Note re: HBP -- I was disappointed. The character development was minimal, and it simply felt rushed and contrived. I.e., let's get Book 6 out of the way so we can focus on the important Book 7 Grand Finale.

I'm sorry, but after a couple of particularly vicious responses to reviews I posted, I no longer provide my e-mail address. If you do not want reviews from me, then provide me with a decent enough summary to avoid your story. And frankly, if you don't want honest reviews, why are you posting your stories in public?

OK, off soapbox for now. Sorry, back to the regularly scheduled channel...

I love to lose myself in the fanfiction of the Potterverse, and sincerely thank all those authors who make it possible.

And that is one of the key things I look for in a story -- the ability to lose myself in the story.

Some of my favorite things:
Authors who take the time to develop characters who are under-utilized in canon. A number of the secondary characters--even Malfoy--are rather two-dimensional in canon. "Dragon Tamer" is a marvelous story in this genre.

And especially, those authors who add depth and substance to the main characters, moving beyond the clichés. "Realizations," "Resonance" and "Coexistance" are wonderful examples of such stories.

Those folks who manage to combine canon with some new and interesting plot twist that does not overpower canon. "Hogwarts Apprentices I: Gentry Green" is an excellent example. I also have to plug "Harry Potter & the Honeychurch Institute of Magic," which includes a minor character named after yours truly :).

And those wonderful folks who are capable of thinking completely outside the box, who deliver delightful parodies on the Potterverse, such as "Harry Potter and the Pretty Sorcerors Balls".

Some of my pet peeves:
People who are confused about the gender of Blaise Zabini. Blaise is a boy's name; it is from the Latin, meaning "stammerer." The two most noted of that name were St. Blaise of Armenia and French mathematician Blaise Pascal (after whom the first popular procedural programming language was named). A variation on the name, "Blasius," is also used in the German speaking countries. Folks, you can't be expected to recognize every name you ever run across, but google is a very effective cure for ignorance.

Authors too lazy check even the barest minimum of facts. I have seen the names of almost every single canon character misspelled with the exception of Harry himself. E.g., Dumbledor, Snapes, Evens, Weasly, Finnegan, Grainger, Magonagal, Zambini (or better yet, for the ice enthusiasts, Zamboni). One author put Hogwarts in Wales instead of Scotland. Prof. Fred(!) Flitwick. Another had Arthur & Molly going to school with James & Lilly. A few folks seem to think that the British currency isthe dollarand at least one thought it was euros. The HP Lexicon and google are your friends!

Authors who insist on inventing additional names for canon characters. Some authors seem to think they need a full first, middle and surname for every single character--why? If JKR can make it through five books without stating a middle name for Severus, why do so many people think they need to invent one? (Add to that the stereotypical American "Just call me Bob" syndrome.)

Authors who flagrantly disregard some canon fact simply because they "like their version better." Includes those people who refuse to acknowledge that Sirius is dead as well as various goofy things like the person who renamed Bellatrix to Isabel because they didn't like the name Bellatrix. If you don't want to play in the Potterverse, then don't. But publish your work as original fiction, not Potterverse fanfiction.

Authors who try to inject too much sex into a story. Writing sexually oriented stories is an art in its own right. If I want to read porn, I go to the Nifty Archive and read porn. Although it can be somewhat amusing to read a teenaged girl's description of oral sex, when it is clear that she has likely never even seen a naked boy, much less had sex with one. I'll also admit to being perplexed as to the number of teenage girls who follow the HP-SS ship.

I'm not a spelling freak or a grammar nazi. I have read (and enjoyed) stories that have had significant problems on both fronts (including one where the author kept confusing "his" and "her" :). That said, they do detract from the story, especially the flow of the story. If spelling and grammar are not your strong points, do yourself (and us) a favor and find a yourself a beta reader who knows the difference between Strunk & White and Smith & Wesson. And do note that using Spell and Grammar Check Tools is an aid, and neither finds nor fixes all errors. Particularly with respect to spelling--a software tool cannot tell whether you should use vial/vile/bile/veil or tome/tomb, just to name two of the favorite points of confusion. Snicker, how's this for a horrible sentence:

She stood in the mummy's tomb, feeling the bile rise in her throat as she checked the instructions in the leatherbound tome before lifting the veil from her face to swallow the vile, disgusting contents of the glass vial.

XoX
Madam Whitbrook

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