By Abraxan
Reviews
Katie Davis posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 12:30pm
another great chapter! keep up the GREAT work!
Abraxan replied:
Thank you so much!! I'm really glad you enjoyed it!!
Abraxan
Cliff Bryner posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 11:53am
Please don't kill Harry off. You've done such a marvelous job of wrapping all of the diverse elements of the story together I would be very disappointed. I love your stories. I just have a need for a hero, and a hope that my own best efforts will all work together for my good, and my friends and family.
Abraxan replied:
Did you read my Christmas story????? What makes you think I'd kill Harry off? No way!! There's a happy ending coming - there are just a few bumps left along the way! It's an action/adventure story, after all -- gotta have some action even AFTER the big battle, or it's just not a well-done story, IMO!
Keep reading! And keep the faith!!!!
Abraxan, who will NOT kill off any of the main characters, I promise!
kittykatluver posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 10:54am
Oh, awesome. How many chappie's are left? Keep up the good work!
Abraxan replied:
Two more chapters and a two-part epilogue. Glad you enjoyed it! Thanks for writing!
Abraxan
Robin Westerly posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 9:33am
why why why?!?!?!?
Why would you do this to Harry? Hasn't he suffered enough?
There was I, happily antisipating a feel good ending and you spring this on us?
Bah. Sorry. I shouldn't be complaining. It is a great plot twist I just get too involved in the characters.
Thankyou for a great chapter
Abraxan replied:
You should do the math -- if there are three chapters left, including this one, how could I POSSIBLY fill those chapters with nothing but fluff????? Nope, there have to be bumps in the road, and this was one of them!! ;-> And I do love tweaking the readers with plot twists and cliffies -- at least I didn't leave you hanging with this one (did I? Need to look at the chappie ending again. . .)
Thanks for writing!
Abraxan
DJ posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 9:29am
gzzzz can't you give him a brake he just got out of the hospotal. I still liked it thanks for all the work.
Abraxan replied:
Sometimes life's just like that - and you have to deal with it. Thanks for writing!
Abraxan
Michael69 posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 9:25am
Oh..found out about those t-shirts...thought you were joking actually... Anyway...what's with the x-large limit? I know I'm reading Harry Potter, and to most people my age, I'd be a bit weird for that, but the fact is I'm big and tall and close to being fat...not there yet...but close. XXXL, or at least XXL, and you've got yourself a customer.
Abraxan replied:
M'Dear, I can get you shirts up to *10* XL!! Go ahead and order your XXL or XXXL (I can ship a XXL right away -- a XXXL will have to wait until I can get more in stock and printed, and I'm about to go out of town for two weeks, so it will be late Feb before I can get a XXXL to you). E me at Abraxan@yahoo.com and I'll send you the pricing info for the largert sizes. I couldn't put them on the basic web page because the shipping costs are different and I couldn't figure out how to make Paypal offer THAT many choices!! LOL! Ol' non-techie me!!
Abraxan
Michael69 posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 9:20am
One day...Harry will walk and talk just like a normal guy. I have hope, and you should too. Oh...that was cool how you put Blaise on the 'electric wall'. Eyes falling out of sockets and all that....cool.
Abraxan replied:
Yup, Harry WILL walk and talk just like a normal guy, and in the not too far distant future!! Glad you liked Blaise's going out in a "blaze of glory," so to speak! LOL!
Abraxan, who amuses herself every so often! LOL!
Quizer posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 9:12am
Everything you say makes sense, and you do keep us on the edge on our seats, but not necessarily the way you probably intended. Harry being surprised by Zabini is realistic to the core; Harry assumed it was all over and he was proven wrong. Painfully. And yet, Harry being who he is, could have gotten out of that fight with little more than a good fright and worry about Ginny and it would still have been realistic. Harry's life seems to be an endless series of blows below the belt, and watching at length how he recovers from each of them, over and over again, isn't all that exciting anymore after a while, trust me. Even if it is filled with good ideas and interesting things, like the lead lung curse and Hermione's idea for treatment. Yes, even the main hero of a story gets hurt sometimes, but even you have got to admit that your Harry easily beats almost every other Harry ever written in that department.
You have many good surprises in your story, the Dumbledore - Grandfather thing being a noticable example. It took me totally by surprise and that was probably because I had difficulty accepting it. Suspense and dramatics can be overrated however. There should also be phases where everything fine and the people have some time to relax and spend some quality time. I don't count the time he spend in the hospital that; Harry certainly did not want to be there.
