Name: Jerry... Male... Age 28

Likes: Kickass, independent Harry Potter who wises up and doesn't take any shit from anyone, although I'll admit that I'm a bit of a closet romantic and will occasionally indulge in the fluffier side of fanfiction.

I prefer fics where Harry actually lives up to the evaluation that the sortinghat gave of him in book one. Odd that he had 'Talent, oh yes, not a bad mind either and thirst... to prove yourself' and spent most of the rest of the series lazingabout, not taking his studies seriously or actively learning more defensive and offensive magic despite the fact that he had a crazed killer after his blood. He got by on luck alone. I prefer a Harry Potter that lives up to that first evaluation. I want to see HIM showingHermione how a new spell works just as often as she shows him, I want to see him tell Ron to get off his lazy ass and actually work for something or kick him to the curb.

Dumbledore: Whether he's good, evil, manipulative, senile, I don't care, I like him, unless he's portrayed as stupid and incompetent. Get real people, he's been the man in control for an awfully long time, he isn't stupid.

Pairings: I usually prefer Harry paired with older women or underused Hogwarts girls, so I don't usually get into fics with Ginny or Hermione unless the story is really good.

Harry/Bellatrix: Real good for darkHarry fics. On occasion a redeemed Bellatrix is good but those fics are few and far between because the author usually botches it up. Its always the Imperius Curse or a magically binding marriage contract that is influencing her behavior, come up with something more original!

Harry/Narcissa: Simply because I like pairing him with Draco's mother. What better way to torture the little shit?

Harry/Tonks: Probably my all-time favorite pairing. He often acts older than he is, she often acts younger than she is, they balance each other out. Besides which, Harry REALLY needs some fun in his life outside of a Quidditch game and Tonks is an awful lot of fun.

Harry/Fluer: Nough said! Although I would much prefer a Fluer that seems to have actually deserved to be Beauxbaton's Tri-Wizard Champion as opposed to some who consistently floundered about as she did in the books. GIVE HER SOME SKILLS GODDAMNIT!

Harry/Lily: As odd and twisted as this pairing sounds, it can actually be quite good if the author pulls it off right. I would absolutely be against it if it was in a fic where the Potters had lived and Harry was raised by his parents though, that's just a little too creepy. But in a situation where they don't know each other, don't see each other as family, such as time travel fics, it could work if the plot is good.

Harry/Quidditch girls: Any one of the three, I don't care which, they're all good. Aside from Hermione, they are the girls Harry spends the most time with, so why not.

Harry/Slytherin girl: Which ever one is alright as long as its good. This pairing, I think, has the most potential to be the best all round because it simply has so many possibilities that, with a very few exceptions, hasn't been explored fully in many well written fics.

Hermione/Neville: Of everyone I think about, I think Hermione with Neville would have been the best. I'm not into the whole Opposites attract crap but Hermione and Neville are far enough away from each other in terms of their interests to complement each other while still having the same sort of desire for learning, Neville with Herbology and Hermione with everything. Hermione is very vocal about her beliefs and seems almost compelled to throw her intelligence in everyones faces while Neville sticks to the background. I think he could tone her down a bit while she would be able to draw him out of his shell.

Ron/Umbridge: The only woman I think he deserves, end of story. Although I have yet to see this pairing, unfortunately.

Dislikes

When an author spends the entire first half of their first chapter coming up with their own version of JKR's perfectly 'normal neighborhood' spiel. We've all read the books to. We already know that Privet Drive is normal, as are the Dursleys who try to hide their 'abnormal' nephew. We know that he has to do his homework after dark, and under a sheet, so why in god's name spend the first five or six thousand words of your fic telling us the OBVIOUS.

Flamers: While most seem to call everyone who tears your fics apart 'flamers', if the review has actual constructive criticism, no matter how crude it may be presented, I don't think of it as a flame. To me, flamers are people who leave reviews for no other reason than to belittle and insult the author, no matter how good or bad the fic may be and that annoys the hell out of me.

