deathtocapslock | 03 HP Philosopher’s Stone (Reply)

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