Oh the whole thing was beautifully done. I got choked up and teary, every bit as much as when Harry was grieving for Sirius, and Dumbledore's funeral. The Buckbeak angle was brilliant, the idea of that pure, simple animal affection, and the understanding of loss was absolutely heartbreaking. And it did a very good job of mirroring Remus's own emotional turmoil. I'm still teary and sniffly, just writing the review... I hope you're happy!! (j/k)
Awww... short & simpled, but poignant :( Hadn't thought of James preparing to die & expecting Lily to live. And it's heartbreaking how his thoughts here are so sad, yet what actually happens is a hundred times worse. Very well written though, good job.
WOW. That was incredible. Not only a deep and poignant message, but beautifully written and entirely believable. The pacing and repetitions did a wonderful job of conveying the mood, and I think you paid just the right amount of attention to the right details... small physical gestures and objects, mingled with deep thoughts... really sucks the reader in.... One of the best one-shots I've ever read.
--cb
Really great, really sad. I cried, literally shed tears, at this bit:
James, fallen on the ground, eyes that once sparked with mischief now staring glassily at the ceiling. The feeling of being unable to breathe as he realized that his best friend would never be with him again. James’ glasses were lying smashed beside him. He can never remember if he had stepped on them accidentally, or if he had found them that way.
The rest of it was done in such an oddly detached way, it conveyed perfectly the sense that Sirius had locked away all emotions to cling to whatever shreds of sanity he could.
One point: I thought Bellatrix came into Azkaban only a few weeks or months after him? Your story says years. Or has he just so lost track of time that it feels like years?
Anyway, great job, very enjoyable read (in a sad way, of course).
Author's Response: I\'m really glad you liked it, your review made me squee! In writing this I wanted to write about the fact that however normal he may have appeared later, Azkaban really did ruin him and drive him mad. As for your point, I think that to him it didn\'t matter how long it was because there was no difference between the days and with the whole atmosphere of the place little things like time become unimportant. Anyway, thanks for the review!
Very interesting and well-crafted. I like how you cut to the story-within-the-story to show how the ring worked. Actually, I want to know more about how the ring works; who's voice is it? Or how does it decide what to say? I mean, does every woman who wears it feel like a burden on her husband and kill herself? Or does it just control the woman according to whatever the man wants?
Anyway, really enjoyed it, great job!
cb
Author's Response: I thought of the ring as tapping into a woman\'s insecurities and fears. By accentuating these and agreeing with the things she most fears about herself it can twist a woman\'s view on events and reality - making them think they\'re her fault and that she is completely worthless. If suicide is her only way out it\'s an easy, albeit evil, way for the husband to dispose of his wife cleanly and still look like the injured party who has just lost his spouse. Hope that helps! I\'m really glad you enjoyed the fic and thanks for your review!
That was cute! I really thought he was gonna transform into Padfoot and scare them all away though.
Author's Response: *has visions of a rabbit avalanche on the Black stairway* Thanks for the review!
That was almost... sweet. Bella all shy and pining instead of being the usual raving, sadistic loonball. Except not at all out of character. I like the infatuation thing, it adds a lot of depth and dimension to her character. So yea, very enjoyable read.
Author's Response: Well, she must have been normal once, no? A long, long, long long time ago. I see Bella as having had to be infatuated with him, to a degree. It\'s the only way she could have gotten where she did in the ranks of DEs. Thanks for reading!
Wow. That was very beautiful and poignant. I especially liked how Lily's telling her story as a fairy tell echoed the fairy-tale like quality of the first book somehow, when Harry first learned he was a wizard. Subtle, but I think it really added something special to this one shot.
I'd never have thought a fic about Michael Corner would capture my interest, but whaddya know... it has! The first chapter is good, and it's refreshing to see things from a totally new POV instead of the same old, way overdone main characters. :D
Author's Response: Dear Capella,
Congratulations on reading something outside your comfort zone. I am so glad you did! Thank you for taking the truoble to review.
Regards, GhV
An excellent one-shot, very well written! Your look inside Lupin's head is perfect, really captures his personality. And Sirius was great too, I loved the bit about the gaudy tropical birds. So again, good stuff!!
Author's Response: Thanks for coming over here and reading my story, and thanks for the kind words! The friendship between Lupin and Sirius is fun to try to write about, I guess because they\'re both great characters with complicated pasts.
I\'m afraid I can\'t take credit for thinking up the tropical birds, though. JKR has Sirius sending them to Harry at the beginning of GoF...
Man, that was pretty decent, for being set in Vegas. :p I wonder what Hermione thinks about that army of house elves that now comprise Harry's staff. I really thought he was about to barge in on a more intimate moment for the two of them, so I wasn't at all surprised by the eloping. Well, it is Vegas, after all. Hehe, good job.
Author's Response: Thank you. Well, you have to work with what you got, and that \"barging in\" did flicker through my mind. It just didn\'t work out that way. Thanks!