Whiny Authors: Authors that can't take criticism annoy me just as much as flamers. While I have received a number of flames myself, and made my displeasure known at various points, people who bitch, cry and respond with threats of violence and abuse reports to the site's administrators get on my nerves. I am sick and tired of authors trying to justify their own inadequacies by complaining that flamers obviously have nothing better to do than criticize 'good' stories since they obviously can't write themselves as they never post their own work.

Well here's a little news flash for you, only a fool would post their fics under the same account they use to post flames, if they did so they would be inundated with a mass of flames by authors simply because they were flamed as well. It could be the greatest fic ever written but most of the reviews would be left by other pissed off authors that can't take criticism. For all you know, some of the most popular fanfic authors on this site could be the person that flamed you and you would never know it, deal with it.

If you don't like flames, ignore them and if you can't take constructive critisim, and ignore the genuine problems people point out in your stories, you shouldn't be writing, but either way, stop bitching about it.

Too much angst: When dealing with a universe such as Harry Potter, a certain amount of angst is to be expected, we are talking about teenagers here, but some authors take it entirely too far which makes it exceptionally difficult to read no matter how well written or interesting the plot. Those of you who have read Kinsfire's work are probably well aware of this already.

Severtus fics. Harry is the son of James Potter, not Serverus Snape, deal with it people!

Fics where Harry goes through a 'Magical Maturity' and all of a sudden becomes nearly invincible with no active effort on his part to get better.

Fics where Tonks is basically Dumbledore's whore, being sent out to seduce Death Eaters for information. In fact, I absolutely despise this.

Pairings I dislike, and the reasons why!

Harry/Ginny, embarrassingly enough, had been my favorite pairing for a while before common sense took hold and it was pushed further down the ladder but HBP killed that entirely. Pairing Hermione with Ron or Tonks with Lupin just makes me nauseous. JKR apparently used up all her creativity in books one through five and just bombed since then, especially when it came to the relationships between the various people. Seemed she was going for the whole 'opposites attract' nonsense with most of it and it just doesn't work.

Harry and Ginny said probably twenty words to each other in the first five books and all of a sudden in HBP Harry's insanely jealous of Dean Thomas and feeling a 'monster' in his chest when he looks at Ginny, give me a break. Absolutely no work was done to actually build an actual relationship between the two, she just gave Harry a severe crush and then threw them together. Not exactly a good basis for a long lasting relationship, in either fiction or reality.

Ron and Hermione spend the entire series bickering at each other, Hermione telling him to do his homework and Ron making fun of her and ridiculing her for her study habits. Not to mention that someone as intelligent as Hermione would never tie herself to a lazy, jealous, prejudiced git like him unless she is severely hurting for companionship. A show of hands from you women out there, if you were in a life and death struggle to kill some insanely powerful, nearly immortal dark wizard and your boyfriend abandoned you over a stupid argument, would you welcome him back with open arms when he showed up a month later or would you beat the shit out of him before castrating him?

Tonks and Remus, YUK. While Remus may have been a prankster in his day, throughout the series he is shown to be the pathetic, gloomy, 'remember when' bum you see sitting in the coffee shop all day long reminiscing about how great the past was and how pathetic the present is. Tonks is exactly the opposite. She's bright, cheerful and just seems to have fun doing the most inane of tasks. Tying her to someone so boring is a travesty.

SLASH: My problem with slash isn't what most would think. I really have no problem with it from a moral or mental standpoint. The reason I absolutely despise slash in Harry Potter fanfiction is because the idiotic fanfic authors always, ALWAYS pair him with someone he has shown to absolutely despise. Its always, Draco or Snape. Lucius Malfoy or Voldemort. SHOW SOME FUCKING COMMON SENSE PEOPLE!

Oddly enough, most of the slash fangirls out there that are pumping out one piece of shit like this after another are also some of the most vocal against pairing Harry with Bellatrix or Narcissa, claiming that he would never get involved with them. Right, and Draco, some other Death Eater or the man that murdered his parents would be any more realistic.

Come up with a realistic slash pairing with a good story behind it and I'll read it although I draw the line at smut and if the story has some guy getting pregnant I won't even give it a try because that is just plain weird.