4447: Because Why Not - Hermione Granger and everybody else practically
Title: Because Why Not (Please see the origin for the reason behind this title.)
Perpetrator: starspangledpumpkin
Sue-O-Meter: Toxic
Cover/Banner Art: I believe this is a picture the writer drew.
Summary: “Hermione was just a scrappy, autistic child with no name and no past until she was adopted by a wonderful pair of dentists. The summer after she would make the best friend she would ever have from Ottery St. Catchpole. How much more would her life change when she is told that that tingling sensation she felt in her very core is magic? Now in Year 4”
Full Name: Hermione Granger
Species: We’re supposed to believe she’s an autistic!Hermione, but her autism only shows up when the writer wants us to know Hermione is autistic and not when her autism would normally have a negative effect.
Hair: n/a
Eyes: n/a
Markings: n/a
Possessions: Here is a description of the Granger home. “They lived on Herbert Street, Chalk Farm, London. It was a beautiful, white stone terraced house with an olive green door. Rather than a backyard it was a high-walled garden with flower beds, a stone patio, and lovely wrought iron furniture. Roger spent a lot of time planting beautiful flowers so that every time he and his wife had tea, they were in their own little world. The top floor of the terraced house was their master bedroom and bathroom, the floor below also had a large, but not quite as large, bedroom and bathroom with a small office. The ground floor held their kitchen and reception area. The majority of the reception area was transformed into an elegant library with a display case for rewards and photos of accomplishments, the section by the window separated by a paper separator and set up as a parlor. The basement was their TV room with the laundry room tucked in a corner, a piano in the closet, and a computer against the back wall.” We then get this description of Hermione’s bedroom when she first comes to them. “They painted it a periwinkle blue and furnished it with beautiful, walnut furniture. They set up a canopy bed with pastel green curtains, a dresser with pink flowers painted onto it, a desk with a variety of drawers for her supplies, a vanity for when she got older and more independent on styling herself, and numerous bookshelves that she could fill in with whatever she wanted. A chest for toys was placed at the base of her bed and the little sitting area had a rocking chair, and a child sized table and tea set ready for use.” They also get her a puppy. She names the dog Pongo.
Connection to Canon: First, we’re supposed to believe that the Grangers aren’t Hermione’s biological parents but her adoptive parents. The person showing them the children available for adoption says she may be from Spain. The writer decides to tackle Hermione’s supposed autism by giving us the following paragraph in the second chapter. “She was also different. She didn't make a lot of eye contact. Her parents would make a joke and she took it literally or got mad when they'd joke around and then become serious a few moments after, making her miss the opportunity to join in, which often led to her tasting her foot. Her food couldn't touch either and some she just absolutely could not eat. She walked on her toes and was rather clumsy in general. She also had severe aggression and anxiety. What scared them most was that she'd bang her head on the walls when she was overwhelmed.” Later we get another sentence which says, “she didn’t like loud noises because they made her lose focus. It was almost as if her eyes vibrated and it wasn’t the same as the rest of her body.” This sounds like she’s having a seizure, but instead of covering her ears with her hands she is sticking her fingers in her ears despite the fact Hermione is still quite young in this. Despite the fact she’s autistic she wanders into the woods on her own and meets Cedric. Her stutter is completely gone by this point but so is her autism. Chapter three is more of her getting along easily with Cedric and her issues disappearing. Chapter four involves her inviting Cedric to a Star Wars movie. The fifth chapter involves Hermione getting her letter. She’s also going by the nickname Mimi. She continues writing letters to Cedric, but one of her letters has her say, “what is it about puberty that makes people suck? Or is it just rich kids going through puberty that suck?” There is a comment about how she is unable to make friends and we’re supposed to believe this is because she is autistic, yet we see in earlier chapters she easily makes friends with Cedric. In chapter six we get the line of how, “there was a force that she couldn’t pinpoint. It kind of felt like the aura around Cedric’s tree house. Perhaps it was just her hypersensitivity due to her autism. No, autism didn’t work like that. Did it?” When McGonagall shows up in chapter six we find out Hermione’s going to finish her non-magical education.