There were only three other reviews when I put mine in, but two of them explicitely said the same thing as I did and the third one hinted at it, so I can safely claim that I'm not the only one thinking this way.
I think you're a little to strongly focused on having events be the drive of the story. I'm not saying that there is no character development and that the characters themselves don't influence where the story is headed - those things you pull off perfectly. But they get pushed from one event to the next, with barely any time in between to emotionally recover (and thus the reader can't recover either). I don't think this is healthy for the overall quality of the story.
I said some of these things with the thought in mind that you intend to write real fiction. I'm trying to give advice here. Consider it, keep an open mind, but if you ultimately feel uncomfortable following it, don't. You shouldn't have to change your style into what others want it to be, even if there's tough competition out there. Besides, I'm only one person and maybe there are really a lot of people out there who are into this "surprises & plot twists" stuff, like you call it :)
Be that the case or not, I wish you luck when you venture out there. But first you another couple of chapters to write for us ;)
And feel free to tell me what you think about the points I raised. I'd be interested to hear your response.
Quizer
Abraxan replied:
You raise good points, and you raised them NICELY, which I appreciate! I've had lots of places in both fics where I had "rest" between big or painful scenes like this one, but in this case, I thought the shock value was worth it. Here Harry was, all relaxed and happy to be back at school and he got zapped with a hex Zabini's spent the entire year perfecting (and then it wasn't PERFECT - but it was darned close, making him a better wizard than the arrogant Malfoy, who couldn't cast a big hex no matter how hard he tried! In MY fics, anyway! LOL!)
I've been raked over the coals by readers for settling into a "rhythm" of "action/relax/fluff/action/relax/fluff" or something like that. So when I break that rhythm, I get raked over the coals AGAIN! There's no pleasing everyone, and the only one I can please here is me. I like it, so it stays.
In "real" publication, I'll have an editor who'll say "this goes too far" or "trim this" or "explain that" -- here, I've done it all on my own, with the help of some wonderful volunteer betas, each of whom has brought something different to the mix. But ultimately, it's MY story, and whether it's good or not, whether it's paced well or not, is my doing. Not one of my betas said, 'Oooo, that's one time too many!" Not one. Even if they had, I probably would have used the scene anyway, because I like it. And it serves a purpose. Some of the readers get it (look on Fanfiction.net and read Old Fart's review to see what I mean -- HE "got" what I was doing with this chapter).
There's a TON of time to recover between events in these stories MOST of the time, and there was here, as well. But life sometimes hits you with "the old one-two" and knocks you off your feet. Life doesn't have a nice, set rhythm to it all the time. And that reality is what I was trying to portray here. I always said this was HP for ADULTS - not kids. Most adults over the age of 40 (ballpark, anyway) will probably recognize these rhythms for what they are - reality hitting you in the face.
I appreciate your trying to help and I will bear your comments in mind. However, the original novel I'm writing is not an entire school year in a setting that's been so well-defined that you can't "skip" over things to compress time without people complaining ("Where's the Quidditch?" "Where's Spring Break?" "What happened to Christmas, exams, class time," etc.), so I won't have the "rhythmic" problems I've had here, nor will the novel need to be so long to cover all the bases and tie up all the loose ends, as these had to be.
I learned a long time ago (back in Refiner's Fire when people bitched about me killing off Casey, which I'd planned to do since starting Refiner's) that I have to listen to MYSELF, not to the readers, because most of them just don't get it, or are too young or inexperienced to understand what I'm portraying in my fic. For instance, in Chapter 17 of Destiny, where Molly blew up and tried to break up Harry and Ginny -- the readers who are old enough to have nearly grown kids of their own knew exactly what was going on. The young readers (or those who have never had children of their own) were screaming at me that Molly would never do that! But those of us who have raised our families know she WOULD most likely feel that way at some point real life (because we have, or our parents did) -- and many younger readers just didn't understand that.
So for this fic, the "rhythm" has been different - long periods of character building, for which I got yelled at by many readers ("where's the action???"). I TOLD you guys that Harry would need the strength of character I was building into him when the action started, and that when the action started, there would be PLENTY. I'm delivering on that promise. A different rhythm than Refiner's, yes, but still a valid one, one based on reality. I know people who learned they had cancer and were just beginning to grasp that idea when they learned they had something else horrible wrong, or they just went and *died*, much sooner than the doctor expected. Don't you think their families felt they'd been hit by one blow too many? Sure. That's the same kind of thing that's going on here. None of this was Harry's own fault, either, any more than cancer is anyone's fault (unless they're stupid enough to smoke or live with smokers - there's no reason for whining if they get cancer then -- they knew the risks).
