03 HP Philosopher’s Stone

[chantaldormand]

Ch3 Letters From No one

>I so much do not look forward this chapter. The sheer amount of fake tension in this one is exhausting.

>The title of the chapter sounds creepy. Heck if it was written by another author, situations presented in this chapter could be very scary. Somebody observes your house and tries to come in contact with your creepy nephew, who you are quite sure is secretly a hell spawn. No matter what you do, they do not take no for answer.

>So Harry spends his whole day outside of the house, because Dudley’s friends love to bully him. I’m 3 chapters in and so far Harry doesn’t seem to have any kind of hobby or preferred activities. All I read is whining and scoffing at others. God, he is almost as bad as Bella Swan.

>At Stonewall, students bully each other by drowning their peers in toilet, as opposed to Hogwarts where anything from being trapped in magical closet to getting your head smashed with cannonball might happen to you. I think I might take my chances with Stonewall, thanks.

>I’m kind of hoping that Petunia is simply trolling Harry here and there is no school uniform at Stonewall. Otherwise this is OOC for her, since people would start to ask questions if she lets him go out like this.

>Yes, Vernon, Harry has a letter bomb. Just not the kind you expected.

>And so to rise her word count, Rowling starts here one of the most pointless sections in this book. Only memory-hunting from HBP and camping trip in DH can rival with this part of the book. Somebody call an editor or we might die of boredom!

>Instead of reading about Letter Drama I would love learn just what James and Lily did to Vernon. Poor man acts so unhinged in this chapter that I cannot imagine what happened to him.

>+1 to Crime Count, since wizards somehow managed to learn where exactly Harry sleeps. Stalking?

>Just how big is Harry’s cupboard? Apparently “big and beefy” man like Vernon can “squeeze through the door” to it, which suggests that there is enough space for him once he passes through the door.

>Petunia doesn’t seem to be type to keep broken stuff, so why there is a room in this house dedicated to keeping this mess? For bonus angst points?

>Also Dudley would fit quite nicely in Hogwarts. Running over a neighbour’s dog with small tank, trading parrot for toy, tossing tortoise through greenhouse roof. Sounds like Gryffindor to me.

>Harry is acting like a total brat. He gets a new room? Boohoo!! I want my letter from creepy stalker!

>”Oh, these people’s minds work in strange ways, Petunia, they’re not like you and me.” If only you knew how right you are Vernon.

>Who is sending those letters? I don’t think that Hagrid has enough patience to sit back and troll Durslays this way. Minerva? She seems to be too overworked and pragmatic to waste so much time copy-pasting letters and spamming them in such ridiculous fashion.

>I do have to wonder about poor confused milkman who delivers eggs full of letters. Was he a victim of mind control?

>“Who on earth wants to talk to you this badly?” when your characters start to point out flaws in your writing, perhaps it’s time to have a nice and long chat with editor?

>+1 to Death Count, since I’m quite sure one of the letters flying through chimney should at very least injure Harry. Preferably knock him out and crush to death, just so we would be done with this whiny protagonist and stupid section of the book. Also +1 to Crime Count for harassment via spamming letters.

>+1 to Uncovered for 100 letters at the hotel. 

>”He hoped the roof wasn’t going to fall in, although he might be warmer if it did” Sadly this is not how this mess ends.

>How exactly does Harry know when his birthday is? If Albus didn’t leave any kind of official documentation in his letter and Petunia had as bad relationship with Lily as this book suggest then there is no way that anyone in this family knows when our protagonist’s birthday is. +1 to Leap of Logic

>Also, once again in section where you would expect Harry to be scared he is just slightly whiny.

Crime Count: 2

Death Count: 1

Leap of Logic: 1

Uncovered: 1, Most of strange stuff here happened in places where only people who already know about magic could see it happening.

Spell Count: 0, we don’t know who is trolling Durslays nor it was done on screen

Comments

[smirkingcat.livejournal.com]

laugh count:
Sounds like Gryffindor to me. +1

Boohoo!! I want my letter from creepy stalker! +1 - also this sounds like bella swan again

If only you knew how right you are Vernon. +1

when your characters start to point out flaws in your writing, perhaps it’s time to have a nice and long chat with editor? +2 because i couldnt stop!

Sadly this is not how this mess ends. +3 because of the irony, the drama and the truth

laugh count: 8 times so loud that if i were home with my cat she would be truly annoyed right now!

also go you for pointing out the leap of logic for his birthday- outside of the magical world no one should know when is birthday was !

[themightyflynn]

Just read this chapter tonight. Her poor punctuation skills annoy the hell out of me!

[chantaldormand]

You mean my or Jo's punctuation skill?
If mine, then yeah I know that my grammar and punctuation aren't exactly by the books. English isn't my native language, so I'm always open to criticism. *shrugs*
As for Jo... there were quite few moments when I stared confused on page and wondered if that is how you are supposed to use punctuation/grammar in British English. It's strange since she used to teach English to non-native speakers.

