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beholder_mod (beholder_mod) wrote in hp_beholder,
@ 2011-05-06 14:44:00

Entry tags:

bathilda bagshot, beholder_2011, femslash, fic, griselda marchbanks, griselda/bathilda, rating:r

FIC: "The Ladies of Godric's Hollow" for featherxquill
Recipient: featherxquill
Author: tetleythesecond
Title: The Ladies of Godric's Hollow
Rating: R
Pairings: Griselda Marchbanks/Bathilda Bagshot, implied background Albus Dumbledore/Gellert Grindelwald, with appearances of a canon-character's semi-original aunt.
Word Count: 17,000
Warnings/Content Information (Highlight to View): *None.*
Summary: Griselda Marchbanks and Bathilda Bagshot are two women with a dream and sound principles. However, when Bathilda's nephew pays them a visit in the summer of 1899, the question arises how to stay true to them.
Author's Notes: This comes with fervent gratitude to my fantastic betas, Kelly Chambliss and Pale Moonlite, who worked miracles on this tale. Dear featherxquill, I had the hardest time choosing between your wonderful prompts -- I hope you like what I did with this.

One literal and one paraphrased quote are from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, page 287 of the British hardcover edition.

"The Ladies of Godric's Hollow"

(Don't forget to return to this post to leave feedback for the author!)

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perverse_idyll
2011-05-07 08:17 am UTC (link)

This is brilliant and tragic and absolutely convincing and almost painful to read. I felt a sense of creeping dread all the way through, but I was also utterly absorbed in the lives of these women. You evoke their era beautifully, and the interplay between their moral decisions and betrayals and what we know of the history they helped to shape casts a pall over their story, a shiver at the way evil can ruin innocence simply by crossing its path. On top of that, the helplessness and devastation of old age is so starkly chronicled it wrings my heart. Yet there's also tenderness, and it makes Bathilda's ultimate fate almost unbearable.

It's too late at night for me to do this justice, but it's one of those unforgettable stories that conjures up an entire lifespan, an age that has passed away, a legacy that's unintentionally appalling. I'll have to come back later and try to be more coherent, but I feel genuinely haunted by this fic. It's inexorable and sad and spellbinding, and I'm bowled over.

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tetleythesecond
2011-05-30 07:08 am UTC (link)

You will not believe how surprised and delighted I was to wake up to your comment! Despite the miracles my wonderful betas worked in midwifing, paediatric surgery, and post-partum therapy, I was still convinced that I had failed utterly in bringing across what I want. One of the things that bother me about Rowling's handling of the whole "fight against Evil" matter is her premise that you simply have to make the right decisions and stay true to the the Good side. Well, it's not as simple as that, is it?

Thank you so much for your wonderful words! To say that they made my day would be a gross understatement.

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perverse_idyll
2011-05-30 07:26 am UTC (link)

Heavens! Your response showed up literally as I was finishing re-reading this story for the second time. I still want to expand on my feedback at some point, because I love this fic muchly, and I got pulled entirely into it again, shuddering a bit less and mourning a bit more. At this moment I can only say that I'm glad not to have shared Griselda's heart or conscience once she heard, as she inevitably must have, what exactly had been done to Bathilda. I can hardly imagine the extent of her guilt and grief.

(Also, pardon me for mentioning it, but in the interests of preserving one of the tensest scenes in the fic, I wanted to point out a typo before you re-post this: Albus was sitting in an armchair, motionless, his head buried in his face.)

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	beholder_mod 2011-05-30 08:00 am UTC (link)
	(just to say, I've made the correction on the DW page. Well done, eagle eyes!) (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	tetleythesecond 2011-05-30 08:10 am UTC (link)
	Thank you, Beth! I think I'll go over basic English anatomy again before I sign up for my next fest. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	tetleythesecond 2011-05-30 08:09 am UTC (link)
	his head buried in his face. Oh my. Thank you! Can you believe that this escaped me during every single re-read, and I even had to read your quote three times before the glaring error hit me? I clearly need to revise my first-year vocabulary one day. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	perverse_idyll 2011-05-30 08:24 am UTC (link)
	I think because it's a familiar turn of phrase, our minds simply elide the word and substitute what we know should be there. I completely missed it the first time I read this. (And hurrah for speedy Beholder fix-its!) (Reply to this) (Parent)

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