I read the original story, and it grabbed me. Neville is easily one of my favorite characters; I relate most to Hermione, followed by Neville of the first six books, and then all of a sudden, one of my favorite characters who I totally just want to huggle and promise that everything will be okay turns into a badass of awesome magnitudes, and while it seems to be out of nowhere, it also totally fits and I just LOVE it!
The thing about characters for whom that kind of thing happens, though, is that they tend to believe what they've heard for the last sixteen years: they're stupid, they're useless, they can't do anything right. Neville has low self esteem to begin with, because he knows that he's not good at anything except Herbology. He's been told by everyone he respects and by his peers that he's not good at things, with the exception of Professor Sprout, and Professor Moody, and the latter turned out to be a Death Eater. I read somewhere that for every negative thing someone hears about themselves, to counterbalance it, there has to be eight positive things heard. Neville never received eight positive things, and he sure received a lot more than one negative.
I love Neville. I really do. And I love having characters unable to see things about themselves that other people do. But gol-lee, the ending to this story makes me tear up every single time.
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The thing about characters for whom that kind of thing happens, though, is that they tend to believe what they've heard for the last sixteen years: they're stupid, they're useless, they can't do anything right. Neville has low self esteem to begin with, because he knows that he's not good at anything except Herbology. He's been told by everyone he respects and by his peers that he's not good at things, with the exception of Professor Sprout, and Professor Moody, and the latter turned out to be a Death Eater. I read somewhere that for every negative thing someone hears about themselves, to counterbalance it, there has to be eight positive things heard. Neville never received eight positive things, and he sure received a lot more than one negative.
I love Neville. I really do. And I love having characters unable to see things about themselves that other people do. But gol-lee, the ending to this story makes me tear up every single time.