Thank you!
Thank you for such an astonishing story. The opening sequence has to be one of the best I have ever read! It’s funny but intensely challenging – the reader is given a situation that, like Lily, they may well want to leap back from. To be honest, I did. I’ve never been particularly interested in the Marauders’ era characters, and that combined with the incestuous feel that those first lines prompt, made me back off, whilst at the same time knowing at once that the quality of the writing looked so very promising. I’m so glad I came back to it. Lily’s thoughts and emotions are wonderfully explored. Baby Tom is challenging too, isn’t he? Our instinct to be protective of a child, combined with the horror of knowing who the man he was is, the tangible feeling of threat and compassion that his presence in the story invoke , is unsettling and interesting. I enjoyed the exploration of what an afterlife might be like – if everyone, ‘goodies’ and ‘baddies’, continue to exist. The twin threads of Harry’s possible lives are beautifully woven, and even though we are seeing them at second hand, are vivid and intense. The relationship between Harry and Severus – well. What more could the reader want? Wonderful, strong, passionate, imperfect – them. It’s a real treat to have a story so full of ideas and so well written. Thank you so much. Philo