Reviews for Death's Other Kingdom
Naisa chapter 1 . 8/21/2013
This story has great description, I thought it was very cleverly written as you really get inside the head of Bellatrix, you can see how mad she is and even feel sorry for her as she searches for Voldemort but has no body to mourn. Great work!
Inkfire chapter 1 . 8/21/2013
Sending you my review here as well!
Well, you already know that I love this. Rereading, every metaphor strikes anew :D Your parallels/comparisons are so very powerful—the earth, the sky, the light. It seemed so very essential, if you see what I mean—as in, those huge elements that shaped the whole universe—no small things, no details, just the huge and the bewildering. Everything was turned upside down, shuddering and falling apart, and she stood there absolutely lost. And it was so fitting because that was what her master was to her—that huge, powerful presence, boundless, and without him the universe didn't make sense. Without him it was all empty, fallen out of balance, ready to crumble. Such powerful words.
And your writing is so beautiful. Short sentences at first, straight to the point, so very striking. That sentence must be a favourite of mine: "Between one cataclysm and the next she breathes." And before, the repetition of "gone", the image of a cage. And then the first longer, breathless sentence, the contrast between the sweet, sweet, sweet little house and the destruction. Her swaying, gripping whatever she can regardless of pain, ready to crumble. All of those images were perfect—like her as a mask in a sea of masks, and how she cannot see anyone's face and yet his haunts her. The light, the redness, the darkness—breath-taking visual effects and really beautiful sentences…
I loved your treatment of time blurring by, rushing past her, and the past devouring her. How she sits there out of time, unreachable and unable to reach for anything, numb, ice-cold. Just one thing: "One by one they go. Winking out of existence" there should be a dot there, yes?
I commented before on the brilliant subtlety between "what she is losing is" and then "she is losing whatever…", the loss expanding and devouring everything. And the emptiness—losing her tears, losing her eyes, watching from somewhere outside the world, detached and unreachable… And she accepted it, she wanted to lose everything, leave only a hollow core, hoping to find the sky beneath—your symbolism was amazing her. (And the snakeskin of course, so fitting.) Such entire destruction, and she even found her only hope in the destruction, in falling deeper into the spiral and the rush of falling apart… Also loved the "they", like those people begging her to eat and sleep didn't matter at all, she didn't even know them, they were small and nagging and faraway and irrelevant…
And then the "they" were embodied by Narcissa, so different, so delicate, so normal in her love and fear and concern, that one could not but loathe her as Bella did at that moment, and yet feel for her, having to take care of her shattered sister. I loved how very physical you showed their relationship to be, with Narcissa bathing her, cutting her nails, wanting her to eat and sleep, being terrified by her extreme thinness—which you described in a very beautiful, haunting way. Narcissa loved her and Narcissa was frightened, but Narcissa could not see beneath the surface, she saw how lost she was but did not realize the extent of that hollowness within, she couldn't tell the sky was missing, the world had ended. She was so faraway from all that and of course Bella would hate her for wanting to force her back into his world of human concerns and sanity, his healthiness. She wants the stars ("there are no eyes here for her to look forward across time"—this sentence is so stunning as well). So eerie and beautiful. And the moment in which Bella turned against Narcissa and HURT her was incredibly intense, I could feel my heart clench—I didn't know which one of them I felt for the most at that second. Very haunting.
You portrayed Severus' loss quite powerfully too, I loved the detail that he had a body to hold and mourn for and she didn't. He had lost a woman, she had lost the sky but they were both empty and drained and desperate at that moment, still. The moment in which Bella clambered her way through the wreckage was really wonderfully described, such chaos, such destruction and she was a similar wreck, as empty and as silent and as desperate, listening, listening for his heartbeat and finding none. I winced when she found Lily's body—it was very striking that you depicted it as so soft, so warm, a human woman with human blood, nothing more, nothing less—human and a mother. Striking because of the difference between her and the immense thing Bella had lost, striking because such a human being had caused the Dark Lord's downfall, striking because the softness in her couldn't be more different from what Bella was. The contrast was everywhere there… And Harry was similarly plain and innocent and human, and yet he had destroyed her world. I loved the way you depicted her broken, crumbling sky at that point, and the way she grasped Harry in hatred and desperation, and yet could not kill him because she couldn't allow him to follow the Dark Lord…
The part with Barty was so very breathless and full of desperation, and the part about Rodolphus and how she hated him for sleeping and living was quite intense as well. I also loved the way everything around her seemed to be a blur as time went on… But when Rabastan came to her and gave her hope again, it was like she had suddenly woken up and you really showed her hunger and desperation, the raw edge of desperation, how she had absolutely nothing to lose. Loving the repetitions of "guilty", as I mentioned before… The part about Azkaban was small but very intense and painful and it was beautiful that she was set free just at the moment her entire flesh was covered with her waiting. And it was great that the green light closed the fic… So very striking! :)