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Loading... Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7) (edition 2007)by J. K. Rowling, Mary GrandPré (Illustrator)
Work InformationHarry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J. K. Rowling
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. Here we are, at the end of a truly great storyline. I have said it several times before, but I'll repeat it one last time for good measure: despite the fact that I don't like J.K. Rowling anymore because of her shitty behavior on Twitter, I will always love Harry Potter. I've literally just finished re-reading this story for the 4th time, and I already want to go through it all again. It is just that well-written. Anyway, what do I think of the final entry? It's great, obviously. I will say it's probably my third favorite book in the series, behind Order of the Phoenix and Goblet of Fire, which are probably tied at the top for me. Firstly, I will talk about the few problems I have with it. One, the epilogue, while done fantastically in the movie, is not as stellar in the book. It's okay, but I feel it could have been a bit more... satisfying, you know? The way they did it in the movie left tears streaming down my face; here, I thought it was okay. My main problem with this book, however, is the pacing. It feels like certain sections of the book move a little too quickly, and certain other sections move a bit too quickly. The fact that, by the last 400 pages of this nearly 4,000-page story, only 2/8 of the fragments of Voldemort's soul had been destroyed is a bit odd. Things have moved a little too slowly by this point. Only 2 of the remaining 6 fragments of Voldemort's soul were within reach of the protagonists, and they had no way of destroying them. Then, things start moving very quickly, and the remains of Voldemort's soul (Horcruxes and his own body) are very quickly destroyed. I don't know. It almost felt like there should have been another book because there was so much left to be done. Besides that, though, this is an exceedingly satisfying conclusion to the saga. So many things are finally revealed and resolved. As I mentioned in my Letterboxd review of Deathly Hallows Part 2, the reveal of Snape's loyalty is probably my favorite aspect of this entire story. It is even more detailed and satisfying in this book, where Harry reveals the truth to a stunned Voldemort as hundreds of on-lookers watch. Severus Snape will forever remain one of the most well-written characters in all of fiction. He is truly incredible. While I do slightly prefer Alan Rickman's adaptation to the book version because of how much less nasty he is in the movies, I am still a massive fan of this character in the books. He's probably my second favorite character behind Sirius Black. A lot of people dislike the first half of this book because of how "boring" it is, but I must disagree. While the first 150 or so pages aren't that interesting because they form the obligatory section before the main story (at Privet Drive and the Burrow), everything that comes afterwards is immensely entertaining. Even the camping parts of this book I found interesting. There was so much work that had to be done by the main characters that I couldn't help but remain hooked, avidly anticipating their next course of action and wondering how they are going to overcome the obstacles that faced them. The part of this book that absolutely blew me away, however, was the chapter "The Forest Again". It is an absolute master stroke of writing. Harry Potter, with the devastating knowledge that he is the final Horcrux and must walk into Death's arms, proceeds slowly through the Forbidden Forest with both fear and bravery. He has gone through more than any other witch or wizard in the history of his world, and he willingly carries out what he perceives to be his final sacrifice. The way Rowling depicts his fear at leaving his world is breathtaking. It honestly overwhelmed me. Bravo. At the end of the day, Harry Potter has proven to me, time and time again, that it deserves to be held up there with the all-time-greats of fictional writing. It is one of the most brilliantly crafted stories of all time, and I won't stop coming back to it til the day I die. 7 Mar 2015: It's been five years since I last read this?! WOW. I have forgotten a lot of the details. After I have now re-read the entire book series, I am still amazed by how different the last book is from the first. The final two books are in my opinion definitely the most powerful, fleshed-out books. Though, of course, the deus ex machinae are riduculously over-present. Everything just *happens* to happen at the most opportune moment?! Must be magic. 27 Nov 2010: Read for the third time to freshen up my memory - there seem to be a lot of deus ex machinae, but Rowling has a way of making them seem like the most logical thing in the world. Good conclusion to the series, which explains pretty much everything.
