Review of Drop Dead Gorgeous

[flyingskull]

As promised, though tardily, here it is, my review of Drop Dead Gorgeous.



"… Commodified fantasy takes no risks: it invents nothing, but imitates and trivialises. It proceeds by depriving the old stories of their intellectual and ethical complexity, turning their action to violence, their actors to dolls, and their truth-telling to sentimental platitude. Heroes brandish their swords, lasers, wands, as mechanically as combine harvesters, reaping profits.

Profoundly disturbing moral choices are sanitized, made cute, made safe. The passionately conceived ideas of the great story-tellers are copied, stereotyped, reduced to toys, moulded in bright-coloured plastic, advertised, sold, broken, junked, replaceable, interchangeable. What the commodifiers of fantasy count on and exploit is the insuperable imagination of the reader, child or adult, which gives even these dead things life - of a sort, for a while. "

(Ursula K. LeGuin – intro to "Tales from Earthsea")

Why do I start with a good healthy dose of bad-fantasy-writers bashing a critique of Maya's latest – and funniest – adventure in fanfic writing? Because, once again, a decent author who thinks about the meaning and function of what she writes has hit the nail on the head: when fiction is bad in the way she describes, good writers will feel the urge to correct the superficialities and give life to the dead things, even if only for awhile.

I realise this is a very general statement to make and it's more a defence of fanfiction than a comment on Drop Dead Gorgeous, but it always starts here for me: giving life to dead things. Which mistful does… in abundance.

So Harry and Draco as the Odd Couple of Aurorland works perfectly well. It's so SO delightful that it transcends crack and becomes fic because mistful is incapable of writing true crack. Humanity keeps intruding. Which is as it should be, really. It's not witty or humorous or laughworthy if there's no humanity in it; even parody – or crack!fic, if you prefer – has to have real people in it to work.

Of course, what makes it parody is the constant intrusion of meta that underlines the sheer idiocy of canon: the monster in Harry's chest, the Harry Had Changed Over The Summer Into a Sex God cliché, the What Heroes Do Is Always Good By Definition amorality. She also parodies the ever-popular fanon idea that If You Are Dead Sexy You Have It Made, Mate, as exemplified in all the Happy!Veela!Sub!anyone stories.

It's not all meta, of course, as I said, humanity keeps intruding. Being on the verge of being constantly raped because you're irresistible is not funny; being a borderline sociopath who has no idea of how to function in a society is even less funny: there are the makings of tragedy here. Yet Maya writes it funny because the other face of tragedy is farce, as she knows very well, and laughter will make the Dousing With Ice Cold Water of personal tragedy all the starker.

It's mistful's compressed and lucid style that makes it work so well. Consider this:

Malfoy turned towards him, his left eyebrow and the left side of his mouth both flying upwards in that lopsided quizzical look he got sometimes. Harry ran his fingers through his hair twice, and only twice. (emphasis mine)

See how many things are expressed in two sentences: Harry's inability to read Draco's expression, to understand what emotion lied behind it; Harry's yearning to touch and his refusal to yield to it, Harry's rigid control of his reactions and the way his very control expresses his affection. I'm probably over-psychoanalysing the character here, but, at the same time it's all there, in two ironically lucid sentences.

Maya quotes constantly, not direct quotes – alright, there's a DW Watch direct quote in chapter 3 – but allusions, implications, refenceres to anything from old TV shows to fairy tales. One reversal of fairy tale cliché I particularly loved to pieces. This:

Malfoy had worked flat out for two and then fallen asleep abruptly by his desk. He’d started to coo, and Katie, with circles under her eyes, had knelt down and kissed him into silent sleep.

She’d looked up and seen Harry watching, and given him a rueful smile.

“It’s the only thing that keeps him quiet,” she said, and then laid down beside Malfoy. Even sleeping, he’d slid his arm around her.

Princess Charming kisses her Snow White Auror to silent sleep. And ain't it lovely that he coos like a dove?

And talking about old TV shows… It was true of Starsky and Hutch and it's true of Drop Dead Gorgeous – a truth universally acknowledged, I might add if I was feeling Austenish – that, no matter how many beards one throws at the protagonists, the only relationship that's central (I had typoed 'ventral', shades of Freud?) to their emotional and social life is the one they have with each other. It's so central and basic that, even if they never kiss or even hug, they are to all effects and purposes a couple, spouses, soul-bonded and double-tied in mutual dependence.

