My editor reached out to me for a chat this afternoon, and I was flattered. As a newbie, I was caught a little off guard by her attention.
Unfortunately, it wasn't good news.
She said she was sorry. Although the follow-through readership was good, the book wouldn't be getting a second round of promotion.
I'd seen it coming. After all, gaining only a hundred bookmarks a day during the first round was a bit hard to justify.
I had mixed feelings and couldn't quite accept it, but then I felt a little more at peace.
My editor said this was the HP fanfic with the best integration of Eastern elements she'd ever read. Unfortunately, it had come along at the wrong time.
I'd seen that coming too. Before starting this book, I'd already browsed other stories in the genre. Apart from a handful, the vast majority grafted Eastern immortal cultivation onto HP.
Combining high magic with low magic-how could that not be satisfying? It's a total stomp! I even wondered whether Voldemort could beat a Foundation Establishment cultivator.
But is giving readers that thrill really all a novel needs? I'm not sure, but I couldn't convince myself of that. Even if you're going for thrills, I think you at least need some logic behind it. It has to be internally consistent.
That's probably just how I think, how I see things. After all these years, I still can't change it.
Why did she say it had come along at the wrong time? Because readers had developed an extreme reaction. They had PTSD. The sight of any HP fanfic with Chinese elements made them physically nauseous.
What's the best thing about Harry Potter? I think it's how beautifully it meshes with the real world, to the point that people wonder whether such a magnificent magical world really exists.
So what matters most in fanfiction?
Preserving that sense of reality, staying as close to the original as possible, and finding that same feeling.
So I had to consider what kind of East wouldn't feel absurd, what the East would look like if the world of Harry Potter really existed, and what the relationship between magic and Daoist magic ought to be.
I gave it a lot of thought. You might laugh at me for this, but I first had the idea for this book four or five years ago. Three years ago, I started by typing a title into my writing software.
I reckon it could have done pretty well if I'd released it back then.
Then news of Hogwarts Legacy came out, and I decided to play through it as a Slytherin before I started writing.
And so... that wait turned into three years.
Ummm, does all this rambling mean I'm about to abandon the book?
Of! Course! Not!
I wrote my first novel seven years ago. It did pretty well and showed every sign of taking off, but I bailed on it. Some readers quietly stayed with me for seven years in a QQ group with barely anyone in it.
They supported me the moment I started writing again. A lot changed in seven years: I got married, had a kid, and even grew a little potbelly. But one thing hadn't changed-they were still there.
My editor said, "How could you repay such kindness with anything less than cross-dressing?"
Cross-dressing is out of the question, so I'll just keep writing. Good follow-through readership at least means there are still people who like my book.
Salute!