Name: RonsGirlFriday (Signed) · Date: 10 Jul 2020 09:17 AM · For: Envy

Ooh I kind of love that you did this with Lily.

 

Ok, first of all, I like Lily, I'll get that out of the way, but she's sort of canonically perfect? At least, we're not told any glaring flaws about her. So I love to see an interpretation of her that involves traits and feelings that are human and imperfect, the kinds of thing that we don't want to admit to people about ourselves, such as envy. 

 

And how fascinating you chose envy for her, because a big part of her story is how Petunia was envious of HER, and how Lily has this wonderful gift and experience that Petunia didn't -- so to turn that around and show that even Lily feels envious of others, when she herself is unfairly envied and that's part of what caused the rift between her and her sister -- I love it. And I also like how you show the aspect of envy that judges other people for not being grateful enough (by the standards of the one doing the envying) for what they have. Because someone else is always going to have it worse than Lily, and they'd probably have the same thoughts about her.

 

<3 Melanie

Author's Response:

god isn't she so perfect LOL Lily has always been the character I both hate to love and love to hate, and I like how fanfic gives us the opportunity to poke at her a little more because in the canon she's a pretty boring person to me, I'm not interested in characters who don't have visible flaws, so this was definitely my attempt to pick apart some of that 'perfect' veneer. <3 

And I agree!! I thought there was some irony in the envy choice, but I liked it because isn't it always how it happens - you're envious of someone, and then you find out they're envious of someone/something too, and it's kind of like a domino effect where you start to realize everyone wants something they don't have and yeah some people should probably be a little more grateful for what they do have, but the truth is, being envious doesn't help any of us actually attain that thing. But yes exactly!! I'm glad you got the idea I was going for here and thank you again for the review <3 

Name: RonsGirlFriday (Signed) · Date: 10 Jul 2020 09:08 AM · For: Wrath

Sirius and Regulus's story IS a sad one, and I liked that your approach to wrath was this point where things seemed to have broken between them for good. And none of it is really driven by hate for one another -- it's love and disappointment and all sorts of messy stuff, which I think makes the rage more profound.

 

This was a great example of a little snippet that tells a larger story beyond the word limit you had to stick to here.

 

<3 Melanie

Author's Response:

Eventually I think I would like to write a much longer work involving the Marauders, maybe revisit an old fic idea or find inspiration in something new, but when/if I do, I definitely want to focus on Sirius and Regulus' relationship again because I think there is a lot under the surface there that JKR didn't touch because she didn't really have the space to, but sibling relationships (especially messy complicated ones) are so interesting to me and, in this case, really heartbreaking. <3 

But thank you so so much again <3 I'm not very good at drabbles, so I really appreciate that haha <3 

Name: RonsGirlFriday (Signed) · Date: 10 Jul 2020 09:05 AM · For: Greed

Greed, I feel, is a difficult prompt to write about? Especially with these characters. I like your decision to sort of subvert the prompt. It's an ironic take on it, because Remus here is really not greedy at all -- but in his own mind he is, because it's been so ingrained in his mind that he's already been afforded more than he deserves. I think you did a great job with this one!

 

<3 Melanie

Author's Response:

Greed was definitely very difficult for me to write about - I had this idea in my head and then I sat down and I was like "frick what if this isn't actually greed and it's something else" but I wanted to stick with it and really try to get the deeper point across and I'm glad you got that because it's exactly it! Of course no reasonable person would look at Remus and say he's greedy for wanting what his friends have (i.e. normalcy), but he's always come off to me as this horribly self-deprecating person which I get as someone with a marginalized identity, it's very easy to start believing the awful rubbish things people say to you and really internalizing it, especially as a kid. <3 

anyway, thank you again for the review <3 

Name: RonsGirlFriday (Signed) · Date: 10 Jul 2020 09:01 AM · For: Pride

Ooh I love that you did a whole collection of the deadly sins drabbles and wanted to give them some love (drabbles don't really get much attention!) -- and Marauders are perfect for the deadly sins, I think!

 

You make such great observations in this one and tell such a story -- an ongoing one that really encapsulates them -- in so few words. The little bit of dialogue at the beginning is perfectly illustrative of the kind of hubris we've come to expect from the Marauders, and lol by the way, at the boys hanging Sirius out the window. I am cackling. Like the hijinks don't even need to be all that complicated or flashy. Just really anything stupidly dangerous. And in the end, even Remus isn't exempt (even though he tries to act so above it).

 

Great job with the pride prompt. :)

 

Melanie

Author's Response:

Melanie! 

I'm finally getting to all of your lovely reviews on these drabbles and thank you so much for them!!! I did, I wanted to do all of them as a set for the competition, and I wanted a theme, and Marauders was the first one that popped to mind so here we are lol but thank you!! 

I have a lot of feelings about the Marauders and the "best" (not the greatest word choice but I hope you get what I mean) ways of portraying them because I think there are a few directions that you can go in as a writer that make the most sense, but it's hard because we simultaneously know so much and then nothing at all about these characters and we really do have to think about so much when writing them (at least I do lol). but YES the vibe I was going for was "stupidly dangerous" so I'm really glad that came across <3