Harry Potter And The Methods Of Rationality

Yes, Luminosity reads like a YA novel; that's a compliment since the source material was the same genre. An empathy/thought diary-writing transhumanist who actively campaigns for an altruistic world change is not what most would consider a "emotionless blank slate of a protagonist who just keeps making the smartest and most sensible decisions". Especially since most people do not agree with transhumanism to begin with.

Instead of cramming in different "Sequences", Luminosity takes a couple of skills, introduces them at the beginning, and uses them repeatedly through the story. That's much easier to swallow for most readers. The rest of your "issues" are subjective issues. Is it wonderfully written? No, but considering the source work, it demonstrates that critical thinking skills isn't "smart people stuff". It takes female characters and brings them agency and leadership skills. It takes several strengths of Methods and extends them to a different universe.

What I would've liked is more of the male characters to have gained a similar increase in Smart Ball handling. I would tend to guess Alicorn was female because their work shows more fleshed-out female characters than male characters. Dr Cullen, especially, should've had more critical thinking skills that grew with his morality/philosophy and time as a vampire (instead his "skill" seems to be "knowing other potentially vegetarian vampires"). But given that the source work had similar flaws, I have trouble using that as a strike against it.

You bring up very good points. However, I argue purely from perception. This Bella does all the right things, for the right reasons, the right way. She is never incompetent, abusive, irresponsible. She's unassailable and unapproachable.

As for transhumanism, it shouldn't be a hard sell to people who fantasize about vampirism. At any rate, advocacy for it went completely over my head, since the idea that people should be proactive in prolonging life and improving their ability to enjoy it strikes me as an utter truism.

Luminosity did what it set out to do, and was intellectually and ethically unimpeachable, but, on an emotional level, it was thoroughly unsatisfactory.

The YA novels I was thinking of were specifically Hunger Games and the original Twilight: I couldn't stop reading, but there was no payoff. Worm and Pact also come to mind, even though the protagonists are slightly more fleshed out. I need more time to put my finger on exactly what makes me uncomfortable with these pieces...

In a world where Battle Royale, in all its various forms, has been around for nearly a decade (if not more) before Collins decided to become hella fucking rich all of a sudden, that the Hunger Games books and films exist at all will never cease to baffle me. Same deal with Meyer's... work. Sparkly vampires had been around for decades before she decided to do some really bad Anne Rice fan fiction, and things snowballed way beyond her control. And also spawned E.L. James' rip-off of HER rip-off, which I'm pretty much never going to forgive Meyer for.

I like Luminosity and Radiance, heck I bought both of them, but I'd prefer if the need for them to exist had never arisen in the first place.

You know, could it be possible to make a Fusion Fic of HPMOR and Hamilton?

How does a half-blood, orphan, son of a muggleborn and an ancient house, grow up to be a hero and a scholar?

I mean, HPJEV matches Ham pretty well, Draco is a Burr, sir, Hermione's a nice blend of Eliza and Angelica, Dumbledore is like George Washington with a sense of humour...

edited 27th Nov '16 3:13:23 PM by TheHandle

... No, no. You don't merge Hamilton with Hogwarts. Hogwarts is an institution of magical united kingdom, while hamilton is about the founding of the US, so it has to be a story about the foundation of the magical world in the US. Which has an entirely different set of flaws than those of magical UK. (Much more competent government. Also insanely harsh government)

Is that from FB&WTFT?

edited 5th Dec '16 6:26:42 AM by TheHandle

Yes. The ministry in the UK is above all else incompetent and corrupt. The US magical government is neither of those things - it's competent and draconian. There's other differences - Houseelves are free.. and seem to have slotted into a social niche that parallels african americans in muggle US at the time to a just uncomfortable degree, exogamy with muggles is outright illegal, and the standard of competency for adult wizards seems.. rather higher.