Some years ago, I had an idea for a Harry Potter fan fiction. I don’t recall when it first came to me, nor do I recall even first writing it, it has taken me a long time to complete. It’s called “The Lucky Muggle”.
This blog details some of the ideas I wanted to put in to the story and the reasons behind them.
You are welcome to read it – I would be pleased if you did. There are spoilers in this blog so you may want to read it first. You can find it here:
https://jmbwilcoxson.wordpress.com/the-lucky-muggle/
The initial idea for this fan fiction came when I was listening to J. K. Rowling recount a journey she had from Manchester. She arrived at London hours later with the concept for Harry Potter fully formed in her head. I thought that could become an interesting plot point – what if she had been given the idea?
I started by researching some of Miss Rowling’s life – how would she have to be at the start of the story? Where did she work then? Did she have children then? I knew most people would not know these stories, but I decided I was writing this for the “superfans”, so included as much as I could.
I also looked in to some of the background stories she had written for the books, much of which hadn’t made it to publication. In particular I looked for interesting stories connected with the places that would be visited in the story, such as “Queerditch March” near Manchester, the place where Quidditch was invented. This was partly for me own amusement, but also I believed the “superfans” may enjoy these details.
Perhaps I took the research a little too far, but I even researched the train route from Glasgow to London. I added the places into the books in the order they would meet them in the train route. The number of people who would have noticed this is probably close to zero – so I guess it was just for my own unique weirdness!
To get the story started I needed to find a way for Wizards to be on a Muggle train, so I invented the idea of Hermione and Ron “practising” to be Muggles so as not to use magic in front of Hermione’s parents. I think this worked OK, and it also gave me an opportunity to briefly explore how Ron would react with meeting Hermione’s parents.
The lost of Ron’s brother became a good reason for Ron to want to tell the Muggles about the magical hidden world. This type of thing has been close to my own heart, having lost someone very close to me too. I like to think they still exist, if only in my memories.
Having written a story about the conception for the Harry Potter books, I realised I could put lots of inside jokes about the writing of the book – Hermione not having two large teeth, or why Ron always seemed to be “guessing his way through school” are just a few examples. In fact, I tried to put a fair amount of “thing that would amuse” throughout the story, I wanted it to have a lighter side. I particularly liked the line “Thank you for your chicken”. Hopefully someone else found it funny too.
I tried to invent as little as possible so the story could sit alongside the real Harry Potter books. The only real invention came from the transferring of memories which is never mentioned in the book. But I feel it would not be too far away from what is suggestioned. I also added in returning Hinkypunks back to the marsh – I thought that was an interesting comment about how we are all thinking more about the environment, and also because I thought it was a really interesting idea (connected with the how Fred and George created a marsh at Hogwarts in the fifth book!)
One thing that isn’t obvious from this story is the difference in causes in dates. This all gets a bit meta… Originally, the Harry Potter books are set at the then end of the 90s. But this short story is set in 1990 (when JK states she had the original idea). So that means the “true” date setting for the books is the 80’s! It’s also interesting to note that the Ron and Hermione in this story are not the same Ron and Hermione in the books… they’re just based on them…!!
It has been a labour of love. I wrote if for myself, for the fans of Harry Potter, and for J. K. Rowling as a thank you for the magic.
Thanks for reading this. I hope you had fun reading that.
Love JMBW
J. M. B. Wilcoxson 
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