Christiana
Most Mary Sues aren’t as hyperbolic as Lieutenant Mary Sue or Ebony. In “The Greeneyed Orphan,” author HermioneGranger4343, recounts the tale of Christiana Dalton, an illegitimate child of Lily Evans and Severus Snape and Harry Potter’s half-sister. In the story, Christiana Dalton, after being raised by non-wizards in France, finds out about her biological father’s death. She decides to travel to London to find her half-brother and, in the process, gets a job at Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes, a joke shop run by George and Charlie Weasley (after the death of George’s twin brother Fred). Through working at the shop, Christiana falls in love with Charlie and the two begin a romance.
The premise of this fanfiction suggests the trope’s presence. Christiana is related to two of the most important characters in the series, she is an original character that serves as the main protagonist of the story, she falls in love with a character that shares her affection immediately, and the “rules” of the series are bent so that Christiana can exist. According to the story, after Lily got pregnant in her sixth year, she only agreed to have the child if her memory was wiped. Thus, Dumbledore wiped the entire school’s memory of Lily’s pregnancy and Christiana was sent to France so Voldemort would not learn of her identity. This, even for fanfiction, is a stretch, and a reviewer called the author out for it. “Are you serious? seriously? I am feeling sorry for you, but more importantly, for myself - for reading this mary sue rubbish,” said an anonymous reviewer of the story (anonymous, 2009).
“What can I say about Mary-Sues? I love them. Many of you have the long-held belief that Mary- Sues are bad, the sign of an inexperienced writer or a pre-teen bookworm who spends too much time daydreaming about living in the worlds of the books she reads. Well... you're mostly right. Many people write Mary-Sues for their first story. It's a good way to get a feel of descriptions (even if it's just her appearance and what clothes she's wearing) but it's not so good if you have a fragile ego...With my C2 I hope to raise awareness of just how big a demographic the Mary-Sue writer is, and to push for it to be accepted as a fiction style of its own without the flames and loathing that these stories are usually given. So subscribe to my C2, by all means. Read the stories. Giggle at their clichès and overuse of the nickname "Mione". But after the laughter has died down, spare a thought for the young, naive writer who is creating these works, using a tried and true method: the Mary-Sue.” (Sharap’n)
The user gets at an important point. Many Mary Sue authors are just starting out, sometimes the stories are outlandish or even laughable, but not all of them and, even if they are, readers don’t all necessarily dislike this. Sometimes it’s nice to see an original character get a happy (if not improbable) ending. A key difference between Ebony and Christiana, for example, is that Christiana is not so perfect that she isn’t relatable, especially to a younger audience. “She had never been kissed – had never even had so much as a love interest – due to her status as an outcast for so long… she felt like she had friends for the first time in her life,” writes the author. And though it may be unrealistic for a young woman to be taken in by strangers and given a job on her first day in London (HermioneGranger4343), Christiana finding a community and a sense of belonging is not merely a wish-fulfillment on the side of the author, but a yearning that is likely echoed by many readers.
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