Choices, PG-13, Narcissa/Severus

[flyingspatulas]

Title: Choices
Author: Gwendolyn James
Genre: Angst/Romance
Audience: Most People
Pairings: Narcissa/Severus, Narcissa/Lucius
Warnings: Character Death
Length/Complete: 3291, yes
Summary: I sacrificed everything to be what they wanted me to be, just so I could have a small piece of their empty admiration.

Comments

[jen_deben]

Your writing is clean and has a good flow to it, and you have the start of a good story here, but I never felt emotionally engaged with the story.

To craft an effective plot, you want your protagonist to be faced with problems, and to make choices to try to fix those problems. The choices can lead to things going right or going wrong, but you do want your protagonist to be the one moving the plot forward.

Narcissa doesn't do anything here. Her father tells her she's getting married. Her sister tells her not to screw things up. Severus initiates their relationship. Severus tells her they cannot run away together. Lucius's mother tells her she's to produce an heir. Draco becomes Daddy's little boy. Do you see? Narcissa doesn't do anything in this story. She's a doormat. She makes no choices; she doesn't affect the plot

[flyingspatulas]

I can see your point, but I really feel that Narcissa *is* someone who has just let life happen to her. There are real people who do the very same thing. I don't think that a character has to be brave or proactive or even someone who stands up for themselves. I see Narcissa as a woman who has lived a seemingly "perfect" life, but at a severe personal cost - she has lost who she is. She is not the heroine of her own story, but I also do not feel that she is "spineless". She is scared, and yes, even weak at times, but that does not make her a character to be despised.

Narcissa never rebels, and we never find out why.The whole first section discusses how Narcissa lives to please her family - she wants their approval. I didn't feel that I needed to spell out the exact consequences of "rebellion" because I assumed that the reader could infer from canon and from the brief statements about Andromeda just what would happen if Narcissa attempted to take her life into her own control. I have always hated when authors babied their readers and

[sigune]

I must agree with the things Jen says... It's difficult for me to give advice in this, though, because I'm myself in the habit of telling a lot rather than showing :). I like your language and word choice a lot and enjoyed reading the story, but it is a fact that though Narcissa tells us she is impetuous, we *see* no such thing

[flyingspatulas]

I've responded to Jen's post, so that answers most of what you've said.

As for the canon - I realize that Ted Tonks was a muggle-born, but to families like the Blacks, they are just as unworthy as Muggles. I should have made that clearer but it honestly didn't occur to me at the time. The typos can be fixed - I was writing this story just after getting my wisdom teeth pulled so the drugs must have been affecting my brain. :P

The bit about Snape - I can see your point and that is certainly how we have seen him in canon; however I don't believe that he was always like that, and I do believe that love can make a person do things they would not normally do. He really loved Narcissa and was therefore willing to put her well-being first, or what he thought would be good for her well-being.

Thanks for the review - I really appreciate your comments! :D

[signet85]

*shyly decides to write* Okay, so perhaps I'm weird, but when people write characters outside of my perception of them, it doesn't bother me. I like the refreshing nature of reading about something of which I myself haven't thought.

I really enjoyed it. From what we see of Snape in the books, yes he might have felt that he deserved just as much at Lucius did but we aren't to know whether he had the guts to take what he felt he was owed. Perhaps he worried about performing in bed should he and Narcissa get married *shrugs* who knows, but I believe that it is a perfectly valid stance to take on Snape's character.

And having read the points made about Narcissa simply being a "nothingness" protagonist: Hey, not everyone is the hero of their own story, are they? The beginning sets up nicely that Narcissa -isn't- in control, she doesn't question what happens to her and she floats through, taking the blows and sucking it up eventually to smile and be pretty (eventually).

I enjoyed reading it,
Cheers,
Signet

[flyingspatulas]

Thank you very much. I appreciate that you're willing to read characters differently than you imagine them. It's very hard to keep a character in line with canon when canon speaks so little of them, so writing Narcissa's life before we even heard of her is a challenge. :) Thanks for the review! :D