In My Opinion

Grim by ShortyWolf20 and Agc1019

Full title: Grim | Harry Potter by ShortyWolf20 and Agc1019
Source: Review request
Genre: Fanfiction
Subgenre: Fantasy
Fandom: Harry Potter book series by J. K. Rowling
Mature: N (mild swearing)
Status: Ongoing
First impressions: 32/40
Digging deeper: 81/100
Final thoughts: pending

Clicking the "External Link" button below the "Continue to next part" button will take you straight to the book.

*****

First impressions total: 32/40

Title: 10/10
I don't know if a more perfect title for a Harry Potter fanfiction centered on Sirius Black.

Blurb/synopsis: 7/10
Okay, I like the single lines starting with years - at first. There are way too many of them. The punch of a single, clipped line loses its value when it's sandwiched between so many other single, clipped lines, and I start to wonder with all the years listed if I'm going to get the entire timeline of someone's life story. I would cut it back to 3-4 lines, or add in longer paragraphs of info between and around the lines to break them up. The excerpt from the story detracts from the year lines, so I'd cut that out completely. Also, the sentences in the 1991 line are a bit awkward, but I'm not going into that because I think there's a better way to handle this, and the way I'm going with doesn't even need that section.

(And, of course, this example is just one of many ways to tackle this, and you have your own style, so just play around with it and see what you like.)

So, for this example, the first three lines stay the same. Then, I skipped the entire 1991 section, because Harry Potter isn't the main character here, and introducing him breaks the natural flow you already have going on. 1993 is more important. You gave it 3 lines to emphasize that, which I think is too many, but there's more than one way to show its importance. Just flipping the rhythmic, gradually lengthening, single-sentence structure you've established on its head would do it:

In 1976, Sirius Black met the love of his life.
In 1980, two lives were given, and one was taken.
In 1981, Sirius Black was carted off to Azkaban, and his children lost their last bit of family.
He returned in 1993. Their world fell apart.

As far as the quote from Sirius Black at the bottom, it's fine to leave it there, but I don't think it's necessary.

Cover: 9/10
The font is throwing me a bit. I don't think it necessarily fits well with the gray-scale imagery. It's okay, but the blocky lettering used for the title is too movie theater-esque instead of grim (pun intended), and the cursive is too pretty. The placement and sizing of the text is good, as is the background imagery. But I'm not deducting much for the font, because I realize it's purely my opinion, and I know this would suit another person's taste perfectly.

First chapter (and everything that came before it): 6/10
Notes: I found a "who's" that should be "whose," and that sentence should actually be 2 sentences (period where you have a comma). But, otherwise, I appreciate the casual hello, and the heads-up about cannon changes.

Achievements and reviews: Congrats! That's kind of all there is to say about that. ;)

Aesthetics: I'm not much of an aesthetics person, but I know a lot of people are, and I think these will make them happy.

Prologue: This is really, really long for a prologue. One section divider is okay, but how many were there here? 4? So 5 parts? After the 2nd section divider, it started to feel long, and then year 1, and year 2, and I was starting to worry that you would go through all 7 years in the prologue. This reads more like several short chapters than it does one long prologue, and I would split it up that way and flesh each section out. The bit before the train ride, the train ride itself, and maybe the sorting hat could be 1 chapter, or push the sorting hat off to the next chapter with year 1.