Origin: The writer decided to try and combine multiple AU ideas instead of just one. One of the ideas is an AU where a canon character is autistic. Another is one where the same character is adopted. I clicked on the link for the story and found the story dripping with a tone which screams life is perfect. It’s pretty bad when the first chapter has the line of “it was lovely and absolutely perfect.” The writer says in their first chapter that, “yes, my Hermione is Black, Hispanic, and Autistic. Because why not?” My answer to why not is simple. Hermione isn’t the writer’s character but J.K. Rowlings, but I don’t feel the writer is exploring any of those things because they want to try to explore things. Instead I think they’re tacked onto Hermione’s character to spice things up and make her an even more special character. I should also add Mr. Granger has military experience. Getting into further chapters I’m going to say the only reason Hermione is Autistic and the other things is because it makes the story special because her autistic traits disappear quickly, her skin color never comes up, but the Spanish she rattles off also never adds anything to the story.
Special Abilities: Apparently Hermione doesn’t have a name before they got her, but she also knows Spanish and French. She’s given the flaw of having a stutter. (We’re talking a character who is four meaning the stutter is cute and likely something she’ll grow out of in two years.) The story spouts off that “so, she stuttered with English, but spoke Spanish very well. Not uncommon when it comes to stutterers.” Apparently taking Spanish in high school and college is enough to allow someone to communicate fluently with Hermione. (Sometimes, but not always.) Hermione’s autistic traits conveniently show up to prove she’s autistic only to disappear when they should be negatively effecting her such as when she meets Cedric for the first time. She can sense magic possibly because of her autism. Despite being autistic we learn in the sixth chapter when McGonagall shows up that “she’s getting her General Education Degree in a few years, she’s top in her Taekwondo class, she’s learning to wield the staff. Yes, she has autism, but that just means that she’s wired differently than the rest of us.” Yes. Autistic people are wired differently than normal people. Everyone knows this. Looking at chapters
Notes: I’m thinking the writer didn’t do their research. I’m not even half-way through the first chapter and Hermione has no autistic traits yet at least one of the reviewers is jumping on the idea she is savant. The issue regarding her stutter and speaking a foreign language doesn’t add up to the articles I found. However, things got worse in the later chapters.
As for their take on autism, I wish to point minions to the article Conditions That May Look Like Autism, but Aren't. I also wish to point out there are other articles out there. All the writer did was look up a bunch of common traits for an autistic individual and slap them onto Hermione only to miss some of the majorly important ones. The way she easily socializes with Cedric in the first chapters and how her stutter conveniently disappears bothers me. I get the fact there are a few autistic readers who love the story, but this doesn’t change the fact the autistic traits weren’t coming up when they normally would have shown up to have a negative effect.
Everything I wrote is just the first six chapters, or five if you consider the first a prologue. As of today there are actually seventy-eight chapters to this story. Looking at the reviews there is one for chapter five which calls the writer out for not researching cultural differences. A reviewer for chapter twelve says Hermione as an autistic character is realistic, but I didn’t. Chapter sixteen reveals they “hope at some point the story will stop to just follow the main plot points from canon and actually deviate from it.”
Another reader points out this same issue in a review for chapter twenty. A review in chapter thirty-nine reveals the writer got rid of Cho. The same reader says, “this is the scene that JK Rowling should have written”. We’re talking a scene where Cedric and Hermione are conveniently there during the Basilisk scene and for some reason Ginny is kicking butt and the next chapter Narcissa is for some reason interfering. Scratch that. I went back two chapters and we get a Cassius Warrington picking on Cedric of all people, but I find myself glad Rowling didn’t write a chapter like that. I’m also wondering why Cho is his girlfriend but not a part of the plot. On top of this the scene where Ginny kicks butt involves quite a bit of dialogue from the books or movies, but I suspect there are plenty of other chapters which liberally lift from the canon material.
I’ll end this by saying butchering the original canon material is not a “cool twist of canon, which should lead to interesting character development”. The point of an AU isn’t to completely tear down the already existing sandcastle and make your own, but to instead build upon and change the already existing material. The Hermione in this is Hermione in name only and is in truth an OC. Here on Pottersues the “because why not” reason doesn’t fly.
Sample:
Mrs. Smith sighed and shook her head, but took them over to Hermione anyway. She spoke very slowly and very loudly. "Hermione. This is Mr. and Mrs. Granger."
