The Boy in the Book is a Harry Potter fanfic by LonelyHarvest.
The Quiet Ones have all returned to Hogwarts for their second year of magical schooling- regardless of the efforts of hysterical house elves. There are new lessons to attend, new students to avoid… and a new plot afoot, hidden in the depths of the ancient school.
Meanwhile, a rag tag group of outlaws and their hostages pursue rumors of the Dark Lord rising, change brews on the distant isle of Azkaban and deep within the Chamber of Secrets a boy in a book learns he is not as strong as he once thought…
"...why is there a tree growing in the middle of the Chamber?"
This is a sequel to The Child of Azkaban, the second story in The Quiet Ones series, and can be read on Archive of Our Own here
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Sadly, it appears to be a Dead Fic.
This fanfic provides examples of:
- Adaptational Nice Guy: While "turbulent" is a generous way to put Sirius and Kreacher's relationship, here Sirius actually tries to put an effort to be nicer to the house-elf.
- Anti-Role Model: Not only is Lockhart blisteringly awful as a teacher and obnoxious as a person, since he has a sizable fan-club among the student body, he winds up encouraging bad behavior among them to the point where it is becoming a problem for the other teachers as well.
- Berserk Button: Kreacher wasn't happy at all with Dobby for trying to steal Lord Black's mail and breaking into the townhouse.
- The Butler Did It: Apparently house elves have been used by various people in the wizarding aristocracy as assassins all across history due to their Undying Loyalty to their masters, their ability to go unnoticed and their inherent magical talents. This was taught to Harry by Augustus Rookwood, hence why he immediately goes into red-alert when he finds Dobby in his room.
- Chick Magnet: Platonic Version. Harry has become even more of an interest to the general student population, with first-year stalkers (or "fans" as Lockhart calls them) following him around, dropping in at random to ask things and generally being annoying. This is most definitely not helped by Professor Lockhart, who has developed a tendency to single him out for one reason or another, accosting him at random intervals and doing everything he can to draw attention to Harry under the delusion that he is as much of a fame-hungry Attention Whore as he is.
- Class Clown: Filius claims that even as a student Lockhart was a problem to deal with, having gone to great lengths to keep him away from the Marauders for fear of what would happen if they met officially.
- Dead Fic: The story hasn't seen any updates since September of 2019.
- Distressed Dude: Remus is being held hostage by Crouch Jr. and Pettigrew.
- Enlightened Self-Interest: Narcissa acts cordial with Harry and Sirius despite being on opposing sides because she knows that it would be better for her and her family if they got along with Sirius (who is the current holder of the Black family name and is thus an influential wizard) and Harry (who is a celebrity and is widely considered a hero).
- Feuding Families: While the Weasley's and the Malfoy's were implicit enemies in canon due to acting as Foils to one another (the Weasleys are impoverished, predominantly Gryffindor and very much for wizard-muggle relations; the Malfoys are rich, predominantly Slytherin and are Wizard Supremacists), here there is an actual backstory that explains the animosity: the Weasleys were originally rich just like the Malfoys, having loaned the Malfoy family a very large amount of money in the 13th-century they refused to repay, even after losing their fortune during the War of Roses.
- For Want Of A Nail: When Harry goes to the bookshop to pick up his textbooks, Lockhart is away on his lunch-break.
- Hate Sink: Lockhart is almost worse here than he is in-canon. He spends almost every waking moment trying to direct all attention to Harry, encouraging students to stalk him and behave like Loony Fans (something the staff had taken great pains to prevent in the previous year) to leech off of his fame. As a self-appointed mentor to Harry, he has No Listening Skills, thinking that Harry's aversion to attention is him being modest and continues to hound him. As a DADA teacher, he has absolutely no idea what he is doing and makes the class all about him. As a role model he is a hazard, encouraging bad behavior among students to the point of it becoming a problem in every other class. As a student, Filius claims that he was always a blow-hard and a problem-child, none of the other staff knowing about it because he tried so hard to keep his antics relegated to the Ravenclaw common-rooms. As a Hogwarts staff-member, no one likes him, almost to the point where all of the teachers are completely understanding as to why Harry made sure to keep the Chamber of Secrets a secret just to find a place to get away from him and his bad influence. This is all made worse by his popularity, making it that much harder for the teachers to find a good excuse to get rid of him without causing a scandal. He is so obnoxious, that Harry considered using his aura of reason to gamble that it would clear the man's head and make him less obnoxious, but that would mean purposefully spending his free time around him and deciding against it.
- Identical Twin ID Tag: Sirius claims that Andromeda and Bellatrix were identical twins before puberty, their differing life-styles creating divergencies.
- Nice to the Waiter: It is implied by Narcissa that Draco has inherited his father's abusive behavior towards their house elves, this being a reason why Dobby went to warn Harry in the first place.
- Oh, No... Not Again!: When Harry Potter sees Voldemort possessing Ginny Weasley, he's reminded of last year when Voldemort possessed Professor Quirrel and exclaims "Bloody hell, not AGAIN!"
- Punny Name: When Harry buys his snowy owl, she introduces herself by perching on his head, meaning she's a Head-Wig.
- Screw Politeness, I'm a Senior!: Even when Augusta Longbottom is being cordial with Sirius, she clearly despises him, him being a suspected Death Eater and her having both a personal and ideological pre-disposition against Death Eaters. It's even worse with the Notts.
- Spot the Thread: Harry called out Lockhart as being a phony shortly after he read one of his books, noting how some of the details of his battles contradict information he had read in his textbooks.