This is acknowledged here:

They were just - odd together, that was all. When Malfoy was with her he was gentle and considerate, and it seemed incongruous, as if he was a lynx trying very hard to pass for a housecat.

Which can well be Harry's jealousy talking – in a sense it is just that – but it's also a comment on how the only 'natural' relationship, the only one not fraught with trying very hard to pass for something one's not, is the one the joined-at-the-hips partners have with each other. True, Harry doesn't declare his undying passion to Draco, but he wouldn't anyway and besides he's not the sharpest knife in the drawer when it comes to understanding his own jumble of violently self-centred emotions.

Right, Maya gives Harry a more-than-canon honesty about that which is why the fact that he can recognise the problem and correct his behaviour because of it doesn't jar.

To end this long and unbrilliant critique, there's a thing that… no I tell a lie, two things that intrigue me a LOT in DDD.

One is the conundrum of Draco's perceptive capability. Apparently he can read subtle signals that Harry is not aware of transmitting – alright, they could be huge anvil-like flashing neon signs as Harry is fairly oblivious of his own facial expressions – and can react accordingly, BUT is he aware of Harry's all-consuming passion? One is tempted to say that yes, he is and he's not reacting to it because he's trying not to complicate matters and would do nothing to jeopardise this 'beautiful' friendship he has with Harry now, a thing that, according to Pansy – and canon – he's wanted since he was eleven. But it's not a given. Not at all, o subtle and wise Maya. I just love to see how that will resolve, I love puzzles and this particular puzzle gives suspense and thrills in the whodunnit of the boys' ultimate personal fate.

The other is one of THE most hilarious mistake by absent-mindedness in the history of fanfics:

Malfoy had righted Dixon’s chair and was lounging in it. When he caught Dixon’s eye he smiled in a truly horrible way he’d perfected, rolled down his sleeve and showed him the Dark Mark.

Rolled DOWN? rolled DOWN?? MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Sorry, sorry but the image is totally absurdly funny. I can see Malfoy, Draco, Auror and ex Death Eater, ripping his sleeve from his shoulder to make a cloth ring around his wrist to show the Dark Mark (TM) to right bastard Dixon.

All the other characters are either extremely IC with a mistful slant or delightful OCs, all – and this is extremely important – are real, fully flashed out people, even if they are kind of extras. I feel immensely for poor Chrysanthemum; I could cheerfully strangle Cuthbert (who's a very Pratchettian kind of character); I could, and in fact did, cheer Harry for punching Theophilus (who's a very Austenian character) and so on.

The one I love best, though, is Pansy. Maya is the only fanfic author I've read that can write a Pansy I can believe in, a Pansy who won't admit in public she loves unicorns, but can wear in public a PINK frilly dress, a Pansy who's intelligent and earthy and who can move on from things, a Pansy Ron deserves because in Mayaverse he's got the nous to finally move on from hero-worship and star-junkie to become his own man.

Oh, and because I'm a Draco-loving woman – no surprises here – I absolutely love Maya!Draco, the White Dove Unicorn of Sarcasm and Hiding Behind Words. And you know what? Harking back to the one real quote in the series – so far - I can actually see Draco in the Watch drawing Carrot absolutely crazy, flirting with Angua, doing impressions of Nobby and Detritus and things.

So, leaving you with this cheerful image, I conclude by saying: Your Original Works have absolute precedence, Maya dear, but please don't stop writing fics, don't stop writing DDD and, to me MOST important, don't stop writing QOM, your fanfic masterpiece. We need you to give life to that dead thing: canon.

Comments

[sarahtales.livejournal.com]

At this point I prove myself totally clueless...

I never spotted the rolled down sleeve thing just because - well, damn it, the saying is wrong! If you're holding your arm to roll your sleeve down (down, damn it!) the direction your sleeve is going is down. Stupid inaccurate world, I defy its conventions. (Now that I've had them pointed out, that is.)

In further proof of my sheer stupidity, what on earth was the DW quote? Now I'm terrified - I'm a plagiarist! That was totally unintentional. I swear! Not that I wouldn't quote, but I signpost like a madwoman - like Draco's songs. (Oh God, I must instantly re-read my originals and check them for plagiarism!)

