Title: In Loco Parentis
Fandom: Harry Potter
Pairing: gen, (Harry/Hermione, Harry/Severus, Nymphadora Tonks/Hestia Jones)
Categories: angst, dark, drama
Length: Epic (81,072 words)
Warnings: deals with many difficult and possibly triggering issues including depression, infidelity, abortion, racism, bullying, and voyeurism, underage sex. Some characterizations could be interpreted as character bashing.

Author on LJ: dolores_crane / dolores_crane
Website: dolores_crane / Dolores Crane at walkingtheplank

Author's Summary:
'It's not just Death Eaters that kill Muds. After the Second World War, the Muggle civil rights movements got started. Black rights, and feminism, and gay rights. We -- wizards -- we never had the sixties, because we just kept replaying the war, over and over again: Grindelwald in the forties, then Voldemort in the seventies, then Voldemort again in the nineties. I just hope this time it's really finished, and we can sort out our own fucking house.'

Hermione is back at school after a summer in the Muggle world, and everything is changing. But getting closer to Harry doesn't get her any closer to the war - until she's unexpectedly enrolled in the Order of the Phoenix, and meets Hestia Jones, the founder of Mud Pride.

Review:
This story is so long and complex, it's hard to summarize. While it's marked with pairings, the focus is on Hermione as she transitions of youth to adulthood.

Dolores_crane does a magnificent job exploring of the dark racist and sexist undercurrents of Wizarding society, as well as it's problematic political and legal systems. Further, it is a spot-on exploration of depression and social ostracism.

Huge and intense, dark and depressing, but by the end uplifting. It's one of those stories that drops you down with the characters into the darkest interpretation of canon, and into the depths of depression, but also works through the personal and social issues causing the problems and brings you out through that into a place of hope.

Really mind the warnings. Huge swaths of this fic are just heartbreaking, and while the issues mentioned above are handled thoughtfully, they might be difficult to handled if you're not in the right place.

In Loco Parentis