It didn't go unnoticed that Hermione covered her ears and winced when Mrs. Smith talked.
"Hermione," Mrs. Smith said sternly. "Can you say hello?"
Hermione blinked. "Sí, pero hablar inglés es muy difícil." She swallowed. "I s-s-stutter."
Roger and Beatrice grinned. What an intelligent little girl. "Hermione. Would you like to be our daughter?" Roger asked.
She gasped and flapped her hands.
"I think that's a yes," Beatrice chuckled.
Hermione jumped out of her chair and grabbed onto the woman's hand, bouncing up and down with excitement; her curls bouncing with her.
"Hermione, calm down and sit on your hands," said Mrs. Smith, sternly.
Roger scowled at her, took Hermione's free hand and began jumping with her much to the young girl's delight.
The woman asked them several times as they filled out the paperwork if they were sure they wanted a challenge like Hermione and each time their answer was the same: "We love her already."
Once the the last signature was scribbled. Beatrice and Roger made their way back to their new daughter. Hermione had her meager possessions stuffed into a tiny backpack. On top of her sweater was a hand-me-down jacket. She had no stuffed animal to call her own or even a blanket, but her eyes lingered to the book she was reading.
"Ready to go, Hermione?" Roger asked with a smile.
"R-r-ready aaas I'll ever b-b-be. Sí. Vamanos."
So, she stuttered with English, but spoke Spanish very well. Not uncommon when it comes to stutterers. They took the little girl by the hand and led her out to their car to take her home. From that day on, she would be known as Hermione Jean Granger.
Hermione let them lead her over to the car. A brand new, turquoise Ford Anglia. When she saw it, she became scared and uncertain.
"It's alright," said Roger. "We don't live very far."
Beatrice repeated it in Spanish for her and she seemed to relax and readily crawled into the back seat.
"Thank God I took Spanish in secondary school and in college," said Beatrice.
"I wish I took it rather than French," Roger replied with a grin. "I guess she'll just have to learn both. Hermione, Tu voudrais apprendre le francais?"
"Oui, je p-p-peux p-parle en francais."
"We just got the most brilliant child in the world," said Beatrice.
"That we did love," Roger agreed. "How lucky are we?"
Perpetrator: starspangledpumpkin
Sue-O-Meter: Toxic
Cover/Banner Art: I believe this is a picture the writer drew.
Summary: “Hermione was just a scrappy, autistic child with no name and no past until she was adopted by a wonderful pair of dentists. The summer after she would make the best friend she would ever have from Ottery St. Catchpole. How much more would her life change when she is told that that tingling sensation she felt in her very core is magic? Now in Year 4”
Full Name: Hermione Granger
Species: We’re supposed to believe she’s an autistic!Hermione, but her autism only shows up when the writer wants us to know Hermione is autistic and not when her autism would normally have a negative effect.
Hair: n/a
Eyes: n/a
Markings: n/a
Possessions: Here is a description of the Granger home. “They lived on Herbert Street, Chalk Farm, London. It was a beautiful, white stone terraced house with an olive green door. Rather than a backyard it was a high-walled garden with flower beds, a stone patio, and lovely wrought iron furniture. Roger spent a lot of time planting beautiful flowers so that every time he and his wife had tea, they were in their own little world. The top floor of the terraced house was their master bedroom and bathroom, the floor below also had a large, but not quite as large, bedroom and bathroom with a small office. The ground floor held their kitchen and reception area. The majority of the reception area was transformed into an elegant library with a display case for rewards and photos of accomplishments, the section by the window separated by a paper separator and set up as a parlor. The basement was their TV room with the laundry room tucked in a corner, a piano in the closet, and a computer against the back wall.” We then get this description of Hermione’s bedroom when she first comes to them. “They painted it a periwinkle blue and furnished it with beautiful, walnut furniture. They set up a canopy bed with pastel green curtains, a dresser with pink flowers painted onto it, a desk with a variety of drawers for her supplies, a vanity for when she got older and more independent on styling herself, and numerous bookshelves that she could fill in with whatever she wanted. A chest for toys was placed at the base of her bed and the little sitting area had a rocking chair, and a child sized table and tea set ready for use.” They also get her a puppy. She names the dog Pongo.
