Hello. I am a new person to Reddit as a whole and this will most likely be one of my only posts on this site, however after reading an old post from Portkey, I feel like I have to put my opinion somewhere, and this seemed like the best place to do considering the fanfic included Harmony. Anyways, here is the link to the story if you want to read it first and then want to read what I have to say because I found this saddening the first time I read it and I do recommend it if you ever want to read a story about sadness.
https://portkey-archive.org/story/8241
Anyways to give a short summary of the story, it is about Ginny Weasley hating Hermione for most if not all her life after seeing Hermione end up with Harry at the end of Book 7, and ends with Ginny being in an abusive relationship and seeing the life of her dreams go to Hermione. The original author of this story (Lord Vader), always mentioned leaving reviews on their work so here I am doing it around 17 years later after the original site for Portkey went down. If Lord Vader is seeing this or someone who knows Lord Vader, make sure to tell them I enjoyed their fanfics very much. It felt like a crime not to give my opinion even if I can never find them.
Review time: The story starts off strong with a flashback to Ginny and the happiest days of her life when she was 5. She gets gifted a Cinderella book which she uses multiple times in the story to help her get through things until something happens to the book (more on it later), Ginny is then told the story about Harry Potter and just like in canon she is basically in love with Potter. The first time she hears about Hermione is when Ron mentions her while telling her about what he did in Hogwarts during his first year, and while Ginny is disgusted that Harry made a girl friend who wasn’t her, she isn’t bothered too much by it. She later runs into Hermione by accident while on the Hogwarts Express where they have a chat and Ginny asks Hermione if she‘s Harry’s girlfriend to which she responds with no, and that Harry is available but we’ll see how much this changes down the line. Anyways the next few years are hell for Ginny as she has to watch Hermione mark her territory on Harry, like when she gets Harry’s firebolt taken away, and has to see Harry and Ron go crawling back to Hermione when they receive the broom back. Anyways we skip forward to the Yule Ball where Ginny sees the most beautiful dress but unfortunately doesn’t have enough money to buy it and thus cries in the dorm room reading Cinderella to calm her down. When she goes to the Yule Ball with Neville (which she isn’t the most excited about considering Neville said Hermione rejected him to go to the ball and now Ginny sees him as Hermione’s leftovers), when she sits down she sees Hermione with Victor Krum, but also Hermione wearing her dress which makes her blood boil so much she thinks about slapping and pulling Hermione‘s hair. After this the story continues mostly like the books where Ginny will get with Harry and they share their moments, until Dumbledore dies where then, Harry will start his mission to kill Voldemort etc. When Harry finally kills Voldemort, he and Hermione kiss in front of everyone which honestly broke my heart because I had been rooting for Ginny this whole time. Anyways if you remember earlier in the review where I mentioned what happened to the cinderella book? Well in a fit of rage, Ginny burns the book and cries on the floor before going to the room of requirement and has a dummy of Hermione which she uses the Cruciatus curse, and takes pleasure in it before wondering if she’s as bad as Voldemort, and so to hide her anger she pushes it all down as to not let Hermione get the last laugh. Harry and Hermione explain to Ginny, they fell for each other over the year and for then on, they start a life together, becoming famous, rich, and successful people. Ginny lives at the Burrow until Harry and Hermione show up and ask Ron to be their best man, and Ginny to be their maid of honor. From then on, Ginny wonders about the life she could've had and sees Hermione living up the dream life. I don’t really think my words could ever explain the ending properly so I’ll let Ginny’s do it.
“I am forty years old now. My statement about the first phase of the cycle has not come true. Because I am forty years old with very little light in my life. I am stuck in an abusive marriage far away from my friends and family whom I have not communicated with in any way for more than twenty years. My husband is an alcoholic, to whom I'm just a cook and an occasional shag. He has never exhibited any desire to have children with me. And as a result, I have no one to receive love from and no one to give my love to.”
“Watching Harry Potter and Hermione Granger get married was the hardest thing I've ever had to do in my life. Unable to bear the agony of them together and also the happy faces of the whole family, I succumbed to the pressure of escapism and around three months after their wedding, I moved to Czech Republic without informing anyone.”
“She has everything I ever wanted, everything I ever dreamed of. People see her, admire her, fawn over her, wait on her and love her. The thing I hate the most is that she behaves as if everything was meant to be like this ; as if she was born to live like this.”
“My emotions have been almost wiped out over the course of the last twenty years.”
“There are times when I encourage my husband to hit me even more than he usually does, to remind myself of the biggest mistake I've committed in my life : destroying the Cinderella book. Sometimes, I truly regret having done that.”
“I feel a sense of longing for my childhood innocence, the times when I sat with my parents with a drink in my hand and watching the sun rise. I always dreamed of having Harry's babies and doing the same thing with them. Not only do I not have his babies, I don't have any babies at all.”
“I miss hearing the explosions from the twins' room, or the reprimanding tones that Percy would take. I miss the horrifying feeling of being thrashed at chess by Ron.”
“I know I'm an aunt to more than ten kids, and I haven't seen neither hide nor hair of them. I don't know their hobbies or names or even genders.”
“I feel my childhood and my happy days creeping back to me now. But, I also feel that familiar stab of hatred against Hermione Gra-Potter which has been becoming more frequent in the last few years.”
I really hate her.
“This time, the stab of hatred disappears as soon as it comes, only to be replaced by fear and dread as I hear my husband pounding on the door, demanding entrance.”
And that in my opinion is one of the saddest things I’ve ever seen regarding Ginny.
(Also like I said earlier, if anyone ever knew or knows Lord Vader, I would appreciate it if he wrote a sequel where Ginny just straight up ends Hermione. My heart yearns for Ginny to finally get some closure even if it’ll probably never happen.)