Good Writing (was Why now?)

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 110728

> Kneasy wrote:
> > Remember -  these books were not conceived with a 
fan-base in the  hundreds of millions in mind and it's totally 
impossible for  all  of us  to get the ending we want. <

It's also impossible for all of us to get the level of detail we
want, which is why I think JKR is communicating more publicly 
with the fans. I think she's facing the end of the series and 
realizing that there are a whole lot of things her fans would be 
delighted to know, but just can't be crammed into the books 
without boring the average reader to tears,  I mean, who, 
outside the fandom, gives a hoot about Ron's middle name? 


I do agree that she's  also managing our expectations, but is she 
managing them so that we'll see what's coming, or so that we 
won't? On the evidence of Phoenix, I'd say the latter. For all the 
weighing and bagging of evidence that went on here at HPFGU, 
for all that we were told OOP would be a dark book and that 
someone close to Harry would die, it was still a shock. And that 
was very much the effect that JKR intended.

 She *still*does not want first time readers of OOP to know that 
Sirius is doomed, although, if you reread the books from PoA on 
knowing that, there's so much foreshadowing that he might as 
well have a neon sign that says "goner" over his head. But she 
was very careful to make sure it could all be interpreted as 
misdirection--we were so glad those death omens weren't for 
Harry that it never occurred to most of us that they could be for 
::sob:: Sirius himself.

So when she says "keep your eye on Petunia" or "keep your eye 
on Snape" that is like the wave of the magician's wand. Very 
likely we will learn something interesting about those characters, 
but it won't be what we think it is.

Laurasia: 
> 
> This, I think, is why Sirius's death was deemed 'sloppy writing' 
by  some fans. Because, as yet, we can see dozens of possible 
ways out  of Sirius's death, and, as yet, not many ways it could 
possibly actually benefit the story.<


Herself has said that we will understand why Sirius had to die, 
and I believe her. For now it is a mystery on several levels, 
especially if you accept the premise that we don't really know 
who killed him. But, IMO, Harry's decision to go to the DoM was 
only peripheral--we are going to understand in the end, I believe, 
that the central and critical cause of Sirius's death was his 
refusal to free Kreacher. That is what makes it tragedy and not 
melodrama.

But in a series about choices, it is utterly necessary that we be 
convinced that  heroes, even *the*  hero, can make bad 
ones--otherwise there is no jeopardy. 

Pippin