I love this. It has the same quality as Terry Pratchett's books in that it appears superficially humorous, but is actually wincingly serious and sad and creepy. Poor Snape - what a horrible experience.
Neville as a character seems spot on, although I felt some of the dialogue seemed a wee bit too old or too long-winded for him.
I especially loved the bit about Snape not being able to bring himself to destroy knowledge. This is of course exactly the same real-world dillemma that science faces in regard to the knowledge obtained from the Nazis' experiments on unwilling human subjects. Do we say "This is tainted" and throw it away, or do we say "People died for this" and make the best use of it we can?
And I loved, loved, loved the scene at the very end, where Snape is talking about the Death Eaters and having to grovel to Voldemort (and you know that as a spy he's going to have to go back to that). There are such depths of pain and rage and responsibility and self-knowledge and rigid honour here (yes, of course he's going to admit it was largely his error - with a somewhat ill grace) that it makes me feel slightly ill. And the bit about Hufflepuff - a beautiful compliment snappishly (Snapishly) paid, and he has to wrestle with his own speech-patterns and backtrack and explain himself just to make it come out as a compliment and not an insult.
And the idea of him using detention to set Nevill up on a date of course - sweet and yet still faintly malicious :)
[Minor irritating Americanism alert. "Stomped." Aaaargh!]
Author's Response: Thank you; I'm glad you liked it! And I love Pratchett, so I'm delighted to get a comparison to him (Granny Weatherwax rules! :D). Thank you also for the concrit, which I heartily appreciate. "Stomped" is an Americanism? Eep! Would "stamped" be better? |