Connection to Canon: First, we’re supposed to believe that the Grangers aren’t Hermione’s biological parents but her adoptive parents. The person showing them the children available for adoption says she may be from Spain. The writer decides to tackle Hermione’s supposed autism by giving us the following paragraph in the second chapter. “She was also different. She didn't make a lot of eye contact. Her parents would make a joke and she took it literally or got mad when they'd joke around and then become serious a few moments after, making her miss the opportunity to join in, which often led to her tasting her foot. Her food couldn't touch either and some she just absolutely could not eat. She walked on her toes and was rather clumsy in general. She also had severe aggression and anxiety. What scared them most was that she'd bang her head on the walls when she was overwhelmed.” Later we get another sentence which says, “she didn’t like loud noises because they made her lose focus. It was almost as if her eyes vibrated and it wasn’t the same as the rest of her body.” This sounds like she’s having a seizure, but instead of covering her ears with her hands she is sticking her fingers in her ears despite the fact Hermione is still quite young in this. Despite the fact she’s autistic she wanders into the woods on her own and meets Cedric. Her stutter is completely gone by this point but so is her autism. Chapter three is more of her getting along easily with Cedric and her issues disappearing. Chapter four involves her inviting Cedric to a Star Wars movie. The fifth chapter involves Hermione getting her letter. She’s also going by the nickname Mimi. She continues writing letters to Cedric, but one of her letters has her say, “what is it about puberty that makes people suck? Or is it just rich kids going through puberty that suck?” There is a comment about how she is unable to make friends and we’re supposed to believe this is because she is autistic, yet we see in earlier chapters she easily makes friends with Cedric. In chapter six we get the line of how, “there was a force that she couldn’t pinpoint. It kind of felt like the aura around Cedric’s tree house. Perhaps it was just her hypersensitivity due to her autism. No, autism didn’t work like that. Did it?” When McGonagall shows up in chapter six we find out Hermione’s going to finish her non-magical education.
Origin: The writer decided to try and combine multiple AU ideas instead of just one. One of the ideas is an AU where a canon character is autistic. Another is one where the same character is adopted. I clicked on the link for the story and found the story dripping with a tone which screams life is perfect. It’s pretty bad when the first chapter has the line of “it was lovely and absolutely perfect.” The writer says in their first chapter that, “yes, my Hermione is Black, Hispanic, and Autistic. Because why not?” My answer to why not is simple. Hermione isn’t the writer’s character but J.K. Rowlings, but I don’t feel the writer is exploring any of those things because they want to try to explore things. Instead I think they’re tacked onto Hermione’s character to spice things up and make her an even more special character. I should also add Mr. Granger has military experience. Getting into further chapters I’m going to say the only reason Hermione is Autistic and the other things is because it makes the story special because her autistic traits disappear quickly, her skin color never comes up, but the Spanish she rattles off also never adds anything to the story.
Special Abilities: Apparently Hermione doesn’t have a name before they got her, but she also knows Spanish and French. She’s given the flaw of having a stutter. (We’re talking a character who is four meaning the stutter is cute and likely something she’ll grow out of in two years.) The story spouts off that “so, she stuttered with English, but spoke Spanish very well. Not uncommon when it comes to stutterers.” Apparently taking Spanish in high school and college is enough to allow someone to communicate fluently with Hermione. (Sometimes, but not always.) Hermione’s autistic traits conveniently show up to prove she’s autistic only to disappear when they should be negatively effecting her such as when she meets Cedric for the first time. She can sense magic possibly because of her autism. Despite being autistic we learn in the sixth chapter when McGonagall shows up that “she’s getting her General Education Degree in a few years, she’s top in her Taekwondo class, she’s learning to wield the staff. Yes, she has autism, but that just means that she’s wired differently than the rest of us.” Yes. Autistic people are wired differently than normal people. Everyone knows this. Looking at chapters
Notes: I’m thinking the writer didn’t do their research. I’m not even half-way through the first chapter and Hermione has no autistic traits yet at least one of the reviewers is jumping on the idea she is savant. The issue regarding her stutter and speaking a foreign language doesn’t add up to the articles I found. However, things got worse in the later chapters.