In re Mira above (haven't read the other author) I agree she's fabulous. Actually, Shadow, while brilliant, has the fundamental problem for me that I haven't seen Harry and Draco's relationship develop so I don't believe in it, but that's my own awkward psychology getting in the way. (I had to terminally confuse several people with allllll my flashbacks in DDG because I cannot leave Relationship Building alone. I have a problem.) But I love many of her shorts - Kailash, When It Rises is one of my top ten fics. A woman of great talent!

Conversely, I was appalled by Howl's Moving Castle. My favourite DWJ book! (Though Howl is not my best-loved DWJ character - that's Christopher Chant.)

I was really pleased to see Le Guin quoted about my humble fanfiction - I just re-read The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas, and wept because it's so good. And also wept because it's so unholy depressing.

Giving life to dead things both makes me pleased and makes me laugh as I picture myself as the Voodoo Mistress of a Zombie Army. (I completely want to infuse life into cliches! And to be the voodoo mistress of a... But I've said too much.)

I was totally thinking of Starsky and Hutch while I wrote DDG (the remake, because I'm a philistine) - I do think the buddy cop dynamic is fascinating, though of course my regular complaint is that people need to be more screwed up.

I use my Ron and Pansy icon because they really are my OTP, you know, and of course I do not have any spoilerish comments to make on Draco. Except that anyone who thinks he's playing with Katie to win Harry's affections is not right.

Thank you for a really thoughtful review! While the Chief Original sits with agents, I can probably do something about QoM or DDG. ;)

[flyingskull.livejournal.com]

AHA! Now I see how you picture it: forearm raised to a 90° angle like a rather rude Italian gesture and the sleeve is, of course, rolled DOWN the upraised forearm. It's still so absurd it makes me laugh. :P

The DW quote was: Malfoy drank the drink. Okay it's not Malfoy, obviously, in the DW, but there was a long sequence in Men at Arms or maybe another one when all the watch is in the pub and they stare at the drink and then they drink the drink that's repeated a lot so it stayed in my sieve-like mind. No sooner read than remembered the Watch. I know it was not intentional, I DO know, but the subconscious is a fiery beast and also it bites. Sorry about upsetting you.

You're right about the H/D being sort of plopped in without a shade of how in hell it happened - my take is that Myra has it firmly in her otherwise intelligent head that Draco has done nothing with his life but pine unceasingly for Harry since the day he was born and that's why he took Sex Magick in decadent France, yes well, she's American, Draco learned Sex Magick to finally have his wicked bottom way with Harry, TEH Manly One.

Okay, I'm not kind to my fave authors, but that's me: unkind is my Subtly Disguised As A Renowed Author's Surname second name.

Ah yes, Christopher Chant love! *sigh* Alright, I do dote on Howell, but Christopher has my intelligent heart. Glad you too were appalled by 'orrible film, though.

As you prolly suspect, I love LeGuin fiercely and forever and also I kind of like unholy depressing books. I mean, I'd rather be unholily depressed by a spiffy good book than bored to death by a bad one.

You are the Voodoo Mistress of a Zombie Army! You write Harry Potter fanfic! :P

Since reading Flame and Shadow I've been firmly convinced that Pansy/Ron is the only true OTP that can reasonably emerge from canon. He needs her more than she needs him, true, after all she's got the White Dove Unicorn and he's got the heartlessl murderous controlling bitch; but at the same time I do believe Ron would be a very good thing for Pansy.

The very idea that Draco could be using Katie to win Harry had never begun to percolate in my brain! Utterly unthinkable! NO really, it doesn't work if ... alright you would never write anything so lame and it wouldn't work anyway except in a very Fangurl On The Sugar High Of A Lifetime way. Blegh, the very idea repels.

You deserve thoughtful because you write thoughtful, dear.

P.S. I don't know if you can, but if you can you really should see the original Starsky and Hutch series. It was full of gay innuendo poorly disguised as cop duo in-jokes. Was also full of Katies. The film remake was really poor and flat in comparison. Also it tried too hard. I don't like it when authors of all kinds try too hard. I don't know how hard you try, but, like an etoile dancing, I can't see it and that's all I ask: apparently effortless grace.

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

Draco has done nothing with his life but pine unceasingly for Harry since the day he was born and that's why he took Sex Magick in decadent France

I think it's sort of implied in SoHW that Draco was involved in a Dark Wizarding cult. The sex magick is just part and parcel of the whole thing it seems.

