You Meet in Paris

By enembee

Status: Complete, Word Count: 5,500, Pairing: Harry Potter/Gabrielle, Genre: Romance/Tragedy

Read the Fic Here: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13328397/1/You-Meet-in-Paris

Author’s Summary: …and she eclipses the sun. A short story.

My Thoughts:
Characterization: So really, the only character who is explored here is Harry. The story is told from his perspective, in an admittedly different and odd way, and he’s really the only one who gets completely fleshed out. What the fic essentially does is bring us into his perspective, and then allows us to watch as he lives a good portion of his life. We watch his go through ups and downs at work, we watch him fall both in and out of love, and by the end, we have a very good sense of who this Harry is as a person. It’s very interesting, because he does not exactly have traits the way normal characters do, but by bringing us into his perspective through the use of second person storytelling, the author successfully conveys who Harry is nonetheless. While Gabrielle is not given much of a characterization, I honestly don’t think she really needs to be given one. She’s just a regular person who Harry gets along with, and that’s really all we, as the reader, need to know. It’s a very minimalist way of doing characterization, and it’s not something that I think works very often, but in this particular instance, I found it to be very compelling. By devoting so many words to Harry, he ends up being a very fleshed out and familiar, and I think it works really well. This is a hard fic for me to properly analyze for reasons I’ll get into in a bit, but I think this characterization works quite well, and I think I’d call it great, overall.

Plot: So, I think this fic’s plot is absolutely fascinating. See, at face value, this is a boring as shit story. It’s just Harry kind of going around and being an auror, and then going around and being a teacher. That’s it, and…yeah that should be boring as fuck to read about. However, what this fic does masterfully is use Harry’s emotions to repeat similar scenes multiple times and have the reader view them in very different contexts. Specifically, there’s a line about Harry’s routine about aurors that’s reused three separate times and hits very different each time, and this is what I really like about this fic. It has a sense of repetition to it that was very impactful to me. The time this hit me the hardest was at the end very end, when Harry repeats the first thing he says to Gabrielle at the beginning of the fic to her son at her funeral. Man oh man, did that give me the feels, but…anyway, back to the actual plot. I don’t want to give away too much about this fic’s plot, because I honestly think going in blind is the better way to experience it, but I will just say that this might be the most biased I will ever be in a review, because looking back on it, I can see the flaws with this fic’s plot. However, when I first read it, it hit me so fucking hard. Like, I was walking when I read it, and when I got to the end, I had to actually sit down for a minute. It hit me harder than any other fic I have ever read, and for that reason alone, this plot is crusade worthy for me. Like, holy shit.

Dialogue: The overall dialogue ranges from solid to good, with glimpses of brilliance. Again, the way this fic utilizes repetition makes certain lines hit really hard, but there also just isn’t that much dialogue in the story. The vast majority of the fic is just really well done narration, so while the dialogue is, overall, in the high up good tier range, that is mostly because there isn’t all that much of it, and there are only a few lines that really hit. But hey, credit to the few lines that do, because oh my god they hit so fucking hard.

Tone: So….this fic’s tone is insane. I don’t even know how to describe it, really, but it’s this perfect blend of cheerful and melancholy that works fantastically for what the story is. See, the plot is kind of an ongoing arc between ups and downs in Harry’s life, and while the tone never changes, it is a perfect enough blend that it always fits whatever mood the fic is going for at any precise time. It’s insanely well done, and is definitely at least top tier worthy stuff.

Writing Mechanics: Mechanically, this fic is fucking mind blowing. First of all, it’s second person narration. That’s different, and not something that is usually good, but in this case it works wonders. Also, this fic’s prose are insanely beautiful. I don’t often compliment fanfiction for this, because it normally doesn’t really deserve it, but wow. Even though there are a few misplaced commas here and there, it reads really, really well. These two things combined definitely make this some top tier shit.

Overall: So look. This fic really hit me when I read it. It’s very possible that it won’t do the same for you and that is perfectly valid, but I don’t really care, this is my review and it reflects my opinion. So….I don’t really have much else to say besides I really like this fic. While it’s not crusade worthy because I am not likely to ever reread it, the fact that I had an unbelievably positive experience reading it means that it definitely deserves a top tier placement.

Final Thoughts: If you’re a fan of oneshots, I’d definitely give this a shot. If you’re a fan of Gabrielle stories, I’d probably give this a shot. Finally, if you’re a fan of some weird shit that you won’t see in very many other places, such as well done second person narration, I’d give this fic a shot.

Tier: Top Tier

Written on 06/03/2021