Hullo, boys and girls, ladies and germs (haha! Kidding). Myself Diya Nagpal! Your captain of this journey! Ahoy mates!

So, this is my first fanfiction and I am 14 years old. I just really wanted to write something of my own and thought that why not start from our favourite character of the Harry Potter series! Hermione Jean Granger that is! So here I am, a noob, writing a fic on Hermione's first year in Hogwarts. Please just give it a try guys! I promise it will be worth it!

Yours,

DiyaHunterOfArtemis

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters. It's JKR who does.

Chapter 1: A normal day? Maybe not.

The streets of Hampstead Garden Suburb were bustling with people in office attires and children playing on the footpaths. Shopkeepers were attending to the first customers and vehicles were zooming by. It was a typical warm July morning but the same couldn't be said for the Granger Household.

The day started pretty normal. Charlie Granger, the head of the Granger family and husband of Jean Granger, was fixing his tie in front of the bathroom mirror. He was a decent looking man with sandy brown hair, chocolate brown eyes and adorned a clean shaven look. He was not a bulky man, on the contrary, he was rather tall and lanky. He worked as a dentist in the nearby clinic.

His wife, Jean Granger whom he first met during his trainee days as a dentist, was nothing short of beautiful. She had untameable bushy hair and pale blue eyes. She supported a natural tan and had a petite figure. On that day, she was busy in the kitchen preparing pancakes for her beloved husband and the apple of her eye, her daughter, Hermione Granger.

Hermione was an eleven year old girl with quick wit, deft recall and encyclopaedic knowledge. She had frizzy untameable brown hair which she was graced by her mother, warm brown eyes which held the same warmth as her father's and had naturally dark skin.

At that particular time of the day, she was completely absorbed in one of her favourite novels, Great Expectations by Charles Dickens.

"Hermione deary, come down! Breakfast's ready!". Hermione looked up from her book upon her mother's voice and her warm eyes scanned her room. It was nothing like an eleven year old's. Her room consisted of loads of books. From childhood storybooks like Cindrella to young adult novels such as Pride and Prejudice, she had read them all.

"On my way, mum!" she yelled. She hopped from her king-sized bed, placed her novel neatly on a shelf and made her way downstairs from the first floor where her room was.

"Good morning dad! Good morning mum!" she greeted her parents as she made herself comfortable on a chair near the kitchen. Her mother replied with a smile and a raise of eyebrows on her daughter's chirpy mood.

"Morning, love. Someone's cheerful today, huh?" said Mr. Granger while taking a sip from his tea and looking at his daughter with unconditional love in his eyes. Hermione's face brightened as she replied to her father, "Well, it's just that I have got an arithmetic test today and I am confident that I will get decent marks."

"Now now, Hermione," exclaimed Mrs. Granger with a proud gleam in her eyes, "Don't be modest, we are sure that you are going to receive nothing less than the top grades!" Hermione just blushed in reply and beamed at her mother.

After a short comfortable silence, her mother served the pancakes and received copious amount of compliments from both, her daughter and her husband. "Oh hush" blushed Mrs. Granger.

Some ten minutes later, Mr. Granger rose from his chair and announced while making his way towards the door, "Well, I am off to the clinic now or I will get late knowing the traffic of London." He hugged his wife and pecked his daughter on the cheek and was about to open the door when they heard a loud tap coming through the window near the kitchen slab. The three Grangers made their way towards the window and found a large tawny owl, with a thick letter clutched carefully in his beak, hitting the window pane with his toes and unbeknownst to the Grangers, this was the moment that turned their lives upside down.