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perverse_idyll (perverse_idyll) wrote in hp_beholder,

Oh, I adore this story. The narrative voice is believably young and sheltered and yet still believably McGonagall. The retrospective tone adds an undercurrent of poignance, of intelligent hindsight applied to the self-absorption of youth, which doesn't yet have enough perspective to see the bigger picture. The war atmosphere, filtered through the displacement of Myrtle and Rolanda, is haunting and so expertly evoked. You didn't use it to hammer at us, but the subtlety of its distant roar and the ignorance of wizarding society add so many fascinating layers to the boarding-school parts of the tale.

The decision to make Rolanda and Myrtle Squibs is brilliant. This has instantly become personal Hooch canon for me, partly because you create such a force of nature in her. She seems so exactly right, with her size and her flying skills, her abruptness and her infatuation with aviatrix role models, her loneliness and her stoic self-sufficiency. I am totally in love with the Amelia Air Heart theme, and I have no trouble seeing Hooch as heroic.

I'm also dazzled by all the fresh and interesting things you do with student life. Walburga is marvelously intriguing and oddly sad, not at all the kind of girl I would have expected, and the knee-jerk prejudice of wizarding youth - the parallel between how they initially treat Rolanda as a target and outsider and how easily they fall into the error of seeing Muggles as inhuman - is another stroke of brilliance. There's something creepy and terrifyingly plausible about the idea of sixth-year wizards bustling off to watch Muggles die in bombed villages, seeing it as entertainment and just desserts. I have to admit, this is far more chilling and reminiscent of Nazi cold-bloodedness than anything JKR managed to imply. Not to mention the sheer uselessness of the adults in charge.

The way you frame it here makes Myrtle's fate even more pathetic.

Another thing that sent a thrill right to my toes was the moment of revelation - the fact that it's Hooch who has to pull the blindfold from Minerva's eyes, leading to the painful complexity of Minerva being overwhelmed by the obvious and in no state to respond to Rolanda's own admission of feelings. Masterfully handled, that scene. Delicate but not simple.

I pretty much loved everything about this. Your Rolanda is now mine, the version I cherish. I wish there was more to her story; I wish I could follow Minnie and Rolanda's adventures in Muggle London. Thank you for re-imagining these characters without fanon baggage, for coming up with insights that ring so true and hint at the women these girls will become. Just an incredible job. *applauds*