[themightyflynn]

Oh, no, not yours, sorry!

I've been re-reading the first book again, because I wanted to read the picture version. I'd forgotten that both JKR and her editor have left out a LOT of punctuation marks and that the grammar is bad. She's left out commas, and continued sentences past where they should have stopped. I know I'm fussy when it comes to stuff like that, because I studied it at uni, but really, the editor should have caught it, even if it is just a kid's book!

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

/At Stonewall, students bully each other by drowning their peers in toilet, as opposed to Hogwarts where anything from being trapped in magical closet to getting your head smashed with cannonball might happen to you. I think I might take my chances with Stonewall, thanks./

Also, if a student was being publicly harassed and bullied outside in broad daylight, in front of dozens of witnesses, I'd like to think that Stonewall's staff would take steps to punish the students responsible. As well as not try to cover up attempted murder.

/I’m kind of hoping that Petunia is simply trolling Harry here and there is no school uniform at Stonewall. Otherwise this is OOC for her, since people would start to ask questions if she lets him go out like this./

Others have already commented that the Dursleys' overall treatment of Harry is bizarre. They're supposed to be obsessed with normalcy and appearances, but what is normal about how they treat Harry? If they were sufficiently abusive and threatening enough, I could see how they could intimidate Harry into not telling anybody at school that he sleeps in a closet. But why do they let him walk around in baggy, oversized clothes? What is 'normal' about that? People (namely, the Muggle teachers) should be asking a lot more questions about Harry than just his school uniform.

/Also Dudley would fit quite nicely in Hogwarts. Running over a neighbour’s dog with small tank, trading parrot for toy, tossing tortoise through greenhouse roof. Sounds like Gryffindor to me./

If he wasn't a Muggle and the Weasley twins didn't dislike him because of how he treated Harry, do you think that he would gotten along with them or alienated them if he insisted on being top dog?

[chantaldormand]

/Dursleys' overall treatment of Harry is bizarre/

And it gets even more bizarre as the series continues. Oversized clothes could be explained away if they didn't try to one up their neighbours, but what about bars from CoS? Heck I would love to see Arabella's report to Albus about that incident!

/If he wasn't a Muggle and the Weasley twins didn't dislike him because of how he treated Harry, do you think that he would gotten along with them or alienated them if he insisted on being top dog? /

That is complicated question. During first few weeks Dudley would be off-balanced since aside whole congratulations-you-are-wizard drama at Durslay's house, for the first time in his life he would be cut off from his parents, friends and electronics. He might be either subdued or try to up his game by bulling other students to regain balance.
The way I see twins in PS is not that they have some fluffy feelings for Harry, but that they are opportunistic and pragmatic. Sure they help out Harry with his luggage, but I'm pretty sure they were about to prank him. Then they notice his scar and lo and behold what happens next? Ron cannot find compartment that has free seats followed by twins stopping by Harry's compartment and addressing him by his name. Then Ron goes full fanboy and sticks to Harry.
IMHO twins just like all older Weasley boys are smart and sly and as such used Ron to get closer to Harry. That I don't see changing in this AU. Adding to the mix how majority of Hogwarts population treats Harry in the beginning of school year, I think that Dudley would very quickly give up on bullying the Chosen One. If anything Harry would probably used his status to bully Dudley.
So would twins and Dudley got along? Probably depends on how much Dudley would be willing to suck up to Harry.

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

The title of the chapter sounds creepy. Heck if it was written by another author, situations presented in this chapter could be very scary. Somebody observes your house and tries to come in contact with your creepy nephew, who you are quite sure is secretly a hell spawn. No matter what you do, they do not take no for answer.

You know what's really sad about this? The inspiration for this was supposedly JKR's work experience for Amnesty International, who love to spam their targets with letters.

[chantaldormand]

Rowling having occasion to explore interesting theme/subject and ending up using it to show how awesome is her protagonist/doing comedic shenanigans? Somehow I'm not surprised.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Regarding Harry not having any interests - Rowling wants him to have nothing to miss outside of the wizarding world, but it just makes him a bland character. The more typical story would have the bullied kid develop some ability or interest quietly as an escape, but Harry escapes Dudley into a bland nowhere doing nothing.

Or perhaps that's how he developed his talent of doing nothing and procrastinating for ever - he never learned to do anything, make an effort to achieve something.

[chantaldormand]

The worst thing is that even after he enters WW he doesn't develop hobby or interests. Yeah there is this half-hearted Quidditch thing, but beyond being on the team and reading one book about it, he doesn't act like boy interested in sport.

[oryx_leucoryx]

A better author will have Harry develop a hobby or a talent, then perhaps worry that said interest might not transfer well to Hogwarts, then either find a way to integrate it in their new life or use their talent or knowledge as a way to stand out or make friends, or perhaps find a way to apply it in the fight against the villain of the year. But even when a character has such an interest it disappears from the story asap (Ron's chess skills).