dicta_contrion (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
dicta_contrion) wrote2014-10-31 10:35 am
dicta_contrion) wrote2014-10-31 10:35 am
Rectober #4: Narrative Risks (and Rewards)
There are exciting things afoot over at ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
hp_concrit_fest! Part of what's been so valuable is having the chance to sit down and really think about how different authors balance different aspects of storytelling. It's got me thinking about stories that take narrative risks. It doesn't always work, but when it does the results can be phenomenal. A few of those fics, below.
Fear and Loathing at the Phoenix by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
curiouslyfic - NC-17, 20k, H/D - Harry's Hunter S. Thompson. Draco's his attorney. It's the Tenth annual Victory Day and there's Journalism afoot.
So, I don't especially like Hunter S. Thompson. Not my cuppa. I was not expecting to like this fic. Holy fuck, I love this fic. Ten years after the war Harry's a journalist (nom de plume: Regulus Black), Luna's his editor, and Draco's his (very necessary) attorney (aka: Malfuck). He won't go to the Ministry's official events in commemoration of the 10 year anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts; Instead he goes to, essentially, a Wizarding Harry Potter Con. People are cosplaying a million different Harrys and Dracos (aka: Malfakes) and everyone elses, and Draco and Harry are wandering around taking it all in. It could've been entirely cracky. Instead, somehow, it turns into a meditation on who these people are, what the war did to them, why they're together, how their shared experiences during the war, their history together, makes them indispensable to one another. It also gives an extraordinary sense for how surreal it would be to actually be Harry Potter or Draco Malfoy, what it would be like to try to parse the world after becoming that famous. And the writing, damn. It's gut-wrenching, gorgeous, emotional, sad, funny, hot. Everything. Exquisite.
On the Couch byfrayach - NC-17, 26k, H/D - It’s a Mind Healer’s worse nightmare to lose a patient to suicide, but Mind Healer Nick Nichols can attest to the fact that a murder/suicide is even worse. If only Dr. Freud had come up with a sure cure for love.
This story is told through the eyes of Draco's therapist. It's quite a trip to go on this journey with him, to learn Draco as he does, to figure out what's going on between Harry and Draco as he does. It's sort of the opposite of Fear and Loathing at the Phoenix - instead of being inside the space of the story with Harry and Draco, you're placed outside of their relationship. Instead of feeling distanced from the emotional core of their relationship, this choice and the way it was executed had me hooked. I had to know more, to keep reading, to find out what would become of them. Their attraction is so strong, so irresistible, that it pulls everything along with it, and starting from this vantage point, with this distance, only made that more apparent. Very compelling, very intense, and brilliantly executed.
Salvation and Sacrament byabbycadabra - PG-13, 16.5k - "It seems as if everywhere I go, I find the nowhere in somewhere, or make it of anywhere."
This is another "story in the style of," this time Dave Eggers. Who I like more than HST, but mostly inasmuch as I'm pretty solidly "meh" about Dave Eggers. This one also takes on a bit of a different temporal structure - it starts by telling you the ending, and then gets you there. Because of the eventual destination (as revealed in the first line) that seemed like it was going to be rather a big challenge. And yet, it got me there. And it got me there in such a brilliantly unexpected way. This story explores Harry's hero complex and his guilt - where it comes from and where, without a war to fight, it would go - and does it starkly and unflinchingly. And while Harry is the focus, the same is true of Draco. Just as we get the darker side of Harry's "saving people thing," we see the strength the war brought Draco. It's an unusual portrait of the characters and I can't think of another fic that left me feeling this way about the two of them, or that made me feel so okay about this particular end point.
I think all of these stories are quite extraordinary, though mileage may be especially variable around narrative/structural things. They're also all fics I love talking about, so if you're so inclined (or have recs for similar) please come chat!
hp_concrit_fest! Part of what's been so valuable is having the chance to sit down and really think about how different authors balance different aspects of storytelling. It's got me thinking about stories that take narrative risks. It doesn't always work, but when it does the results can be phenomenal. A few of those fics, below.Fear and Loathing at the Phoenix by
curiouslyfic - NC-17, 20k, H/D - Harry's Hunter S. Thompson. Draco's his attorney. It's the Tenth annual Victory Day and there's Journalism afoot.So, I don't especially like Hunter S. Thompson. Not my cuppa. I was not expecting to like this fic. Holy fuck, I love this fic. Ten years after the war Harry's a journalist (nom de plume: Regulus Black), Luna's his editor, and Draco's his (very necessary) attorney (aka: Malfuck). He won't go to the Ministry's official events in commemoration of the 10 year anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts; Instead he goes to, essentially, a Wizarding Harry Potter Con. People are cosplaying a million different Harrys and Dracos (aka: Malfakes) and everyone elses, and Draco and Harry are wandering around taking it all in. It could've been entirely cracky. Instead, somehow, it turns into a meditation on who these people are, what the war did to them, why they're together, how their shared experiences during the war, their history together, makes them indispensable to one another. It also gives an extraordinary sense for how surreal it would be to actually be Harry Potter or Draco Malfoy, what it would be like to try to parse the world after becoming that famous. And the writing, damn. It's gut-wrenching, gorgeous, emotional, sad, funny, hot. Everything. Exquisite.
On the Couch by
frayach - NC-17, 26k, H/D - It’s a Mind Healer’s worse nightmare to lose a patient to suicide, but Mind Healer Nick Nichols can attest to the fact that a murder/suicide is even worse. If only Dr. Freud had come up with a sure cure for love.This story is told through the eyes of Draco's therapist. It's quite a trip to go on this journey with him, to learn Draco as he does, to figure out what's going on between Harry and Draco as he does. It's sort of the opposite of Fear and Loathing at the Phoenix - instead of being inside the space of the story with Harry and Draco, you're placed outside of their relationship. Instead of feeling distanced from the emotional core of their relationship, this choice and the way it was executed had me hooked. I had to know more, to keep reading, to find out what would become of them. Their attraction is so strong, so irresistible, that it pulls everything along with it, and starting from this vantage point, with this distance, only made that more apparent. Very compelling, very intense, and brilliantly executed.
Salvation and Sacrament by
abbycadabra - PG-13, 16.5k - "It seems as if everywhere I go, I find the nowhere in somewhere, or make it of anywhere."This is another "story in the style of," this time Dave Eggers. Who I like more than HST, but mostly inasmuch as I'm pretty solidly "meh" about Dave Eggers. This one also takes on a bit of a different temporal structure - it starts by telling you the ending, and then gets you there. Because of the eventual destination (as revealed in the first line) that seemed like it was going to be rather a big challenge. And yet, it got me there. And it got me there in such a brilliantly unexpected way. This story explores Harry's hero complex and his guilt - where it comes from and where, without a war to fight, it would go - and does it starkly and unflinchingly. And while Harry is the focus, the same is true of Draco. Just as we get the darker side of Harry's "saving people thing," we see the strength the war brought Draco. It's an unusual portrait of the characters and I can't think of another fic that left me feeling this way about the two of them, or that made me feel so okay about this particular end point.
I think all of these stories are quite extraordinary, though mileage may be especially variable around narrative/structural things. They're also all fics I love talking about, so if you're so inclined (or have recs for similar) please come chat!
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Totally agree w/ On the Couch, such a fascinating read! I was surprised how compelling it was for being such a long outsider POV fic, but I was hooked!
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And yes! I'm so blown away at how Frayach made that work so beautifully, how that distance makes it all feel more urgent. Just amazing.
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