Though notable for its convoluted narrative and constant digressions, the story largely centers on a non-canonical female vampire character named "Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way" and her relationships with the characters of the Harry Potter series, particularly her romantic relationship with Draco Malfoy, culminating in her travelling back in time to defeat the main antagonist of the series, Lord Voldemort.
[1][2][3] Since the work's publication, it has gained infamy for its constant grammar and spelling errors, plot inconsistencies and complete disregard for the original Harry Potter source material.
The story has been speculated to be a hoax designed to fool and troll readers or to satirize fan fiction, but others consider the work and the alleged online presence of the author too elaborate to fake effectively.
The protagonist of the story is Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven[note 1] Way, a seventeen-year-old vampire who attends Hogwarts (located in England instead of the original books' Scotland) as a student in the Slytherin House.
Many of the main characters of Harry Potter are given "goffik" [sic] makeovers which are so extensive that they bear little similarity to their original characterization.
Harry, for example, has transfigured his lightning bolt scar into a pentagram, moved to the Slytherin House, and now goes by the name "Vampire" because he "love[s] the taste of human blood".
Similarly, Hermione Granger has changed her name to "B'loody Mary Smith" and lives as a goth vampire Satanist in Slytherin as well.
Ebony becomes so angry at this perceived betrayal, despite identifying as bisexual herself and professing a sexual attraction to 'sensitive bi guyz', that she runs crying into the Forbidden Forest, where she is approached by Lord Voldemort.
During this time, "Lucian Malfoy" and "Serious Blak" are inexplicably shot by a gun-toting "black guy" (likely meant to be Blade given the vampire themes).
After gazing into a black crystal ball, she is told she must travel back in "tim" (using a pensieve) to stop Tom Riddle from becoming Voldemort by seducing him, and to retrieve a cure for Sinister/Trevolry's addiction.
This leads to a confrontation between the forces of good and evil in the Great Hall, in which professor Snape threatens to rape Draco if Ebony does not stab Vampire.
Author's notes in the story identified a friend nicknamed Raven, operating under username "bloodytearz666", as the work's editor and beta reader.
[1] The true identity of My Immortal's author has become subject to wide speculation, and since the publication of the final chapter, various individuals have claimed to have written the work in jest or as a hoax.
[1][4] At the same time, the "exceedingly complicated" details of the work, including a series of related online accounts outside of FanFiction.net and the effort of writing a work of such length, led to a "consensus" among users of Encyclopedia Dramatica — a website dedicated to cataloging "internet culture" — that it would be too difficult to fake and that Gilesbie was writing sincerely, a sentiment apparently shared by other online communities who mocked the author.
[1] Writing for Vulture, Abraham Riesman wrote that "[t]he mystery of the authorship of 'My Immortal' — even in this privacy-averse age — appears unsolvable.
"[1] A series of videos were uploaded to a YouTube account named "xXblo0dyxkissxX" in 2008 and 2009 in which two teenagers calling themselves Tara and Raven made fun of goth subculture.
[8] Rose Christo, an author of young adult novels, began writing a memoir about her alleged experiences as a Native American child separated from her brother in the New York foster care system.
In early August 2017, Christo posted an update to a previously unknown FictionPress account, seemingly related to Tara Gilesbie, that similarly received little attention.
[11] Later in August, an independently published novel titled Handbook for Mortals came to public attention after it was discovered that its sales were artificially inflated to push it to the top of the young adult New York Times Best Seller list, from which it was subsequently removed.
[3][21] The quality of the writing and the author's apparent goth lifestyle also drew attacks and mockery from users on Encyclopedia Dramatica, TV Tropes, LiveJournal, Something Awful, YTMND and YouTube.
[4][6] Evanescence singer Amy Lee, one of the writers of the eponymous song "My Immortal", was initially introduced to it through her sister, but avoided reading it until an interview request with The Verge.
[23] Michael J. Nelson and Conor Lastowka read the story on their podcast 372 Pages We'll Never Get Back in episodes 78–80, criticizing its bad writing and messy plot.
[25] The infamy of the work is considered a "constant millstone around the necks of fanfiction enthusiasts who struggle to bring legitimacy to the genre".