too late for one more review. I was trolling the list of authors, reading old stories that deserve to be not wholly forgotten, and I clicked on your story because your pen name is like my real name, Victoria.

This was a fun little story, written in a very light-hearted, tongue-in-cheek style, and that is refreshingly unusual for a story about Voldemort, who is usually depicted so seriously. (It reminds me of the humor dramas about Adolf Hitler -- we lessen his power by laughing at him.)

The story is certainly imaginative, and it moves at a lively pace, never dragging or getting boring. The short, declarative sentences make the story plain and easy to read. You have put in just enough description (the cold, barren terrain, surrounding mountains, wire fences, tents) for us to be able to envision the situation without ever slowing the pace of the action. I liked the exotic location (Tibet) and the mental images of the fantastic dragons against a background of frozen tundra.

Although there were several original characters in your story, you kept the focus firmly on your "unfortunate protagonist" by keeping everything in Voldemort's point of view, showing only his thoughts and reflections. But your original characters were well characterized just by their dialogue. I was left wishing that I knew more about them and what work they were doing at the Dragon Reservation; they sounded very interesting.

By treating Lord Voldemort with humor, you have shown us a side of him that we haven't seen before, a tentative and uncertain side. It was fun to see him react to people who weren't impressed by him at all and who considered him incompetent rather than formidable. And yet you drew a contrast between the bumbling Voldy who can't handle a baby dragon, and the ruthless (and more familiar-to-us) Voldemort who casually commits a brutal murder of the guard at the gate. These two opposite aspects of his character provided some dynamic tension in your story and remind us that, after all, he is still Lord Voldemort.

Your writing is quite free of mechanical errors of spelling, punctuation, and grammar. But there is one spot where your computer has "gremlinized" you: at the point where Voldemort wakes up in the tent after having been attacked by the "dangerous breeds" dragon, there is a piece of text from an earlier point in the story ([i]It also became clear....a wall of fire behind him[/i]) that has inserted itself into the middle of the current sentence ([i]He perceived his surroundings and came to a single conclusion...[/i]). This accidental insertion causes confusion in the reading, but it would be only a moment's work to edit it out, and then the text would be entirely free of glitches.

I'll bet you had fun writing this story, and I certainly enjoyed reading it. It is like a breath of fresh air amongst the more solemn and heavy writings which we see so often in these archives. Even in the context of terrible wizarding wars, we all need to laugh sometimes, and your story has accomplished that goal in charming fashion. Nice job.

Author's Response: Hey Victoria! Thank you for taking the time to read and write a lovely review for my fic. I was amazed to have received a review after a really long time. I'm glad you like this story. :)

Hi, Jonnie. This is Vicki of Slytherin House commenting on your chaptered fic Seven Years and Counting which you wrote through chapter 5 a couple of years ago and which certainly deserves more than two reviews. I think you show a talent for writing in general and for plotting in particular, though I can’t say that for sure because the rest of the chapters haven’t been posted (yet?)

Your story has many strong points. You have a richness of characters in your story, both familiar names and new ones, but this does not become confusing because you wisely concentrate on one or two characters at a time, developing his/her/their little section of the story fully before going on to the next. Your original characters are frankly interesting: Sir Faints-a-Lot (love that nickname), the freckle-faced girl, Addie the prefect.

The scenes that you include in your story are wisely chosen, the scenes that further the plot, and you develop each of these scenes fully, not skipping too quickly through them (for example, Albus listening at the closed door; the Sorting Hat scene), though a few scenes did seem to drag a little (the children squabbling at the breakfast table the morning after the wedding; Molly’s prolonged complaining about her cousin’s wedding at the outset of the story).

The promised mystery and tension doesn’t really appear until chapter two, when Albus listens throughout the closed door; if I had read only the first chapter (sulking at a wedding, arguing with her boyfriend, an inane conversation with tipsy James), I might not have waited around for chapter two to be posted, but since there are five chapters available for immediate reading now, the presence of mystery and even danger is becoming obvious (though exactly what, we do not know) and the story line becomes more compelling.

There are many little details that enrich the background of your story, such as “Most of the time the fireplace produced people from the Ministry, and they weren’t normally fun people to be around,” and the entire sequence between Molly and Albus outside the closed door.

