I know, I know. You are saying, SUE! WTF? You already read so much fic and YOU READ TWI FIC!
Well, I cheated on TwiFic and read 2 HP fics and they are great. But because I am new to ficdom, I have no idea where to go from here. So I have been in contact with some folks who know more than I do ...
First up *sniffle* our little Hannah wrote her first blog post I am so proud !! It is insightful and interesting and intriguing and oh hell just read it!!
Now, when Sue asked me to write this here blog post, I felt like I had walked right into it! I had introduced Sue to one of my favourite Harry Potter fanfics: Finding Himself by Minisinoo (See below). Sue loved it, then later she came up with this guest blogging malarky.
Anywho, here we are.
OK, a bit of background on my HP fanfic credentials… I have been reading HP fanfic since about 2002. I was reading the books themselves since about 2000, and was already obsessed, what with the announcement of the films.
Although I have very recently began writing for the Twilight fandom, I never dipped my toe in writing for my first obsession. Mainly because I never thought of anything to write!
The scale of the Harry Potter fandom is enormous. Of course, so is Twilight’s, as we all know. But Harry Potter has a long-time dedicated fanbase. Some of these fans have been on sites for 10+ years! Makes the Twilight fandom look like a toddler in comparison!
So this means there are A LOT of stories. I am talking hundreds of thousands, if not millions to sift through! There is literally something for EVERYONE.
Imagine any, and I mean ANY, pairing (e.g. Harry/Ginny, Harry/Squid, Harry/Snape) and it has been done. There are stories from the MWPP (Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs) era, from the Post-Hogwarts era, and even from Pre-MWPP.
A popular genre is Super!Harry. Harry discovers previously-unknown powers that are the “Power he knows not” and goes on to defeat Voldemort in a fit of awesome magic. For some reason, I actually really like this genre.
AU stuff is very popular. Normally it involves Harry not growing up with the Dursleys, or people just not liking one of the books and changing it. Of course stuff that was written before books came out subsequently became AU, but reading them now, with all the information can sometimes be quite interesting. Some people got some of it very right!
The one thing that is perhaps scarce is the equivalent to AU-Human in the Twilight fandom. In nearly 8 years of reading HP fanfic, I think I have only read one AU-H HP fic.
And also it is much more common to find male authors in HP.
OK, so you can see the vast pot of fanfic before you. Where the hell do you start??
Well, as you friendly HP fanfic tour guide, I thought I would show you a few of my favourite sites, as well as a few of my favourite fics.
Sites:
Our old friend, FF.net This houses (at the time of writing) 428,060 fics. Daunting, I know but just like Twilight, if you just take some time searching, there are some gems.
Fiction Alley This is an archive for Harry Potter up to rating T, I think. This has some great fics, though even after a long time of use the site can be confusing to use. I go to the forums (Fictionalley Park) where they have lists of completed fics link
Checkmated is a Ron/Hermione-centric site, although it does archive stories centered around other couples (as long as Ron and Hermione are together). It has an NC-17 section (the Bedchamber) however you do need to sign up and be age-checked.
Fanficauthors.net houses a select few authors’ stories, and is run by who wrote one of my favourites, Jeconais. This archive is a slow updating archive, but there are a lot of finished stories well worth reading, IMHO.
Sink Into Your Eyes, siye.co.uk, is a Harry/Ginny-centric site, and similar to checkmated, also houses fics for other couples.
The Quidditch Pitch is an archive that holds NC-17 fic if you want some smut. But I warn you, you can find ANY pairing you can think of. And slash is particularly popular there. However, there are some good ones. You also need to sign up to view these stories, but no real age-check there.
Now, of course that list of sites is FAR from exhaustive. There are hundreds of sites. “You can Google it.” These are ones that I use, or have used in the past.
OK, some favourite fics of mine:
So you can dip your toe into the ocean of HP fanfic, so to speak, here is a O/S
Summary Songfic from Maroon 5's "She Will Be Loved". Ron's got to help Hermione struggle through a tough situation. Can he in turn overcome the one he's been battling with for 7 years, and finally declare his feelings for her?
This is an O/S that lodged in my head ever since I read it what is now quite a few years ago. It is perhaps the ONLY songfic that I ever read and loved, but it fits the song so perfectly. I actually think of this fic whenever I hear the song. It probably also helps that Ron is perhaps one of my favourite characters...
Summary 'The boy who almost died' has to figure out what it means that he didn't. Harry's tumultuous fifth year at Hogwarts is Cedric's seventh and final. Bound together by a shared trauma survived, both boys fall under Ministry suspicion and fire, and both undergo a 'deconstruction' of sorts in the face of that crisis. Who is Cedric Diggory? He must find himself amid rumors of war, the awkwardness of falling in love, and a crippling personal tragedy. (parallel canon) Complete
This is by far, one of THE BEST fics I have ever read. It is a very different story to most, being centered around Cedric, but all the characters are extremely well developed, as well as the (complicated) story arc is well executed too. As she says on her site, she has been a writer for 20+ years, and it clearly shows. It is also a story which clearly illustrates why Cedric should have stuck around! Not only for more Rob in the HP films ;)
There is also a sequel, Dulce et Decorum est, which is currently a WIP, but is just as good as FH.
Now, of course Minisinoo is a Twilight author too. She has even been Discerned by TLYDF for Cowboys and Indians.
I can not recommend this fic enough. P.S. Check out the manips!
Summary How did magic in Harry Potter’s world come into existence? The first witches and wizards weren’t just born with wands in their hands, were they?
Extensive Muggle and magical historical and anthropological research has revealed much, but not the whole story. In 2023, ten years after the master wandmaker’s death, a provision of Mr. Ollivander’s last will and testament allowed Harry Potter to give several exhaustive interviews telling the wizarding world the Ollivander family history - the founding of the oldest wizarding business in the world. Finally, the StoryTeller can chronicle this in a readable manner – from Harry’s eyes the summer before his third year. Complete
This is perhaps a strange concept for a fic. It is literally the History of Magic. However, it is fascinating. Aaran St. Vines has taken that little tagline for Ollivander’s shop and padded it out into this beast of a story. It is also some background for A St.V’s other series of stories, the Paladin stories, which I also recommend though they are WIPs, and haven’t been updated in a while. However, I do think it can partly fit with canon, by giving some basis to the HP world. This is a very long story, with most of the chapters beating some people’s actual length of story, but I think it is worth the time.
Summary When the Weasley Boys interfere in Ginny's relationship with Dean, they make the biggest mistake of their lives. The witch decides that revenge is in order, and her first point of call is a new boyfriend - Harry. Complete
So, I thought I would bring in some comedy, seeing as Sue’s lovely blog is all about bringing the funny! This is a funny fic. It is a Super!Harry fic too so there are some slightly ridiculous moments, but then again it’s a comedy, so who cares. Perhaps the funniest thing about this fic is the M-mails they use to communicate quickly. They are essentially emails, which in and of themselves may not be that funny, but the signatures, and To:’s and Cc:’s are. Trust me ;)
This is quite a beefy fic with long chapters, which seems to be the norm on this site. But I quite like that. It’s a light, funny story, with a little Voldemort-induced action.
Jeconais also has some other really good stories, some of them quite dark (e.g. Despair ), some of them just as funny as TMW.
Just an aside. I dunno if any of you like fanart. It doesn’t seem to be that big of a thing in Twilight as far as I can tell, compared to HP anyway. But this artist draws some of the funniest little cartoons, mainly Malfoy family-centric. It makes me really want her, or someone who draws like her, to draw the books or something…
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