Title: Moksha
Author: Portus
Rating: M on FF.net, R on PC.net
Genre: General on FFn and PC
DLP Category: General? Romance?? Humor??
Pairing: Harry/Luna
Words: 9,623
Published: December 29, 2010
Status: Oneshot, Complete
Summary: Whatever Harry had expected for that day, this was certainly not it. He must face the fact that all is not well following the events of the Second Wizarding War. Dumbledore had warned them, after all, about the difficult choice between what is Right and what is Easy.
Link: FF.net; PC.net; DLP WbA thread

As I wrote in the WbA thread, this story grew from a small and vague snippet of a much larger story, to a full on story of its own at around 9,500 words. I've left this Harry with some of the characteristics I plan to incorporate in the wider story arc, though the other story was not planned to be Harry/Luna.

I left the category on FF.net as General, mostly because I hate pigeon-holing a story and/or giving away the gist of your plot or story arc right off the bat. I even left the characters empty initially, but changed it to Harry/Luna when prompted by a DLPer.


I know it isn't exactly frowned upon to nominate your own story for consideration in For Review, though few people actually do it. Still, I know I'm taking a risk, but after a lot of reflection and re-reading, as well as waiting for it to be torn to shreds in the WbA, I'm quite proud of this story and feel pretty good about its reception. Even if you don't feel it deserves the Library, I'd appreciate the feedback on my writing, pacing, characterization - you get the drift. What I can do to improve for the future.

Cheers!


Checked by Minion, August 19, 2013

 

This belongs in the library. The reason I recommended you set the pairing is that there are so few H/L stories on FFN, that any search for them would have your story at the top =D

 

Okay, yeah, I already had a review written for this thread, but since my internet browser decided it was time to fuck with me, I lost it, so unfortunately this review might be a lot shorter.

This fic... well, it was weird. Stylistically, the tone and imagery that was used in this story do not match the events of the plot (although the Threstals were a nice touch), and the way the story is written doesn't mesh well with the story it's trying to tell. From a film point of view, it felt very much like a B or C level script given to an A level director, and here, it was jarring as hell.

Now I'll give Portus points here for a few things. Harry was written decently, and I liked the dialogue with Ron and Hermione - it flowed reasonably well. And I will give massive points for writing a starkly descriptive landscape that I found very interesting and memorable - I could easily imagine the setting.

But I've got issues with this story. First is Luna's character - I'm sorry, but Portus hasn't gotten her right. Now don't get me wrong, Luna's an excruciatingly difficult character to write well (probably on the level of Dumbledore in my books), but she just doesn't work here. The dialogue is stilted and doesn't sound right, and more importantly, despite whatever Luna might have experienced to behave as she did, there's a sense of innocence and honesty that I feel is integral to Luna's character that Portus is missing. She didn't feel like Luna to me, and that really damaged the story, in my opinion.

Likewise, this story is very dark and I was a little creeped out by this fic - and that doesn't happen often. The story was very chilling, particularly with the contrasting symbolic motifs (which I'm not sure Portus considered, but I'm giving him credit for). But my issue is with the main 'plot', so to speak. I'm sorry, it doesn't feel much like something Harry or Luna would do, despite their traumas, especially considering it was implied Harry moved on with his life - and that made it a lot harder for me to buy this story's premise.

I'm not going to say this story is bad, because it's not bad, but there ARE issues that I don't think were handled well, and I'm sorry again, but I don't think Luna was written very well at all. And despite all the callbacks in the beginning of the story to Contemplating Clouds (yeah, Portus, I caught those), I don't think this story is yet at that level.

Now, maybe I'm overthinking things, and I know I'm pretentious when it comes to my fanfic, so for DLP I'd give this a comfortable 4/5, but personally, this is a 3/5 story for me, with potential for improvement.

 

I really don't know what to make of this. Writing is okay, I suppose. You've a nasty habit of repeating words in short succession that makes it read weird, as well as a propensity for run on sentences.

Some of your dialogue is flat out terrible; people just don't speak like that. Also, neither Harry nor Luna feel anything close to their canon counterparts and their interaction is slightly painful at times. There's also a whole slue of little mistakes. For instance, if firebolts fly at ~150mph, how fucking fast is that thestral?

All that said, I still like it. Its not a terrible read and it broaches some interesting topics, not to mention I obviously rate H/L, but the premise is so obviously flawed and at times, incoherent, that I just couldn't fully enjoy it.

Eh.

I don't feel this is library worthy as it is. Perhaps with a bit more polish, some refining of the characters and their interaction, giving the plot a once over perhaps- I don't know.

A tentative 3/5. This should have been an easy 4, really.

