Knee jerk reaction: I loved this one.
Yes, I admit, I was crying at a few points. And cheering at a few others. And going, ah, hah! I
thought so in others.
S
P
O
I
L
E
R
I don't want to go through everything... but I will just say that I found it interesting that Harry, with his perfect soul, manages to get out of actively killing Voldemort, who was killed by his own rebounding killing curse.
I admit that I don't like the idea of Harry actually killing anyone, but isn't this a bit of a cop out? After all, Harry's killed fragments of soul. Where is the difference between killing fragments of soul and killing the body that part of the soul is housed in?
The epilogue: I'm a bit puzzled by that, to be honest. Like others, I thought it could have been better. I, too, wanted to know about Luna, and a few others, and I wanted to know what Harry and his friends had gone on to do as adults.
But I don't suppose that really matters; leaving matters open gives scope for readers to use their imaginations to fill in the gaps (and probably gives grist to the fanfic mill!). The epilogue just about does what it sets out to do, which is show that life goes on... or went back to the wizarding idea of normal, if you prefer. There is a balance to be achieved between rounding off a story quickly, so that the epilogue doesn't detract from the story's climax, and giving us the detail we want. That I think I would have liked a little more detail in this instance, or would have liked to see the epilogue set earlier than the nineteen years later that we got, seems churlish, given what goes before.
What puzzles me most about the epilogue, though, is that I thought I'd seen an interview on TV a few years ago wherein JKR revealed that there last chapter had been written, and that the last word was 'scar'. Well, the last word wasn't 'scar', so am I misremembering? Or has the epilogue been 'tweaked' at some point. And, if the epilogue was tweaked, why wasn't it tweaked to bring it up to the standard of the rest of the writing?
Also, one quick thing about Snape. Yes, he comes out of this as a hero. (I am delighted with the way that was ultimately handled.) But would Harry and Ginny really have called one of their kids after him? Really? I just can't see that, somehow.
I daresay this post isn't as desperately articulate or well reasoned as I would like. I think I'll have to give it a few more days for the details of the book to sink in to know what I really, really feel about it.
As for the series being over? Oddly, I don't feel terribly upset. I feel a little flat, I suppose, now that a few hours have past since I put the book down, but I don't feel the huge sense of emptiness or of loss I sometimes feel at the end of a really good tale.
Rather, on finishing The Deathly Hallows, my feeling was one of complete contentment and satisfaction. The book lived up to my hopes, and the entire saga came to a more than adequate conclusion.
And, really, can any reader ask for more than that?
Chris
Edited in light of Helga's post, below. My apologies to anyone who caught this post by accident. (Do you know, I don't think I even realised that there was an option for clicking on 'today's active topics'.)