The shallowness of Rowling’s enterprise is revealed in the vapid little epilogue that seems inspired less by great fiction than B-list Hollywood scripts. Where the cataclysmic showdown in The Lord of the Rings leaves the Hobbits and Middle-earth irrevocably altered even in victory, the wizarding world merely returns to business as usual, restoring its most famous citizens to a life of middle-class comfort. At the end of this overly long saga, the reader leaves with the impression that what Harry was fighting for all along was his right–and now that of his children–to play Quidditch, cast cool spells and shop for the right wand. Or what George Bush would call “our way of life.” All great writers are wizards. Considering the mass Harrysteria of the last few days, who would have been surprised if they had logged on to YouTube at 12.01 a.m. Saturday and seen J.K. Rowling pronounce a curse -- "Mutatio libri!" -- that would magically change the final pages of her book and foil the overeager reviewers and Web spoilsports who revealed its surprise ending? Potter fans, relax—this review packs no spoilers. Instead, we’re taking advantage of our public platform to praise Rowling for the excellence of her plotting. We can’t think of anyone else who has sustained such an intricate, endlessly inventive plot over seven thick volumes and so constantly surprised us with twists, well-laid traps and Purloined Letter–style tricks. Hallows continues the tradition, both with sly feats of legerdemain and with several altogether new, unexpected elements. Perhaps some of the surprises in Hallows don’t have quite the punch as those of earlier books, but that may be because of the thoroughness and consistency with which Rowling has created her magical universe, and because we’ve so raptly absorbed its rules. Everyone knows that the Harry Potter books have been getting darker. With an introductory epigraph from Aeschylus's The Libation Bearers ("Oh, the torment bred in the race/the grinding scream of death") there is no doubt that the seventh and last volume in the sequence will face us with darkness visible. We all know what's going to happen in this book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, supposedly the final episode in the Harry Potter series. This is the long-awaited final showdown between Harry Potter and his arch-enemy, the Dark Lord, You-Know-Who, Voldemort. Belongs to SeriesHarry Potter (7) Is contained inHas the adaptationIs replied to inInspiredHas as a reference guide/companionThe Deathly Hallows Lectures: The Hogwarts Professor Explains the Final Harry Potter Adventure by John Granger Repotting Harry Potter: A Professor's Book-by-Book Guide for the Serious Re-Reader by James W. Thomas Has as a studyHas as a student's study guideAwardsDistinctionsNotable Lists
References to this work on external resources. Wikipedia in English (12)Burdened with the dark, dangerous, and seemingly impossible task of locating and destroying Voldemort's remaining Horcruxes, Harry, feeling alone and uncertain about his future, struggles to find the inner strength he needs to follow the path set out before him. No library descriptions found.
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)823.914Literature English English fiction Modern Period 1901-1999 1945-1999LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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My issues here were pretty similar to the issues I had with the last few books in the series, and this feeling like maybe the editor could have been a little more hands on.
While I liked plenty of what the backstory portions of this book had to offer about Dumbledore’s sister, about Snape, etc., the insertion of this stuff often feels clunky rather than woven in as smoothly as maybe it could be, and I also don’t love that frequently those backstories along with other information reveals arrive via vehicles that feel sort of like narrative cheats, like certain aspects of character and world building were invented for the sole purpose of making it easier for the plot to go wherever the author needs it to and I just feel like stories tend to have more depth, originality, and surprises, if the author is forced to really think their way out of a corner instead of taking what amounts to a sort of free pass out of them.
Too much of this series has hinged on the main character being kept in the dark, it’s pretty much the equivalent of a romance novel drenched in miscommunication where a simple conversation would have resolved a large portion of the conflict, just as questions asked and answered would have resolved a large portion of Harry’s situation (though of course not all), and it just seems like for a seven volume series that should not be the case because it ends up feeling like things are being dragged out rather than driven forward.
This didn’t feel like there was enough story to justify the length, among other things, there was too much of characters planning rather than doing, too many recaps of events the reader was privy to and didn’t need repeated, and way too many instances where something took several paragraphs if not pages when a sentence or two would have sufficed. I get that epic length matches the “event” type of build up there was for this final book in the series, but the pacing seriously suffered for it, two hundred or more pages could have been cut from this book and nothing actually necessary to the characters or the story would have been lost.
Or instead of cutting those pages, fill them with the likes of Neville who experienced probably the greatest character growth of the series yet we didn’t see nearly enough of it unfold, especially in this book, or Luna, who was in a heap of trouble here that the reader mostly missed out on seeing. I think I would have been a lot happier with the pacing and the length of this book if an editor had said, hey, nothing’s happening in this bit with Harry stewing in a tent so let’s take this opportunity to check in with the characters who are actually up to something interesting at this moment. I know Harry’s the star here, but all through this series I thought it functioned best when we saw more of the ensemble not less. ( )