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carolinewithane's Reviews (647)
So, I am a bit of on the fence on this one. The second part definitely raised the rating, but I still felt a bit underwhelmed. This is all my fault, though—I'd read plenty of reviews praising the author's exquisite writing style and the amazing forbidden love story, and, while the book did deliver both, it wasn't up to the levels I'd been expecting. Definitely will read the rest of the series and am completely, totally, utterly jealous of the author's imagination, but I still was expecting something MORE.
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Reread on 2016. I'm afraid my opinion hasn't changed much, except that I don't think I will finish the series. There are other books that are more my style that I'm going to prioritise.
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Reread on 2016. I'm afraid my opinion hasn't changed much, except that I don't think I will finish the series. There are other books that are more my style that I'm going to prioritise.
this was very sweet. a bit underdeveloped, a bit two dimensional, but very sweet nonetheless.
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31/07
this was fanfiction. and not even a good one at that
--*--*--*--
01/08
Let me elaborate on that, with mild spoilers and overuse of the trademark symbol.
Disclaimer: I knew what I was getting into when I read this. I read the spoilers back during the preview sessions. I knew what the play was about. I knew I most likely wouldn't enjoy it. But I'm WEAK.
Anyway.
Characters
I have no problem with the Next Generation or an older Golden Trio (and friends). In fact, I'm a bit of a sucker for Next Gen fic (which probably contributed to my reading of this as a fanfiction). And I loved Scorpius and Albus. Scorpius is a Cinnamon Roll Too Good For This World™ and I want to protect him at all costs. Albus is an Angst Emo with Daddy Issues and I love him to bits. Rose... was a wasted character who, IMHO, was only there because a) there couldn't be a next gen story without her (though they conveniently forgot Hugo existed apart from a couple throwaway lines) and b) they needed her to keep everything Straight™ (which is another problem I won't even get into). I saw so much potential in her, but instead we got a scapegoat character to represent all the prejudice Albus was facing who then proceed to cease existing for 2/3 of the entire play.
Delphi is the impersonation of any fic featuring a female original character with unnatural hair who plays both a love interest and also the lost relative of Harry Potter/Tom Riddle/etc. AND DON'T GET ME STARTED ON THE LOGISTICS OF BELLATRIX'S PREGNANCY BECAUSE IT. DOES. NOT. WORK. And how can Delphi be an Augury if neither Voldemort nor Bellatrix were? What was the point of that except establishing that she was a Mary Sue™?
However, my biggest problem was with the characters we already knew. Harry had such OOC moments that, though I knew about them in advance (having read spoilers of those who attended the play previews) it still really hurt to read.HARRY POTTER WOULD NEVER TELL HIS SON HE WISHED HE WASN'T HIS CHILD FFS
On the good side, besides touching on very important topics such as trauma and PSTD, which were really well-done, the play also gave us Harry calling out Dumbledore on this less-than-heroic actions toward Harry (though it was all forgiven and forgot because Dumbledore ~loved him, of course)
Ron was Movie!Ron. Joking dad, always thinking about food, not once truly interacting with Harry the way they used to. Also, I'm pretty sure that if we removed him from the play, nothing about the plot would have been different and this really saddens me. I love Ron much. Why are producers always shitting on this character?
I was mostly fine with Hermione and impressed (and happy!) with Draco's redemption arc. Ginny was okay, IC and entertaining. I was amused by McGonagall (though wasn't she supposed to have retired the year Albus started Hogwarts?) and teared up at every Hagrid scene.
I want to scream when I remember what was done to Cedric.
And two characters I found myself annoyed with were unexpected:: Moaning Myrtle and Umbridge. I'm not particularly fond of Myrtle and hate Umbridge, but their characterization was so out of touch with the original series that a different character with a different name wouldn't make that much a difference.
The Plot
WTF was that plot. Did the writers open fanfiction.net, look for the most popular fics between 2008 and 2010 and throw them all together in one unrealistic, nonsense story? It was ridiculous. It was honestly stupid. It was the sort of plot my 14-year-old self adored, but my 22-year-old self cannot stand time-travel fics anymore. I outgrew them after I'd read the same plot about twenty-seven times. And it seems fandom did too.
The Good Stuff
Because I don't want to be all negative.
There were funny lines. Harry's trauma was well-handled. Ginny got to talk about what she went through during CoS. Black Hermione! Scorpius was a delight. Draco got the redemption arc Rowling denied him in the original series. Harry does the cooking! Hermione is Minister!! ASTORIA GREENGRASS DESERVES TO BE WORSHIPPED BY ALL. Albus in Slytherin!
And that's all I can think of. I tried, I swear I did. There's a reason I didn't give it one star, and it wasn't all due to nostalgia.
tl;dr
I was disappointed. I was upset. I was sad. The original Harry Potter series is in no way perfect and I have many bones to pick with it, but I love it to pieces. This play? I only made myself read it because I knew I wouldn't rest until I did, even knowing I would be annoyed with many aspects of it. But not even the magic of reading another Harry Potter book managed to numb me to its many, many, many flaws.
I'm going back to reading fic now. Better ones.
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
All was well…or is it??!!1 Albus discovers a secret, and who is the beautiful girl with silver hair who calls herself Augury? Time travel AU don’t like don’t read!