It would be different if Harry had done something to cause this on top of everything else that's happened, if he'd taken a risk he knew was likely to go bad. But he DIDN'T. Something bad happened, and bad things happen to good people all the time, often one after the other. Been there, done that - that's the advantage (??) of being in my fifties - I KNOW this story is based on the way real life can hit you, over and over. But if you're strong, you can get back up and keep going, and that's part of what this story is about.
I'll get off my soapbox now. Thanks for your input! And I'm not annoyed with you -- I'm annoyed with the ones who simply don't get it and decide to yell at ME when THEY're the ones who don't get the subtleties of what I've done with this chapter.
Abraxan
Jamey posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 9:10am
I'm not going to complain about the time Harry spends in the hospital - I just think of it as one of Harry's traits - kind to children and animals, sudden death to bad guys, loyal to a fault, has a saving people thing, and lives in a hospital. The dorm room is just a place for Harry to stay when he really doesn't need the hospital care - but the hospital remains his home.
However, did want to ask - the gill transformation and immersion scene - that sounds like something that might be used for extreme burn victims (with breathing tube instead of gills, of course, but otherwise, very muggle treatment.) Did you find it somewhere, or is this something you came up with?
Awesome story, though. Thanks for writing! Wonder if there's a sequel for *this* one in mind!
Abraxan replied:
I made it up. IT's true that fish don't have lungs. I'm asthmatic and when I was little, Patrick Duffy (who later starred on "Dallas") starred in a TV series called "Man From Atlantis" -- he had gills and could swim freely underwater like a fish! OH how I envied him! My mother, a wonderful swimmer, constantly told me to never swim where I couldn't put my foot down because of my asthma. To this day, if I can't feel the bottom, I panic -- and I'm a good swimmer now! But I still have that deep-seated fear. . .yet I dream about swimming freely with no worries, *dancing* underwater as Harry and Ginny have done, breathing with no problems (not that my asthma's bothering me now, but I've had severe problems from time to time in my life). The Lead Lung Curse was me writing about my asthma and the times I've had pneumonia and wishing like everything that I could bypass my lungs somehow. That's where the idea came from.
I had not heard that burn victims are treated in a tank like that. Makes sense, I guess, but yikes, what an adjustment, trusting that tube to give you air! And think of the wrinkled prune-skin they'd end up with!
Nope, no sequel for this one -- there's an epilog that is a seedbed of ideas for short stories when I feel the need to revisit Harry and his friends. I've already started on my original novel and am enjoying working on that while still polishing the rest of Destiny.
Thanks for your comment about Harry and the hospital! Yup, you're right! It's his home away from home, LOL! Not that he'd CHOOSE to live there! ;->
Thansk for writing!
Abraxan
James Benfield posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 8:20am
great chapter. Keep up the good work, I cant wait for more.
James
Abraxan replied:
Thanks a lot, James!
Abraxan
Hagrid posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 7:14am
It seems as though you are more rested than Harry is. Don't know of many chapters that require visits ter two hospitals! Course we all knew that Harry would help Snape, but Snape bein' kind ter him will take some gettin' used to. An' I think yer right about what Hermione said, nobody at school will be botherin' Harry after that display of power.
Abraxan replied:
Hi, Hagrid!! Nope, I'm not more rested than Harry is -- we're both quite dithered lately!! ;-> But you're right, he was in two hospitals in the same chapter, poor guy!! Dang Zabini anyway!! Glad you agree with Hermione -- I can't imagine anyone bothering Harry again after that display of power when he was so badly injured! And yes, Snape being kind to Harry WILL take some getting used to, by all involved! Thanks for writing! Always great to hear from you!
Abraxan
Quizer posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 5:37am
Sheesh. You can't give poor Harry a break, can you? In canon and most fanfiction Harry spends ridiculous amounts of time in the hospital wing, healing and recovering from attacks, but you are taking it to an extreme of proportions that rival those Harry's power has compared to a normal human. This is ridiculous. It's not even funny. I cannot even begin to pretend to understand why you did this.
