Books 31 Jul 2007 01:17 pm

ACCIO A BETTER BOOK!

Forgive me, friends who have had this rant emailed to them and also seen it on my Facebook notes. I am ranting all over the place.

SPOILERS

I just finsihed Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and . . . HATED IT. It was a train wreck! It had no surprises! It relied on weak theories, weak ideals, and weakly explained magic. It pushed so many characters into the background that i actually got sick of Harry, Ron, and Hermione. And Dumbledore this, Dumbledore that. Where was Sirius? Why was Lupin barely involved? Snape didn’t show up until the last 1/4 of the looooong book. The entire Malfoy family faded into the wallpaper! What the hell!?

Oh man am I not happy. Order of the Phoenix remains my favorite book, but now if I go back and read it, I won’t have that anticipation of answers to come, because I know how lame the ending is.

Was anyone else totally underwhelmed? Did anyone else have a problem with the poorly explained re-tread of “Harry and Voldemeort 2 gether 4 ever.” For that matter, Voldemort’s death was a huge anticlimax.

The whole book was an anti-climax. The more I think about it, the more I don’t like it. I am going to tell my grandfather not to bother to buy me the UK edition when he goes to England.

It’s the end of an era for me, and not in the way I expected.

4 Responses to “ACCIO A BETTER BOOK!”

  1. on 31 Jul 2007 at 5:08 pm 1.Julianna said …

    Sirius died in Book 5! But I do agree that Lupin’s characterization wasn’t fleshed out well; I thought his mini nervous breakdown after the birth of his son was going to be some sort of turning point, but it sort of just went away. Still, I was pleased with the way she wove all of the elements of the previous novels together and managed to please (almost) everyone! And I enjoyed the parllels in the wizarding world to the rise of the Third Reich, even if it wasn’t exactly subtle. I just wish the Hallows themselves had been introduced in a previous book. And I’m glad that Dumbledore finally gained some flaws.

  2. on 31 Jul 2007 at 5:30 pm 2.meglet said …

    I know Sirius died in book 5 but there was the mystery of him having fallen “behind the veil.” He was such an important character and I expected some sort of closure for him. And the Lupin mini-drama was so brief and contained that it didn’t pack much of a punc. Danny says evryone he’s talked to thinks the book was great. I don’t. Wish I did.

  3. on 04 Aug 2007 at 8:06 pm 3.Bruce Baker said …

    I listened to half of the book and got bored. I have not truly read the others but know a lot about the characters from reading commentaries of others all the time. I thought this was mostly one big chase scene and reminded me of the latter “Left Behind” books where the bad guy gets in control and his henchmen chase the good guys around the world. Lucky breaks keep happening to the good guys and the bad guys are just stupid.

  4. on 07 Aug 2007 at 7:06 am 4.Petie said …

    Just finished reading it last night… had to wait to read your blog until then. My first reaction was glee because I did want a happy ending. Who doesn’t? However, the book does kind of leave a bad aftertaste. I agree on all your points… It’s like she was scared to have Snape in the book too much because she might give more away (which I had already decided he was still a good guy - I just had a feeling about that.)

    There were way too many lucky breaks and not enough believable tricks. I didn’t follow the elder wand logic at the end or how Neville got the gryffindor sword back from the goblin. I did like the explanation of the doe and that I was right all along about Snape. Of course, I’m very excited that Harry lived, but it does seem unrealistic that Harry, Hermione and Ron all made it.