Just another avid fanfic reader.

I will take a moment here to articulate a basic premise that I fail to understand. The Harry-Hermione "ship" advocates. That makes no sense. I'm not a shipper in any real way, except to say I am against canon Hermione and canon Harry because it's just silly.

Abused children, which is the way Harry was raised, would not be interested in a totalitarian girlfriend or spouse. Authors seem to be obsessed with the Hermione character as portrayed in the movies, not in the books. I think of the movies as "AU" Harry Potter stories, since they clearly don't reflect the books.

A few points:

(1) Hermione is a bully. Sure, she grows up somewhat, but her basic personality never really changes.

(2) Harry was abused and raised by control freaks that only gave him "freedom" when he did exactly as he was told. He would not want anyone as rigid as Hermione since it would be a return to an environment he despised. Go read about abused children for the mental impacts.

(3) Just because a character in a movie is attractive (male authors in love with a female actress) doesn't mean the character in the books was attractive - so describing Hermione as such means you're based on the AU movies, no canon material.

(4) Just because some author thinks, "well, *I* would have picked Hermione" doesn't mean the character from the context of the canon story would react that way. So it's automatically AU crazy-land because it's ignoring canon, the canon environment, and the fundamental nature of Harry as a person.

(5) Of all the female characters in the HP books, only Hermione has any significant on-the-page time. Everyone else is a mostly blank slate, even the love-it/hate-it Ginny character. Some have a few defined points - siblings, parents, jobs - but absolutely no other female Harry-age-similar character has as much definition as Hermione. And she is not a nice person in the depictions of the canon pages - she is loyal, hard working, zealous, intelligent, protective. She is not overly nice or compassionate.

(6) Before you freak out over my not-overly-compassionate statement, Hermione is also an emotionally stunted character. She was isolated due to her intelligence, and her total failure of parents to help her socially adjust and learn how to make friends. Really, Hermione's parents were abusive through neglect, and a total lack of involvement in her life. Two abused children - with very different and incompatible forms of abuse - do not make a stable anything. Ironically, if you combine my points 1, 2, 5, and 6, you actually get . . . somethat that acts like Hermione does in the canon pages. Imagine that - who would have thought of the possibility that JKR isn't an idiot?

(7) The rabid Anti-[person] because [person] had [number 0] of boyfriends and is therefore [derogatory term] and not suited . . . gee, how many boyfriends did Hermione have? More than three in canon, including Ron. How does that logic work again?

(8) All the people shouting that JKR said Hermione should have been with Harry? Try reading the actual article and quotes. JKR said Hermione shouldn't have been with Ron, that it was forced. Emma, the actress that played Hermione, said she felt Hermione should have been with Harry - it was not JKR that said such. Now, whose best interests is it for Emma Watson's character to be the main pairing with Harry? Emma Watson's. Not JKR's. JKR never said Hermione should have been with Harry, instead she always said that someone else [Ginny in canon] should be with him. That's pretty much the reference point: anyone not Hermione, as per JKR.

I don't like leaving reviews that don't have substance - what's the point? - and I can't abide authors that demand reviews to post.

The worst sin, though, is the mindless, pointless, brain-damage inducing overabundance of melodrama. Authors that seem to be perfectly capable of new and original plots (cough MK-ONE cough) wind up destroying their skills and abilities by contorting the characters time and time again into pointless twists that no real humans would ever put up with for long.

Oh well. The quest continues for something decent to read.