The rest of the chapter was very enjoyable; unfortuately most of it focused on getting Harry yet again out of danger of dying. I personally feel there was enough of that in the story already. Give him a break already, will you?
The fact that Dumbledore turns out to be Harry's grandfather seems a little weird, not fitting in all that well with the rest of this story. But that's probably just me.
I like your work and still enjoy reading it tremendously. But the fact that Harry can't seem to get a moment of peace, but always has to deal with the next of a neverending series of attacks. The one where the Hufflepuff boys attacked him and dropped him in the lake I found equally pointless.
Having said it three times now, I think you get the point though. I'm looking forward to your next update.
Quizer
Abraxan replied:
This is an adventure story, and Harry's the hero. Getting hurt is part of the deal when you're the hero and a warrior as well. And war's don't end when the dictator is killed -- there are still pockets of resistance here and there. Zabini was a loose end, and a loose cannon and wasn't going to just "go away." That's what happened. I'm trying to keep my stories as realistic as possible (although a normal human would've died ages ago -- but we all know that wizards bounce when humans would go "splat," so they're just more resiliant than we are). This is the way I planned my story from the beginning. If you'll recall "Refiner's Fire," Harry got attacked on the train on the way home -- that's the way I like to write, with surprises and plot twists and other things that keep the reader on the edge of his seat.
Abraxan
crs_seq posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 5:31am
Good Chapter. The Man just doesnt gets a break.
Abraxan replied:
He will before much longer -- the rest of the bad guys had to be dealt with. Zabini's pretty much the last of them. ;-) Gald you liked it!
Abraxan
Jim_xinu posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 5:16am
I've really enjoyed this story. Many thanks for writing it and sharing it with us.
Parts of it have been quite original (at least, in my reading). I loved the chapter about the London Lions, for example. The parts about his new wand were very good.
But the number of times Harry has injuries and spends a bunch of time in the hospital is really over done.
BTW, the over all story summary isn't very representative--He's done with the Durleys after the first few chapters.
Abraxan replied:
*I'm* not done with the Dursleys. Nor have I worried about the overall summary of the story in a while. I've been busy writing it -- I have a new summary for each chapter. Trust THAT.
Glad you liked the chapter on the London Lions! Want to buy a t-shirt? I just shipped the first batch out today! You can order it here: http://www.thesculptedhorse.com/abraxan.html
If Harry wasn't in the hospital, he'd be dead. So he's in the hospital! He won't be for long. As I said in a review reply above, when the dictator is dead, that doesn't mean all the bad guys go off into hiding. Zabini was a loose end that needed to be dealt with. And if you remember "Refiner's" -- he was attacked on the train on the way home long after the final battle. I wrote these stories for myself, and this is the way I wanted it. I know I'll never please everyone (I have some readers still screaming for MORE action, while some of you are saying "ENOUGH!" Those who complained about the earlier chapters where I spent a lot of time character building and getting Harry prepared for what he had to face should remember your complaints and my promise that there was PLENTY of action to come -- and here it is!
Abraxan
calamur posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 3:22am
Fantastic as usual! but why do you repeatedly send Harry to hospital? Poor guy needs a break as well! His hospital visits would be more than a heart patient who is also a diabetic.
I still love your stories
cheers
Abraxan replied:
Glad you liked it, but honestly -- warriors are warriors and things happen to them. There's a reason for this chapter being written the way it was. Once you've finished the fic, maybe you will have figured it out.
Abraxan
Wooster posted a comment on Friday 3rd February 2006 7:54pm
Very clever in the beginning with the Quidditch delusion. I salute you! And Snape's ALIVE??? *cheers raucously* I seriously adore Snape. I wouldn't put it past him to have feigned death for the express purpose of screwing with the morgue-people's minds. And I know it's terrible, but Harry and Ron yelling across the hall about the engagement and each groaning/coughing in pain had a certain black humor to it that had me giggling madly. I also know I'm going to be spending a pleasant night with madcap dreams of "Weasley Brother Initiation"...hey, could I get permission to do a spin-off silly little ficlet at some point of that? And the thing about Dumbledore! Whoa! I'll admit it..when Harry talked about having 'family'...I cried. And Ron with a cane made me think about my favorite TV character...
Ok, I'm sorry. That review was ridiculous. It's your fault you know. QUIT BEING SO GOOD.
