Where Do You Go After Hogwarts?

There is a lot of writing of fanfic going on in fandom. Nor is writing fanfic all that solitary a pursuit. Often, it is a community effort.

No, I am not referring to those oddities wherein a group of authors pitch in to create a book with each of them writing one chapter. I am referring to fic exchanges, and fan fests. There are a lot of these as well. Frequently tied to seasons, or holidays, wherein all of the members volunteer to write (or draw) something to order according to a “prompt” which they are assigned, to be submitted by a deadline.

Once the submissions have all been made, the moderators organize the posting schedule, and the “gifts” are posted one or two a day for the duration. All gifts are first posted anonymously, and when all have been released, after a few days there is a “reveal” where all the authors and artists’ identities are made public.

From 2006 to 2012, one of the most widely known of these was the SS/HG Gift Exchange. This particular fic was one of the gems from the 2010 exchange. Its original prompt went:

“Have Snape and Hermione ‘book travel’ — they end up in another well-known book and have to deal with the characters in there. Maybe they end up messing up the story line? How do they get back home? Think along the lines of ‘Lost in Austen’ — they are having to deal with another book’s realities.”

Very well:

Ten years after the war, Severus Snape is declared legally dead despite the lack of body, and Hermione Granger is given the responsibility of dealing with his estate due to being the only member of the Order of the Phoenix willing to do so. But at Spinner’s End, she finds a book on a child’s bloodstained bed: a copy of ‘Peter Pan and Wendy.’ When she somehow falls into the story, can she and Captain Snape find a way back out?