Reading by JK Rowling at Radio City - Spoilers Within

[Ken Hutchinson]

No: HPFGUIDX 156393

Anne Marie wrote:
>
> 
> She said that she has the last chapter to book 7 already written 
> (which I believe she has said before) and that the series is ending 
> not because she's tired of writing Harry, but because she's afraid of 
> running out of story. How can one run out of stories in a mythical 
> world? I certainly have no idea!
> 

Ken:

Thanks for the report on this event, I enjoyed reading it.

I've heard the science fiction author Larry Niven express much the
same thing in a slightly different way. He had written a related
series of novels and short stories that his fans collectively dubbed
the Known Space Series. At one point he stopped writing in that
"universe" and turned his attention elsewhere. When asked why his
response was that over the course of adding exciting new ideas and
technologies from story to story he had reached the point where it was
impossible to devise a conflict to base a new story around that didn't
have a trivial resolution based on a technolgy that he had already
introduced into the series (think time-turners, grrrr). One solution
is to return to writing in an earlier era in the same universe (or to
have a gang of teenagers wreck all the time-turners). He hit on a
different solution, at least for a few novels. He moved one of his
characters to an isolated backwater of the galaxy where much of the
offending technology did not exist and then stranded him there!

We can hope that at some point the fatigue JKR must feel with the HP
stories will abate and she will invent a way to return us there.


Anne Marie:

She also said that she was surprised at how much left there was to
explain. She said she'd hadn't really realized that she had left that
much unexplained, and she did give a chuckle over shippers, etc.,


Ken:

She has this notion that readers like to be tricked. Well, true I
suppose, but only to a point. And readers *don't* like to be tricked
about *everything*. She has left far too many plot lines unresolved
and no clear clues to how most of them will resolve in her desire to
satisfy our supposed love of being tricked. She painted herself into
this corner. I'm surprised she didn't see it coming.

As for shippers: I've read a comment from her somewhere that she can't
believe folks are still shipping Harry/Hermione after HBP. Well excuse
me but do high school romances always become life long relationships?
Do we readers know if either Ron or Ginny survives to the end of book
7? OF COURSE it is still *possible* that Harry and Hermione pair off
at the end of book 7. For all we know they will be the only two human
beings left alive on planet Earth!! We can see where things are
heading right now and I think the pairings she has set up are very
sweet. We readers won't KNOW until the end of book 7 who ends up with
who and the ships will continue to sail until we have it in our hands.
Rowling seems quite perceptive about human nature, you'd think she
would understand *that*....

Ken