I wonder if one day anyone will say, "Oh, she's Chinese, that's why she wrote it this way." :-P
So far most people seem to be clueless re: my non-native origin though, hah. Except if they're on my friends list, of course.

Christopher has my intelligent heart.

I know exactly what you mean :-)
He's so...*sighs dreamily*

I'd rather be unholily depressed by a spiffy good book than bored to death by a bad one.

I purposefully avoid depressing books :-P
Because when I get ticked off by a book, I carry the grudge for _years_. I'm still rather upset at Gone with the Wind.

It was full of gay innuendo poorly disguised as cop duo in-jokes.

Okay, now you make me want to watch it. Also, pop culture references that I'm clueless about because I grew up in S.E. Asia :-P

[flyingskull.livejournal.com]

I wonder if one day anyone will say, "Oh, she's Chinese, that's why she wrote it this way."

Who knows? Do Chinese have cliché and kinda racist views on France and the French? Because what I meant was that, being American, Mira would sure consider France as TEH PLACE to learn sex magic, sex anything really. American have a cliché about France and sex. The English have it as well. I'm out, cause one of my nan is French so I happen to know the place as it is, not as a Hollywood cliché.

I know, BTW, that Draco has NOT gone to France to sex harry to death, but the way the relationship is presented in SoHW is so unexplained that it could very well have been that way. Nevermind me, though, am bitching.

Er... Gone with the Wind otherwise known as Don't fart SO loud, honey is not one of me faves. I like romances, but I tend to avoid overblown things with masterful men who Tame Their Shrews. Besides only books that I consider bad tick me off, if they end happily, gloomily or messily never bothered me one whit. All I ask is the characters are real people and allowed to have dignity of self. Not much, is it?

The original Starsky and Hutch was a seventies American TV series which lasted several years because it was popular and, in the main, good. I've seen it because my mum taped it and still has the tapes. It started before I was born. It's just like my dada Marvel comics: he kept them so I read things much older than me. Magpie family, that's us.

China, France

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

Do Chinese have cliché and kinda racist views on France and the French?

The Chinese have racist view for everyone. Well everyone except for Koreans--we like Koreans.
I don't know if there's a specific French stereotype...but we do get French people studying Mandarin in China.

Because what I meant was that, being American, Mira would sure consider France as TEH PLACE to learn sex magic, sex anything really. American have a cliché about France and sex. The English have it as well.

Ahhh....gotcha. But I thought the sex thing is Italian? *coughfanon!Zabinicough*

My knowledge of French stops with Le Petit Prince and a fondness for crepe and escargot, haha.

I know, BTW, that Draco has NOT gone to France to sex harry to death, but the way the relationship is presented in SoHW is so unexplained that it could very well have been that way.

I'm amused to death by Draco's implied threesome with the French twin though :-DDD

I like romances, but I tend to avoid overblown things with masterful men who Tame Their Shrews.

So you don't like Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew? ;-)

All I ask is the characters are real people and allowed to have dignity of self. Not much, is it?

Sadly, many authors don't deliver :-/ on the dignity thing. What I hate most is when characters (in original fic!) suddenly behaves OoC.

Magpie family, that's us.

lol, whereas the only old things my family keep are photographs...and a few Italian clothes that withstood the years from when my Mom was in her 20s. Other families pass heirlooms, I get my Mom's Italian clothes X-D

Re: China, France

[flyingskull.livejournal.com]

But I thought the sex thing is Italian? *coughfanon!Zabinicough*

Italians are clichéed as studs - HA! - but the fine art of erotic mastery is clichéed to be France's own invention. Fanon Zabini was even thought of as a girl! I ask you. Blaise is a male French name, so, as he's black, he's prolly North African (Algerian? Pied Noir?) or his Cleopatra mum is.

OTOH, Italian clothes are the MAX! When I go to Italy I always go to this little odd boutique in Rome that's got the womderfullest clothes ever! And they aren't even expensive. Italian shoes and Italian clothes, yes siree! So hold on to that heirlooms of yours, dear, good style is never out of fashion... or... alright I totally ignore fashion so I admit I may dress a little oddly so all of the above may be just my deranged self talking.

I HATE Taming of the Shrew with a fiery and undying passion. I LOATHE it! I DESPISE it! Kate is such a lovely character at the beginning and to see her smashed to bits makes me want to burn the book. Actually it isn't burned because it's in a portable Shakespeare Comedies pocket so I can't even tear out the pages. And I need it to read on planes and such.

