HBP Chapter discusiion Ch 12 : Silver and OPals

[career advisor]

No: HPFGUIDX 149699

> > lyraofjordan:
> 7) Most of JKR's characters, even those with walk-on parts, 
> have a complete name (Mark Evans, Piers Polkiss, and dozens of 
> students who have been sorted in the last few years and happily 
> taken their place in the Charms Society, Gobstones Club, or       
> whatever they do that keeps them from crossing paths with Harry    
> ever again).  
> But Katie Bell's friend Leanne gets six pages of center stage, yet 
> no last name. Did this bother anyone? Was JKR simply signaling    
> that Leanne wasn't really worth bothering with?

>Betsy Hp:
>I didn't even notice this!  I don't think it means anything 
>important.  Leanne has served her purpose and I'm sure we won't see 
>her again.  (Maybe in a few crowd scenes.)

Leanne isn't even a real character. The truth is she was originally
probably Alicia Spinnet. We know from various interviews, JKR's 
website too also I believe, also that Half-Blood Prince was an 
original working title for Chamber of Secrets. We know that the opal 
necklace that Draco eventually buys was mentioned in COS. I'm taking 
an educated guess here, that this part of Chapter 12 is lifted nearly 
intact from her original drafts. Of course she couldn't use Alicia 
Spinnet, Katie's friend, because Alicia had graduated so she just 
inserted a made up name.  

A rare case of lazy writing by JKR in my opinion. She could have used 
another character here that she made up in HBP, how about Victoria 
Frobisher or Demelza. Of course can't be Angelina because it doesn't 
fit with her established character. Angelina would not cry.

One flaw of JKR which is actually endearing is that when she writes 
herself into a corner she often gets out of it by creating a 
character (i.e Barty Crouch Jr is the worst example.) Of course is 
leaves her with 300+ named characters, and a fan base that demands 
resolution for most of them. Easiest way out, kill about 250 of them 
or otherwise make their stories disappear by way of a time reversal
or something like that.  
 
Or she might do something with Leanne now that she has made such a 
dramatic entrance. Perhaps she is one of the good Slytherins (I think
another is Tonks). She probably can't be of Gryffindor house because 
the trio don't know her. I think that if she were in Gryffindor they 
would probrably know the first name of one of Katie's best friends 
(or at least Harry would). I could see Katie with a Slytherin friend. 

D.A Jones