You also have avoided some easy stereotypical traps, such as surprising us by Sorting the freckle-faced girl into Ravenclaw, not Slytherin. We will see more of her, I am sure. But I am surprised that James and Addie wasted a Tupperware tub full of delicious brownies by having a food fight in the library; it doesn’t seem reasonable that they would do so.

By the time the five chapters have elapsed, we can see the mystery plot already becoming more complicated and we are becoming more curious. Less compelling are the romantic difficulties between Molly and Noah or Rose and Scorpius. If the main thrust of the story is a dangerous mystery, then I hope the romance aspect will be downplayed as a distraction to the main plot, unless, of course, it turns out that these romances are crucial to the resolution of the danger.

This story deserves to be finished because it has a lot of potential and because you have the skill to do it well. Perhaps Real Life is standing in your way, but I hope not.

Author's Response: Oh my goodness! I'm in absolute wow of such an amazing review! You have me all giddy inside! In all actuality, this story has fifteen chapters written so far (I've been busy with other stories on other archives). I nearly forgot all about this one and just so happened to log on today, with no intentions of receiving this! Thank you so much! I've actually thought this story was something looked by from readers because I wasn't writing it very well. I've been thinking of going back and editing it a little. Mostly to really downplay the romance, because I'm working on so many other romance possibilities as it is with other stories. I'm still shocked by the review. I don't know what more to say other than thank you so much, and I really hope to get back to this site just so you and the other possible readers I have out there can enjoy what is to come of this. You're a lovely person (and a fellow snake!) and I can't thank you enough!

Hi, Sarah. This is Vicki of Slytherin House. I have been widening my experience by reading Next Generation fics, which I had not been reading before because I had thought that I wouldn’t enjoy them (silly me!), and I really do enjoy this story of yours, and am sorry to see that it is lying in a state of suspended animation after five chapters.

Although it is told entirely from Lily’s point of view, all the characters are well defined; their personalities just shine through. You have achieved great success in this area. Your storytelling talents are also admirable; the plot progresses steadily, and the many details that make the story so vivid are all directed toward the furtherance of the characters and the plot. There is a lot of imaginative originality here.

You have avoided skipping too quickly through the progression of events. You have avoided dragged-out conversations that don’t go anywhere. You have avoided stereotypes that are overused to the point of being boring. You have successfully steered your ship of Romance between the rocks of sickly sweetness and angstiness without getting wrecked on either one or allowing a tsunami of Romance to overwhelm the rest of the story.

I can’t really think of anything that I didn’t like about your story. It would be worthwhile to come back to this story and finish it up.

Hi, Ang. I hope you still check the archives occasionally to see if any more people have read your stories. Even the older stories get looked at from time to time, and this is one of those times.

I enjoyed reading these first two chapters of your story about Harry right after the final battle. Your story is full little good ideas, little observations that make up the tapestry of this momentous period of the Potterverse history, many insightful details.

In Harry’s inner dialogue, I particularly like the description of his thinking of himself as “old” and the previous times in his life as “the olden days”, even though he realizes that it really wasn’t that long ago. I liked that he he was vowing to learn the names of all the dead. “…he would accept her decision without question because he surely would deserve whatever he got” is a good line, showing his refusal the struggle over one more thing (her decision).

You have made good observations in the lines that show that the adrenaline is still surging, stimulated by the sight of the dead bodies (“he found himself fighting the urge to start running”) and that he cannot shift gears instantly. His feeling the need to do the tasks that had been so urgent in recent months, such as finding the last horcrux, and his observation that being able to do nothing was so different both show that he is still on high alert, still running on nerves.

Chapter Two in particular has a whole lot of good lines in it, good dialogue, insightful details. “…How could such a young boy have seen things worse than a room full of dead bodies?” is just one of them; I could cite many more.

As a descriptive piece, full of insight about Harry’s mental states and inner thoughts after the battle, this story works very well. Whether there will be (or would have been) more action in later chapters remains to be seen. The premise and setting have a lot of potential. I’m sorry that you did not finish it. The lack of review by a beta reader shows itself in little spots here and there where there is some unevenness of tone, spots that could be smoothed out a little (as is true with all our stories before the beta gives them a going-over), but the story is probably worth finishing. How will Harry “control the rebound”? He has learned a lot by dealing with the fight against Voldemort. Now he can learn a lot by dealing with the aftermath. Is that were you were going?

I noticed that you said in your intro that this was your first story in the archives. I hope that you have kept on writing, because I expect that you still have good things to say.

This piece does not have an easy-to-follow storytelling style. It gives the feel of a story with many of the sentences missing, and the reader must make cognitive leaps over the gaps like a person traversing a stream on stepping stones. It requires a lot of assuming as to why people say and do certain things, and a fair amount of "Well, I guess what he means is XYZ..."

Still, with a few re-readings the reader can come to some conclusions about what the characters are probably talking about. (What is "ushering a queue"?)

Here we have a little glimpse of Nicolas Flamel and his ever-patient wife (not yet a widow) Perenelle, who are otherwise only referred to in Book 1, never encountered. Nicolas is portrayed as more crochety than I would have otherwise imagined him, and if he is so unfriendly (unlike Dumbledore) and alchemy is a dying art, then why would Jacqueline be so persistent in trying to become his apprentice? She is much better off with Dumbledore.

The time of this story must be when Dumbledore is still a young man, and apparently he has spent some time in Paris and intends to stay on there for a while, since he offers this newly-married young woman a post as his assistant. How did she meet him, at her young age? Perhaps during the fifteen days of the International Alchemical Conference.

I would not care to read an entire book written in this style. It is more obscure than I prefer, and while I enjoy puzzling out a mystery (what do these facts and observations lead to?), I would rather not spend my time puzzling out individual sentences. But that's just me. This story has a certain stylishness to it, and I'm sure some people would appreciate its unique essence.

You obviously put a lot of work into this slice-of-life story, Kuri, and it certainly deserves a review. I have been making a point of reading your stories, starting with the oldest ones and working my way forward, in order to get a handle on your style. Unlike some authors, you do not sugar-coat anything; your characters are diamonds in the rough, and it requires close attention to appreciate them fully.

In the past I have been unsettled by your enigmatic style, what seemed to me as breaks in the flow of the story, but I do not see that very much in this story, and passages that are a challenge to understand at first reading generally become clear when one reads a little further into the narrative. Maybe this story is more fluid, or maybe I’m just used to it, or maybe the many connections to the canon we already know provides a good, stabilizing framework on which the story hangs. At any rate, it works.

Your characters, both those merely mentioned in canon and those who are original, are well characterized; we see their personalities, their strong and weak points, their daily challenges and imperfect efforts to cope. In short, they are like people in real life.

I wondered if there would be some vigorous plot, some crisis, climax, and denouement, but really it was just a gentle slice of life, with a few little victories and even more unsolved problems, but not depressing or, in the long run, pessimistic. It is a story of people who just keep on keepin’ on. I enjoyed it.

Author's Response: I' so glad you liked this one! Thank you for the comments about the characters I think that people have both flaws and good things about them. A professor once told me no character is all bad or all good. (I think after four years at university, that's the only thing I remember about her.) You called this a slice of life story - as I said in another review, I'd like to shake your hand. You get it. People deal with good things and rough spots throughout their day. Thank you so much for reading this.

There are a lot of thought-provoking elements within the few short pages of this story. The outstanding impression of Susan is depression. Yes, Theodore has always been a dicey friend, playing her like a fish on a line, but she has allowed herself to be played. She knows, intellectually, that "he never had a solid foundation", but she keeps hoping that he will be something else, and failing to take care of herself.

The war has taken a big toll on her, and she has responded by isolating herself from people who could help her find her way back. A job in which she interacts mostly with strangers. A specific decision not to join the merrymakers at the Leaky Cauldron on Christmas. She complains of being alone on the holiday, but it is her choice, not her parents' fault. She focuses on what she has lost: her Aunt Amelia, "most of her immediate family" (though both her parents have survived). She faults her parents for leaving her to go on vacation (how dare they?). And she uses alcohol and loveless sex to try to fill the void in her psyche.

Not everyone who lived through the war is so far behind on the road to recovery as Susan is. I don't really see any insight on her part in this story. She has yet to take responsibility for her own happiness. It's a depressing story, and I wonder if it was depressing to write. But despite that, it's well-written, and the details all contribute to a tightly-constructed whole.

Wow, Ken, you stirred up a hornets’ nest with this story. Some readers appear to want to keep our favorite characters squeaky-clean and cannot believe that you would write them as handling their personal affairs so badly. You are accused of writing them Out Of Character, but I must comment on the other side of this debate.

We must remember that these characters are teenagers and early-twenty-somethings; that’s not very old. Neuroscience tells us that the frontal lobes of the brain, the location of the centers for impulse control, planning ahead, and considering the consequences of one’s actions, are not fully developed until about age 25, and even without the benefit of CT scans and MRIs, our Founding Fathers who wrote the U.S. Constitution knew, by their own observations, that people under the age of 25 had less common sense, hence the constitutional minimum age of 25 to be elected to Congress. I have seen teenagers, good kids, the offspring of my friends, do egregiously stupid things, some involving sex and some involving the police, because of three reasons: immaturity (as mentioned above), alcohol, and the stress of difficult life situations.

It is noteworthy that the worst behavior of your characters occurs in conjunction with alcohol, the Number One lubricant for sending people down the slippery slope to unintended disaster. I confess to being a little disturbed by how so many of the fanfiction stories on this site are awash in Firewhiskey—drinking to celebrate successes, deal with disappointments, provide surcease of sorrow, lift spirits, face tragedy, relax with friends, and on and on. When someone dies, someone else (often George) goes on a booze-soaked bender that lasts days, weeks, or even months. Characters who are just getting together for dinner end up tipsy or drunk with depressing regularity, and this is treated as being amusing.

Maybe this accurately reflects the usual real-life behavior at this age; I don’t know. It is easy to believe that injudicious drinking is a sign of having achieved adulthood, but the fact is that when you are in your twenties, your fervent wish is that no one will remember the dumb stuff you did in your teens, and when you are in your thirties, you hope to heaven that no one remembers the dumb stuff you did in your twenties. Wisdom comes with age and experience, not with fame and the awarding of medals.

So Ken, your story is realistic to me: teenagers thrown unprepared into situations they don’t know how to handle wisely. Stabbing Horcruxes with basilisk fangs is one thing; all this stuff is another.

This is a fun little story, even though it ends on a more serious note, and Primrose is a refreshingly charming and down-to-earth character. She must have had a good home life, since she sounds so well-adjusted. And I like the little touch of her translating the runes on recently acquired treasures; it sounds like something that I would enjoy doing!

I enjoy seeing the creation of original characters that are linked to established characters like Bill and Fleur,and it's a treat to get a glimpse of Bill and Fleur in their Gringotts milieu at the beginning of their relationship. And although it looks as if there's no romance for Primrose in this little episode, despite her imaginative daydreams, one need not worry for her; she's a great girl, and some wizard (other than Basil) will see that soon enough.

This piece is well-written, with a light, deft touch. I'm not sure what the last line refers to ("something good could come of this news"), but it is just like Primrose to be optimistic, even in the face of You-Know-Who's return.

Thanks for writing.

What an unusual story. It is a simple tale, but its charm comes from the blending of basic magical principles into a very different culture. The details give the appearance of being researched and are sufficiently plausible that they might be accurate. (Were phoenixes really a symbol of femininity in China? Did regular army soldiers rotate in and out of palace guard posts? I guess so.)

The references to magic are few, just enough to show that this is a magical story -- a wand, Apparition, shrinking the travel trunks, Polyjuice Potion, Veritaserum.

The story gives hints of questions we will have to answer for ourselves. What is the time period? Were members of the emperor's family always magical? Were the "lesser schools" also schools of magic? And how will the prince's experience be, studying alongside both commoners and scheming aristocrats? It boggles the mind to think of the amount of research that would be needed to describe even one ordinary day at Dragon Pearl.

As usual, Aida's writing is skillful and graceful, easy to read and easy to follow. A good blend of background, description, thoughts, dialogue, and action.

It is assumed that witches and wizards are present in countries all around the globe but we tend to imagine them only in Western-culture countries. Aida has opened up a whole new vista of possibilities. Will anyone follow her lead? (No, don't look at me.)