As for their take on autism, I wish to point minions to the article Conditions That May Look Like Autism, but Aren't. I also wish to point out there are other articles out there. All the writer did was look up a bunch of common traits for an autistic individual and slap them onto Hermione only to miss some of the majorly important ones. The way she easily socializes with Cedric in the first chapters and how her stutter conveniently disappears bothers me. I get the fact there are a few autistic readers who love the story, but this doesn’t change the fact the autistic traits weren’t coming up when they normally would have shown up to have a negative effect.
Everything I wrote is just the first six chapters, or five if you consider the first a prologue. As of today there are actually seventy-eight chapters to this story. Looking at the reviews there is one for chapter five which calls the writer out for not researching cultural differences. A reviewer for chapter twelve says Hermione as an autistic character is realistic, but I didn’t. Chapter sixteen reveals they “hope at some point the story will stop to just follow the main plot points from canon and actually deviate from it.”
Another reader points out this same issue in a review for chapter twenty. A review in chapter thirty-nine reveals the writer got rid of Cho. The same reader says, “this is the scene that JK Rowling should have written”. We’re talking a scene where Cedric and Hermione are conveniently there during the Basilisk scene and for some reason Ginny is kicking butt and the next chapter Narcissa is for some reason interfering. Scratch that. I went back two chapters and we get a Cassius Warrington picking on Cedric of all people, but I find myself glad Rowling didn’t write a chapter like that. I’m also wondering why Cho is his girlfriend but not a part of the plot. On top of this the scene where Ginny kicks butt involves quite a bit of dialogue from the books or movies, but I suspect there are plenty of other chapters which liberally lift from the canon material.
I’ll end this by saying butchering the original canon material is not a “cool twist of canon, which should lead to interesting character development”. The point of an AU isn’t to completely tear down the already existing sandcastle and make your own, but to instead build upon and change the already existing material. The Hermione in this is Hermione in name only and is in truth an OC. Here on Pottersues the “because why not” reason doesn’t fly.
Sample:
Mrs. Smith sighed and shook her head, but took them over to Hermione anyway. She spoke very slowly and very loudly. "Hermione. This is Mr. and Mrs. Granger."
It didn't go unnoticed that Hermione covered her ears and winced when Mrs. Smith talked.
"Hermione," Mrs. Smith said sternly. "Can you say hello?"
Hermione blinked. "Sí, pero hablar inglés es muy difícil." She swallowed. "I s-s-stutter."
Roger and Beatrice grinned. What an intelligent little girl. "Hermione. Would you like to be our daughter?" Roger asked.
She gasped and flapped her hands.
"I think that's a yes," Beatrice chuckled.
Hermione jumped out of her chair and grabbed onto the woman's hand, bouncing up and down with excitement; her curls bouncing with her.
"Hermione, calm down and sit on your hands," said Mrs. Smith, sternly.
Roger scowled at her, took Hermione's free hand and began jumping with her much to the young girl's delight.
The woman asked them several times as they filled out the paperwork if they were sure they wanted a challenge like Hermione and each time their answer was the same: "We love her already."
Once the the last signature was scribbled. Beatrice and Roger made their way back to their new daughter. Hermione had her meager possessions stuffed into a tiny backpack. On top of her sweater was a hand-me-down jacket. She had no stuffed animal to call her own or even a blanket, but her eyes lingered to the book she was reading.
"Ready to go, Hermione?" Roger asked with a smile.
"R-r-ready aaas I'll ever b-b-be. Sí. Vamanos."
So, she stuttered with English, but spoke Spanish very well. Not uncommon when it comes to stutterers. They took the little girl by the hand and led her out to their car to take her home. From that day on, she would be known as Hermione Jean Granger.
Hermione let them lead her over to the car. A brand new, turquoise Ford Anglia. When she saw it, she became scared and uncertain.
"It's alright," said Roger. "We don't live very far."
Beatrice repeated it in Spanish for her and she seemed to relax and readily crawled into the back seat.
"Thank God I took Spanish in secondary school and in college," said Beatrice.
"I wish I took it rather than French," Roger replied with a grin. "I guess she'll just have to learn both. Hermione, Tu voudrais apprendre le francais?"
"Oui, je p-p-peux p-parle en francais."
"We just got the most brilliant child in the world," said Beatrice.
"That we did love," Roger agreed. "How lucky are we?"