The Primroses Were Over

This is about the point where the series goes from "hey, this is a fun little "what if" story" to "holy smokes, this is its own thing entirely", and the depth of character and world building we get is something I always cheerfully point to when people attempt to suggest fanfiction is not real writing. This is real writing, and it is real writing by a very good writer.

This is dark, seriously, and you may or may not like the path this is heading down. Harry is a huge, horrifying mess, but this is about him getting himself together in a lot of ways, and watching that happen is a beautiful thing.

It doesn't happen quickly, though. I could point to the sheer size of the page count for this (838, for those curious) to suggest it, but it is a very hard process for him, so having it happen quickly would require it to happen "off screen" in practice.

We get a lot of answers on how Harry was raised and why, as well as some lines being drawn that cannot be crossed again and that are going to color the rest of the series. Harry is coming into his own, finally, and learning that he is worth something on his own, and that involves a few other characters re-assessing their positions on things.

Things start getting complex at this point, as well. Not that they weren't kind of complex already, but here is where we start seeing political wrangling on top of everything else. There are a few new (and very well-developed) characters introduced to help us handle that aspect of it and to provide a crop of new wrangles in the fabric of this series.

I enjoyed this quite a bit, although it is an AU of my least favorite Harry Potter book. If you've read and enjoyed the previous ones, you probably don't need my recommendation to pick this up, but if you have not yet dipped your toes into the enormous pool of potential that is this series, this is a great time to go look at the first in the series, Saving Conner.