Italy, Shakespeare

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

the fine art of erotic mastery is clichéed to be France's own invention.

Because of Marquis de Sade? X-D

Blaise is a male French name, so, as he's black, he's prolly North African (Algerian? Pied Noir?) or his Cleopatra mum is.

Ooh, that's good to know. Thanks :-)

And they aren't even expensive.

Considering how long they last, not expensive at all :-D
I like French clothes too but the dye often runs. Meh.

Kate is such a lovely character at the beginning and to see her smashed to bits makes me want to burn the book.

Yeah...that's the one Shakespeare play I don't get. Seems to run against his usual portrayal of women.

Actually it isn't burned because it's in a portable Shakespeare Comedies pocket so I can't even tear out the pages. And I need it to read on planes and such.

lol. Do you like to read them out loud? :-)

French, erotism and Shakespeare

[flyingskull.livejournal.com]

Actually not because of De Sade, though I've no doubt he played a part in perverted and repressed Victorian age in UK. NO, because of Brantome and others who wrote erotic gossip in the XV and XVI century and they kind of codified erotism in the Western world and they were, of course, French. Y'know? The Court of the Roi Soleil and things like that.

I do ham poor Willy a lot when alone in me house. In planes and trains and ships I tend to ham him in me brain, though it's true I sometimes mumble and get STARED AT a lot. Such is life.

percolate

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

Also! I love how I have to crack up the dictionary every so often when I'm talking to you :-D

It's nice to have erudite friends *g*

Re: percolate

[flyingskull.livejournal.com]

Ooops, sorry. Don't realise I do this so often. Mum's a librarian and I always read a lot: it's a good thing, but at times an enlarged vocab can annoy people.

Apologies.

Re: percolate

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

lol no, seriously, it's nice to learn new words.

I've known "percolate" before but it's not exactly a word that you instinctively remember, you know?

Re: percolate

[flyingskull.livejournal.com]

Well no. But I read odd books about science and things and percolate appears fairly often in there.

Do tell me if I annoy, though. Wouldn't want to annoy you for all the tea in China... MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!! Sorry, wanted to pun but couldn't keep a straight face.

Re: percolate

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

Are you sure? Tea is quite expensive you know X-D

And Chinese tea consumption is...bordering on obsessive compulsiveness, IMO.

Re: percolate

[flyingskull.livejournal.com]

Come to Britain, then. We slosh - well actually I'm an expresso woman but one can't totally avoid tea - the beverage all day long. It's considered therapeutic: it cures depression, stomach aches, colds, possibly even head trauma.

Anyway, sorry for the bad joke... :P

tea

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

Actually I swear by water. I like tea, but no more than one-two cups a day. I got sick of green tea after flying JAL. In China I have to carry a bottle of water everywhere or be forced to drink Chinese tea 24-7.

[sarahtales.livejournal.com]

I didn't mean to go that far - it's not clear to me, for instance, that Harry is The Manly One in the way he sadly is in a lot of fics. I don't think Mira does that. But I did read Shadow wailing for lost backstory and wanting to know how 'he's cute, if his personality was removed' turned into 'Love! that even Ron can recognise.' Of course, of both the two HP fics I read these days (one of them being Mira's) my cry is for backstory, so it's quite possible I just have unreasonable backstory craving. (Though I do think they're a couple who need a lot of backstory.)

I saw some of Starsky and Hutch, and it was good and gay, but David Soul isn't as pretty as Owen Wilson - I mean, I have a less shallow reason I am not currently willing to disclose.

I don't think Draco is all that capable of emotional artifice - in canon even when he tries it it's pretty clear he's feeling, so a loving years-long relationship in the name of a master plan wouldn't work for me. Plus, it would mean Draco was psycho, and thus to be avoided as boyfriend material - in the same way that User!Ginny should be avoided as girlfriend material. Pretending to care about people in order to use them as stepping stones to the Boy Who Lived? It was a revolting thing for Ginny to do, and I was boggled by it, so I was pretty boggled when it was suggested Draco might do the same thing.

I don't think of Hermione as a murderous controlling bitch - I like Hermione, and ship R/Hr, but only as a short-term thing - but I do like the idea of Ron/Pansy very much. I remember telling a newspaper it was my OTP, and they were like 'who? what? what about the gay?'... I am a disappointment to slashers everywhere.

