Alice
AliceStarr.jpg
Portrayed By Sophie Vavasseur
House Hufflepuff
Year Third
Position Student, Hogwarts
Sex Female
Race Half-Blood
Age 13
Place of Birth London, England
Date of Birth March 15th, 1981
First Appearance Scarface is...A Third Year?
Last Appearance

Character History:

Alice Victoria Starr is the youngest daughter of Beatrice and Tobias Starr and a fourth year Hufflepuff at Hogwarts. Tobias Starr is the heir, owner, and operator to Starr's Spectacles, Inc. a small business specializing in crafting magical (and sometimes non-magical) lenses and mirrors for the Wizarding community; everything from glasses to the lenses and mirrors used in magical cameras and telescopes are produced at Starr's. The two met when Beatrice, then working for a magical dentist office, went to Starr's to acquire some dental mirrors. It was love at first sight and soon Beatrice and Tobias were married.

Initially, Beatrice continued her dental ministrations, but with the birth of their first child in 1976, Agatha, she elected to quit and turn to care and schooling full-time. Tobias, of course, continued to manage the family business and, while the family isn't especially wealthy, the business has prospered.

A cunning, ambitious, and bright child, Agatha excelled in multiple topics before going to Hogwarts and being Sorted into Slytherin, becoming fairly well known for her achievements. Overall, the family weathered the Dark times quite well, slipping below the radar of the Death Eaters and the agents of light despite Agatha's over achievement.

Alice was born on the Ides of March, 1980 and from an early age displayed a knack and desire for cooking, though she didn't seem to have the raw talent of her sister in anything else. There was some worry amongst the Starrs that Alice might be a Squib, as no one noticed any acts of incidental magic around the child. Fortunately, this proved not to be true when a letter invitation from Hogwarts arrived on her birthday. All the family sighed a breath of relief; while the Starr's cannot to be said to be precisely of the Pure Blood movement (an embarrassing number of fairly recent generations have Muggles or Squibs in the family tree), they definitely can be said to be Pure Blood fellow travelers, agreeing in principle with the ideals of blood purity even if they can't claim it themselves.

Unfortunately for Alice, school did not prove to be as an effortless endeavor as it has seemed to her older sister. In most areas of magical study, Alice is merely average, able to eke out barely passing marks through patience, perseverance, and stubborn hard work. Still, its fairly clear that Alice has no great ability in magic… except in two specific instances.

The first revolves around her love of cooking. When directly engaged in cooking, even spells that give the young Hufflepuff no end of trouble in an academic setting seem to come quite easily to her. The curious nature of this bizarre quirk may be psychosomatic in nature; she's not cursed, as her parents took her to a specialist as soon as they became aware of her eased abilities while in a culinary atmosphere to have her checked for hexes. Its simply a case that she can only showcase her magical ability when engaging in the act of cooking.

The second instance is in the realm of potions, and this may be related to the first. After all, what is potion making if not a more complicated form of cooking? Alice has also combined the two passions by creating a number of magical confections, some of which she occasionally sells for some extra spending money. Her most popular are what she terms as Flavemotions. They are similar to the popular Many Flavor Beans but, instead of providing flavors, they have been combined with Emotional Amplifiers. The end result is that, when chewed, the user gets a rush of some emotion – joy, love, peace, etc – for a few seconds. Recently, she has begun to research more complicated recipes in an attempt to produce more complex emotional states (such as nostalgia) though she has yet to be successful in synthesizing these. It should be noted that Alice is still only a fourth year and, while she displays great talent for potions, more than half of her attempts at her candies result in “sour” batches; those which have no effect, unintended effect, or unusual (and sometimes embarrassing) secondary effects. Its a bit of a crap shoot whether the Flavemotion will do what it says on the tin.

When it came time for Alice to chose electives, she considered Muggle Studies. She knows so little about the Muggle world and is curious about it, in much the same way as one might be curious about a far-off country. Unfortunately, she knew that her parents and sister would not approve of her taking that course, and so in deference to her family Alice elected to take Arithmancy instead. Still, she's very curious about Muggle culture and will sometimes go out of her way to surreptitiously learn. For her second elective, Alice decided on Care of Magical Creatures in the hopes of discovering some tasty or useful new ingredients for her culinary practices.

Alice lives her life constantly in her older sister's shadow even though the other has since graduated Hogwarts. Alice knows that her family is mildly disappointed in her and have basically pinned all their ambitions on Agatha. Surprisingly, Alice doesn't doesn't mind this in the least, cheerfully accepting her lot in life out of (some would say misguided) loyalty to her family. Alice harbors no ill will to her sister or the rest of her family. Personality wise, she tends to be cheerful with an impish and slightly sardonic sense of humor, though tempered with a twitchy nervousness. Alice tends to blend into the background due to a shy streak; she's distinctly uncomfortable with being the center of attention or initiating conversation.

Secretly, (again, mostly for her family's sake), Alice doesn't like Quidditch at all. The sport makes her nauseous due to a phobia of heights… even watching it makes her light-headed and dizzy. She has to sneak away from games and create elaborate schemes to get out of going to matches without being discovered. When absolutely forced to endure a match, Alice relies on her stubborn willpower to make it through. Thusfar, she's managed to succeed in avoiding any fainting spells. Her bizarre aversion to Quidditch is, again, in stark contrast to her sister who is not only an avid fan, but also a player (though she never did distinguish herself in that endeavor during her school days).

Personality

Alice is a relentlessly (some would say oppressively) cheerful, somewhat scatterbrained young girl who flits about from subject to subject with little segue between. She's generally optimistic, always looking for the best in any situation and always ready with a bit of encouragement or a kind word. It takes a lot to upset her for any length of time, though she is easily flustered for short periods.

Timeline

Other Information

Memorable Quotes:

Trivia and Notes:

*Some might know the Starr family as the owners of Starr's Spectacles, purveyors of fine lenses and mirrors for the wizarding world. Everything from glasses to telescopes to full-length mirrors are made by the company.

*Those in Hogwarts might know Alice by her Flavemotions, a type of candy she created that is similar to Many Flavoured Beans that she sells for extra pocket money. Rather than providing a taste, these provide a two-second burst of emotion (love, joy, sadness, anger, etc). Of course, considering Alice is quite the young witch, sometimes the batches end up being "sour" and can have amusing side-effects. Only the very brave or reckless try her untested new concoctions.

*Faculty and some older students might know or know of Alice's older sister Agatha of House Slytherin. While now graduated, Agatha is everything Alice is not and had managed some minor fame around the school for her achievements (both academic and extra-curricular).

Logs & Events

Date Log Characters
02 Double Take
Lupin comes to Hogwarts to speak with Dumbledore and Alice sees him on the way to have a short chat.

Alice and Lupin
14 An Impromptu History Lesson
Alice gives the Muggleborn Jacen a short history lesson on Harry and You-Know-Who.

Alice and Jacen
15 Dirty Job
Herbology class for first through third years involving repotting of mandrakes!

Sprout, Alice, Melissa, Ginny, Rene, Jacen
22 Greenhouse Girl Talk
Ginny visits Alice in the greenhouse and the pair have a vivacious girl talk.

Alice and Ginny
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