One of the darkest Snape-fics

Soul Play by Snapesforte
 
Characters: Severus Snape, Narcissa Malfoy, Draco Malfoy, Voldemort, Bellatrix Lestrange…
Genres: Action/Adventure, Character Study, Darkfic, Drama
Pairings: Het (m/f)
Rating: SV (has some sex, violence, and/or other heavy content)

URL: http://www.the-archive.net/viewstory.php?sid=1515

Setting

The story begins right after the events of “Flight of the Half-Blood Prince” in book six and follows Snape’s life and those surrounding him while in hiding and back in the service of Lord Voldemort.

Summary

Having proven his loyalty to Voldemort, Snape returns into the Dark Lord’s service and to Spinner’s End in order to lie low. However, he does not do so alone. Voldemort sees fit to “award” Snape by replacing his housemate Pettigrew with none other than snobbish Narcissa Malfoy and her spoiled son Draco, who, likewise being searched by the ministry, cannot return to their Manor any more.
While only reluctantly the three of them come to terms with their new living arrangements, Snape secretly starts working on Voldemorts downfall himself - for his own dark purposes.

Image: Spinner’s End by ~iskandra on deviantART

Review

The portrayal of Snape is very much in character (you will also find elaborate character and background research on the author’s website http://www.half-bloodprince.org), exceptionally multifaceted and psychologically well thought through. Snape is not a nice person, kills for revenge, sacrifices others for his advantage - short, a classical turncoat not being on anybody’s side and with the darkest and most selfish ambitions of all. He however is not without a conscience and not without the capability to love, making it more and more difficult for him to withdraw from Narcissa’s influence.

Especially captivating also the writing with very detailed descriptions of the surroundings, amazing close up views and no less in all those dark wizarding places we always wanted to be taken and never got to.

The story is still work in progress, though with 22 chapters and over 200,000 words already considerably long. The author updates regularly and has another SS/HG story already completed. The main overtone of this story is very dark, containing graphical sex scenes, violence and (be warned!) quite disturbing main character deaths!

All in all I find this story extremely satisfying, a more than adequate continuation of book six and a formidable pastime until book seven.

Rating

9 of 10