[flyingskull.livejournal.com]

Well, yes, I admit I exaggerated a bit about SoHW and poor Mira who's a very good author, but it's true I got a vague sense of manly!Harry and Femalish!Draco in there.

The cry for backstory is not your alone, believe me. I wish that only fanfics would make me cry so, but there's lots of books in WWW (Whole Wide World) that plop relationships upon my unwilling lap without an ounce of backstory thus making incapable of believing it.

Okay, David Soul wasn't as pretty as Owen Wilson, though actually I wasn't taken by both of them: too florid for my taste. Don't worry, I won't pester you for reasons, actually I think your reasons are your own and none of my business: my business is what you write. :-D

I agree that Draco is not capable of emotional artifice of ANY sort ever. He is also not Ginny, thank any passing deity! You know? About what lilian_cho was saying about abysmal chasm in the book about ethics? The Ginny story is an extremely appalling example of that. The epithet 'slag' came often to mind, to be quite frank. Not that Hero Harry's nehaviour was any better: to eviscerate someone and the day after to kiss the girl in front of her ex then to gloat at him when he's so upset are not action indicating any kind of ethical sense.

You're the only author who can actually make me reconcile with Harry, y'know? All the others take his 'pristine heart of pure moral light' too much for granted. You make him human and flawed - actually damaged a lot - and so make him likeable and even loveable.

I know you like Hermione, sorry. I used to like her too, but lately her cold-bloodedness is getting on my nerves, also her sadism. I mean, canaries in the face? What if they had pecked Ron's eyes off? The so-called superior wizarding world seems pretty ineffective about eye damage.

Nah, you never disappoint the slashers! Alright, the slashers with brains. Who cares about ships when one writes so well? And besides what non-brain-dead slasher would want a world where everyone is male, gay and preggers? Huh?

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

Let me embarass myself by fangirling you again here.

(I had to terminally confuse several people with allllll my flashbacks in DDG because I cannot leave Relationship Building alone. I have a problem.)

It was not confusing at all! You clearly set those segments apart with markers. And the feel of Harry/Draco dynamic in the present segment and the flashback segment is totally totally different.

So not confused at all! Give us more flashbacks! Yay!

And Maya, on the event of you leaving HP fandom *wibbles*, will you please oh please write a DWJ fanfic? I don't understand why there isn't a bigger DWJ fandom because so many of her books are brilliant and have lots of fanfic possibilities.

*scampers away*

[sarahtales.livejournal.com]

There's only one more flashback scheduled, which will please the confused, but I am sorry to disappoint the flashback fans. ;)

I doubt I'll ever write any fanfic but HP (I really prefer originals where the characters are my own and no chest monsters ever arrive) but you never know. I don't think DWJ really needs fanfic, since her books don't have HP's gappiness (and I'm not saying JKR is a bad writer, I don't think she is, I like her writing, but chest monsters and the morality of HP certainly twig me as 'gaps'). If I did, it would probably be What Happened to Malcolm from the Ogre Downstairs.

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

It's such a contradiction that good books don't have a huge fandom following :-/
But yes, I do understand--it's more fun if you have all these huge gaps to play with.

And the morality of HP is not one of the "gaps"--try "glaring chasm" X_x;; I was v. v. ticked off by Dumbledore's speech about love to Harry in HBP, so much so that I have apparently blocked it from my mind. I do remember that I was upset because it directly contradicted what he said in OotP.

If I did, it would probably be What Happened to Malcolm from the Ogre Downstairs.

Ooh. A DWJ story that I haven't read! *library search*

Also, Ron/Pansy is your OTP, but H/D is your secondary OTP, yes? (Or past OTP, maybe?)

I don't tell strangers that I ship H/D, but I do admit my unhealthy love for Draco and Snape to just about any victim stranger I meet, including this one airplane engineer who sat next to me on a flight to China. He made the mistake of mentioning that his three sons love the HP books...

[sarahtales.livejournal.com]

Draco/Hermione is my past OTP, but since Draco is my favourite I ship most Draco ships, and I find H/D interesting and appealing!

[lilian-cho.livejournal.com]

Just wondering because you're clearly worshipped by most H/D fangirls, haha.

Yes I remember the lovely Amazing Bouncing Rat :-)

I've read all your fiction online, in fact, I found your FF.net account (Sharon smth? Forgot). Okay, I'll stop being stalkerish creepy now.