 

This is a fairly decent one-shot. I'm not a huge fan of H/L but I think it's decently written despite that.
While Silens and enembee make some good points, I have to point out that presumably it's been some period of time since the end of the series - Luna has likely changed, if not a huge amount. Nevertheless, writing her exactly as she appeared in canon would be a mistake. You may be correct that certain things are integral to Luna's character, but I think it's very possible that she's become slightly (or more) embittered by the lack of retribution her abusers faced.

 

All I heard was that you think I'm an A-level director. But seriously, let me start by saying 'thanks' for the detailed review, even if I don't see the story the way you did. I'm glad you liked the landscape descriptions, because the setting is something I feel is integral to this story.

Spoiler

I chose Africa as the place partly because of the Erumpents, but also because of scenery and the fact my larger story is set there, and I felt it deserved quite a bit of attention.

As for Luna's character, well...

Spoiler

she's quite damaged - I can't say that enough - and this is how she chooses to regain control of her life and, as she sees it, set the scales back to even. In the case of Harry, he hasn't moved on with his life, but rather is only deluding himself that he has, as Luna expressly points out (about Harry, Hermione and the Weasleys) after Harry hears the continued anger in Ron's voice.

I thought I'd put that out there quite clearly, but perhaps not.

On the shout-out to Contemplating Clouds, I hadn't even thought about it until after I'd written the plummeting-through-clouds opening, and didn't realize I might be overdoing it or being redundant with Harry's use of the "further contemplating the clouds or the enigma that was Luna Lovegood" line. In short, I didn't mean to hit anyone over the head with it, but looking back it does seem a little over the top. Maybe.

As for the contrasting motifs, as you put it, I did want to use Thestals, and I really liked the contrast between Thestrals and how Harry and Luna are taking revenge, and the cradle-of-life Africa with its verdant greens, etc. If that's what you mean, then yes, it was intentional; if not, then um... yeah, whatever you saw as a nice contrast? I meant it? <.< >.>

Anyway, while I wanted to include some canon-like humor in it, it was definitely meant to be a darker fic, especially in that Luna isn't as forgiving and easy-going as she is shown in canon. Healing through superior firepower, or something along those lines.

nmb, thanks for your assessment, but I hope this didn't take away writing time for Conlaodh's Song.

I'd like to ask for some clarification on the run-on sentences, because for the life of me I can't find any. Also, as with Silens, I'd appreciate you pointing out what you felt were the stilted parts of the dialogue, since I put a lot of thought into that aspect and liked how it read.

Spoiler

If it's where Harry says at the end that he's "ever so thirsty", well that was meant to be him playfully using a word that Luna used in her letter about her post-bird - "that would be ever such a treat!" He's trying to be playful and at the same time give Henry the finger. I wanted there to be a real but low-level sort of competition between Harry and Henry for Luna's attention/affection, with Harry sometimes forgetting that he's a human and Henry is a Thestral.

As I said in the WbA, Henry fit the bill of a minor antagonist or annoyance to Harry while at the same time providing some humor as well as Luna's transportation.

Oh, and about the Thestral's speed. Well, I'll admit it's been some time since I read OotP, but it's stated there that Thestrals are "magically fast" for travel, and unless I'm mistaken, Thestrals took the "rescue party" from Hogwarts to the Ministry in London in some short amount of time. I don't know exactly how far London is from any best-guess of Hogwarts' location, but I assumed it was quite a ways. And yes, perhaps I made Henry too bad-ass in the speed department, but I did figure at the time that hey, wouldn't Luna be friends with the most bad-ass of Thestrals?

Thank you for the review, but actually, I meant for this piece to be set between a few months and a year or so post-Voldemort, so not a *lot* of time has passed, no. I tried to write her as a person who was and still is quite innocent, but has had something awful happen to her and in her own way, she's trying to make it right. Obviously, that didn't work for Silens or nmb, but I'm personally pretty happy with it, although I do plan to make a few edits and/or clarifications.

Thanks again to everyone who reviewed here and in the WbA. I hope to have another story ready soon, so get ready to shred it...

 

I disagree with Silens Cursor - this Luna was really well done. She was creepy and strange, no "Heheh, I only pretended to be weird". Lack of innocence would be perfectly understandable after Malfoy Manor.

"I'm glad you liked the landscape descriptions, because the setting is something I feel is integral to this story." - yes, it was really well done.

At start there were some words that seemed to be jarring and breaking the flow - rocketing (it seems that it was misused or used in very rare meaning) aggravation (not sure why this one seemed wrong) and some others that I am unable to find on reread.

4/5 for this creepy and sad story.