Relationships: Scorpius/Rose, Albus/OC, Harry/Ginny, Ron/Hermione, Ron/Padma Patil, Voldemort/Bellatrix, implied Voldemort/Astoria
Source
further reading
further reading #2
I'm resisting really, really hard so I don't add this book to my fanfiction-is-fiction-too bookshelf. Like, really, really hard.
this was fanfiction. and not even a good one at that
--*--*--*--
01/08
Let me elaborate on that, with mild spoilers and overuse of the trademark symbol.
Disclaimer: I knew what I was getting into when I read this. I read the spoilers back during the preview sessions. I knew what the play was about. I knew I most likely wouldn't enjoy it. But I'm WEAK.
Anyway.
Characters
I have no problem with the Next Generation or an older Golden Trio (and friends). In fact, I'm a bit of a sucker for Next Gen fic (which probably contributed to my reading of this as a fanfiction). And I loved Scorpius and Albus. Scorpius is a Cinnamon Roll Too Good For This World™ and I want to protect him at all costs. Albus is an Angst Emo with Daddy Issues and I love him to bits. Rose... was a wasted character who, IMHO, was only there because a) there couldn't be a next gen story without her (though they conveniently forgot Hugo existed apart from a couple throwaway lines) and b) they needed her to keep everything Straight™ (which is another problem I won't even get into). I saw so much potential in her, but instead we got a scapegoat character to represent all the prejudice Albus was facing who then proceed to cease existing for 2/3 of the entire play.
Delphi is the impersonation of any fic featuring a female original character with unnatural hair who plays both a love interest and also the lost relative of Harry Potter/Tom Riddle/etc. AND DON'T GET ME STARTED ON THE LOGISTICS OF BELLATRIX'S PREGNANCY BECAUSE IT. DOES. NOT. WORK. And how can Delphi be an Augury if neither Voldemort nor Bellatrix were? What was the point of that except establishing that she was a Mary Sue™?
However, my biggest problem was with the characters we already knew. Harry had such OOC moments that, though I knew about them in advance (having read spoilers of those who attended the play previews) it still really hurt to read.HARRY POTTER WOULD NEVER TELL HIS SON HE WISHED HE WASN'T HIS CHILD FFS
On the good side, besides touching on very important topics such as trauma and PSTD, which were really well-done, the play also gave us Harry calling out Dumbledore on this less-than-heroic actions toward Harry (though it was all forgiven and forgot because Dumbledore ~loved him, of course)
Ron was Movie!Ron. Joking dad, always thinking about food, not once truly interacting with Harry the way they used to. Also, I'm pretty sure that if we removed him from the play, nothing about the plot would have been different and this really saddens me. I love Ron much. Why are producers always shitting on this character?
I was mostly fine with Hermione and impressed (and happy!) with Draco's redemption arc. Ginny was okay, IC and entertaining. I was amused by McGonagall (though wasn't she supposed to have retired the year Albus started Hogwarts?) and teared up at every Hagrid scene.
I want to scream when I remember what was done to Cedric.
And two characters I found myself annoyed with were unexpected:: Moaning Myrtle and Umbridge. I'm not particularly fond of Myrtle and hate Umbridge, but their characterization was so out of touch with the original series that a different character with a different name wouldn't make that much a difference.
The Plot
WTF was that plot. Did the writers open fanfiction.net, look for the most popular fics between 2008 and 2010 and throw them all together in one unrealistic, nonsense story? It was ridiculous. It was honestly stupid. It was the sort of plot my 14-year-old self adored, but my 22-year-old self cannot stand time-travel fics anymore. I outgrew them after I'd read the same plot about twenty-seven times. And it seems fandom did too.
The Good Stuff
Because I don't want to be all negative.
There were funny lines. Harry's trauma was well-handled. Ginny got to talk about what she went through during CoS. Black Hermione! Scorpius was a delight. Draco got the redemption arc Rowling denied him in the original series. Harry does the cooking! Hermione is Minister!! ASTORIA GREENGRASS DESERVES TO BE WORSHIPPED BY ALL. Albus in Slytherin!
And that's all I can think of. I tried, I swear I did. There's a reason I didn't give it one star, and it wasn't all due to nostalgia.
tl;dr
I was disappointed. I was upset. I was sad. The original Harry Potter series is in no way perfect and I have many bones to pick with it, but I love it to pieces. This play? I only made myself read it because I knew I wouldn't rest until I did, even knowing I would be annoyed with many aspects of it. But not even the magic of reading another Harry Potter book managed to numb me to its many, many, many flaws.
I'm going back to reading fic now. Better ones.
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
All was well…or is it??!!1 Albus discovers a secret, and who is the beautiful girl with silver hair who calls herself Augury? Time travel AU don’t like don’t read!
Relationships: Scorpius/Rose, Albus/OC, Harry/Ginny, Ron/Hermione, Ron/Padma Patil, Voldemort/Bellatrix, implied Voldemort/Astoria
Source
further reading
further reading #2
I'm resisting really, really hard so I don't add this book to my fanfiction-is-fiction-too bookshelf. Like, really, really hard.
This was utterly imaginative, unique, entertaining, well-written and satisfying. 10/10 would recommend.