Oh god, did I really say...?! Forget I said that! Obliviate! OBLIVIATE!!! ACK!!!
Abraxan replied:
Ron with a cane reminded you of your fav TV character? Who's that?? I can't think of any TV characters with canes at the moment. . .
I'm so glad you enjoyed the chapter, especially the "black humor" of Harry and Ron yelling to each other and then coughing -- nobody else has commented on that, LOL! Trust you to notice it! heeheehee. I'm so BAAAAAAAD to those boys! heehee.
Yes, you can write a spin-off ficlet, and we can publish it here and on my Yahoo group -- I have a file for such ficlets on the Yahoo group, and I'm sure Asad wouldn't mind making a similar one here. Just e it to me and then we'll go from there! I'd enjoy seeing what you come up with!
And FYI -- MY idea of the "Weasley brother initiation" only involves "dutch rubs" (scrubbing Harry's scalp roughly with the knuckles while holding his neck tightly in the crook of your arm) -- remember, Ron gave him one when Harry asked about giving Ginny the promise ring in Refiner's. No other forms of torture are included in the initiation, mostly because the boys know Ginny would hex them into oblivion if they did any more harm than that to Harry, LOL! And they honestly LIKE Harry, too! heehee
I look forward to seeing what you come up with, m'dear! And thanks for the fun review!
Abraxan
Trey1 posted a comment on Friday 3rd February 2006 2:18am
Another great chapter, I can't wait to see what you have in store for us next! You really are an amazing write, I must say! Keep up the good work!~Trey
Abraxan replied:
Oh, I have some VERY interesting things in store for you guys!! Glad you enjoyed the chapter! Thanks for writing!
Abraxan
Imp posted a comment on Thursday 2nd February 2006 11:47am
Good chapter. I like the thought of Harry asking Ginny to marry him, but I most certainly would have waited until I could get on one knee to do it, or forced my self into that position some how no matter how injured. I didn't mention Snape in my last review because I realized just barely before I typed it, who had cast the curse. I would be lying if I said I saw that Snape was still alive, but I found it hard to believe that Snape would get killed by Malfoy's wand. Malfoy never did a single one of those big spells right. I thought that the way Malfoy died was briliant. He deserved it. One thing that puzzles me though is that you said Dumbledore never took James on as his apprentice. But he had to have had some type of relationship with him in order to reveal the secret of the heirs of Grifindor. Just a thought. Love your writing. I will be very sad when this story is finished because it will be the end of your HP fanfic. I will eagerly await your publication and will stand in line if I have to to get a copy of your first novel.
Abraxan replied:
The Heir is not normally the previous Heir's apprentice. Harry was a special case becuase of the Refiner's Fire -- the Refiner's Fire powers, and the need for Harry to gain control of them as quickly as possible so he could use them in facing Voldemort (whenever that happened) are why DD made Harry his apprentice.
Yup, Malfoy never was good at the big spells! Glad you like how he died.
Getting down on one knee isn't *required* for a proposal, y'know. Ginny would've been satisfied with the one he did on the battlefield, but Harry, bless him, wanted to do things "right." He feels he's already waited nearly too long to ask her, and he's in no condition to be kneeling yet. Ginny certainly didn't mind him not getting on one knee! :-D She just wanted to get engaged, and then to get married ASAP! LOL!
The epilog of Destiny is a seedbed of short story ideas for me to play with when I need a break from my novel or other things I'm working on. I can whip out a HP short story (like the Christmas one) fairly quickly now, once I work out a few basics for it. So I won't say I'll "never" write HP stories again, but certainly no more novels, except ORIGINAL ones for publication! And I'll certainly keep you guys posted on my novel, so you can order one (or more!) when (not *if*!) it gets published! Thanks for your interest, and for your nice review!
Abraxan
PhiloWorm posted a comment on Wednesday 1st February 2006 7:32pm
Awww so sweet... poor bedridden Harry though. And I must say the fact that Malfloy is or was unable to do the AK made me laugh like hell.
Abraxan replied:
Glad you liked the chapter! And yes, poor Malfoy is -- erm "was" -- a bit incompetent when it comes to the big spells! Remember, he messed up that hex he did on Hermione on the Astronomy Tower in Refiner's, too. Lucky for our heroes (and Snape!) that he's such a klutz at big spells!
Abraxan
sanghamitra posted a comment on Wednesday 8th February 2006 12:54pm
Abraxan replied: