Lifting Each Other Up…One Book At A Time

 When I think about “womanhood” and the “women support women” movement, yesterday is what comes to mind.


SenLinYu is the author of one of the most printed — and yes, illegally sold — fanfics of all time. She wrote it in a fandom that isn’t even canon to the HP universe, but has become one of the most debated, loved, and hated Harry Potter ships out there: Dramione.


For those who don’t know, Dramione is an entire community built around one moment in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — the moment Draco Malfoy could have followed through with villainous behavior, but didn’t. The moment we realized that while he may have hated the Golden Trio, he didn’t want them dead. It was the first glimpse that Draco wasn’t just a “bad guy.” He was a child thrown into impossible situations by the choices of his family.


J.K. Rowling herself has condemned the idea of Draco and Hermione together, saying Draco was always meant to be bad. But my take has always been: if you didn’t want him to have a redemption arc, you shouldn’t have given him a conscience at the last minute.


And maybe that’s part of why so many of us love Dramione — because Rowling hates it. It’s our collective way of saying, “Fine. Watch us do it anyway.”


And out of that community came one of the most beautiful, heartbreaking fanfics I’ve ever read: Manacled.


Manacled is a three-part epic — a dark, stunning combination of The Handmaid’s Tale and Harry Potter. And when SenLinYu announced late last year that she was pulling it from AO3 because she’d gotten a publishing deal and was rewriting it as her own original story? I was ecstatic.


She built her own world. Her own characters. And yesterday, that book — Alchemised — was released.


I pre-ordered my copy from my local bookstore back in February (because we support local bookstores here!) and yesterday I finally got to pick it up. And I’ve never been so happy to see Penguin’s name on the back of a book in my life. For those who don’t know, Penguin is one of the Big Five publishers every author dreams of signing with.


This — THIS — is how we lift each other up.


Imagine how different the world would be if we supported everyone this way.


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