Half-Blood Prince

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 183865

Carol earlier: 
> > > Stll, though, I find it annoying to have to search for
explanations as to how a character could have known something. It's
like Ron knowing that Draco had a Hand of Glory (which, canonically,
he didn't because Lucius refused to by it for him)
> >  <snip>
> >
> > Pippin:
> > <snip> But where a logical explanation can be devised even if not
intuited, why not leave it to the reader? 
> > 
> > Some of us enjoy that kind of thing, and rather than taking us out
of the story, it leads us deeper in.
> 
> Mike:
> Right, Pippin, like me. :D And I don't find the Hand of Glory 
incident that hard to track. 
> 
> Harry started to tell Ron and Hermione about the Malfoys after he
got out of Knockturn Alley, but was interrupted by Mr. Weasley. But
then they all separated and HRH go wandering around Diagon Alley
together for an hour. You find it hard to imagine Ron piping up with,
"What were you going to say about the Malfoys?" Then Harry relates the
story about the Hand of Glory and they all get a good laugh over the
way Lucius indirectly upbraids Draco for lack of ambition.

Carol:
Except that JKR frequently uses the tactic of interruption, in which a
character, usually Harry, starts to convey important information but
doesn't because he's interrupted, distracted, or has second thoughts.
It happens in PoA when he's talking to Lupin and thinks of telling him
about the "Grim" and decides not to and in HBP when he's planning to
tell Dumbledore about Draco's whoop and is distracted by Trelawney's
unintentional revelation about Snape as the eavesdropper. I'm sure
there are plenty of other instances, which you can spot yourself if
you look for them. (The secret room under the Malfoys' drawing room is
another important bit of information that never gets revealed.)

Mike: 
> I know I had to make that up, but there is a lot of stuff that goes
on off page that you have to take for granted. As for Draco actually 
acquiring the Hand, we saw that on page. Draco bought something in
B&Bs in "Draco's Detour" that he took with him under his robes. We 
just didn't know what it was at that time. Turns out it was the Hand.

Carol responds:

Draco doesn't leave the store concealing anything under his robes. He
merely asks how he would look "carrying that [the Vanishing Cabinet]
down the street," warns Borgin not to sell it, and emerges from the
shop "looking very pleased with himself" (HBP Am. ed. 126). Harry
later says that Draco has bought something, but he's mistaken. Draco
has bought nothing in this scene.

Yet Ron talks about "that Hand of glory thing Malfoy has" (quoting
from memory here) as if they have all seen it and know that it's in
Draco's possession. (Draco didn't have it in the CoS scene in the
Slytherin common room, either.)

It's yet another case of JKR not remembering what she has written
previously. (She says herself that she hasn't reread any of her books
since they were published.) It's a shame that the consistency editors
haven't caught her on these details. I wonder what they *did* catch?
(One of them noticed that Moaning Myrtle's U-bend had become an S-bend
but let it go because both were found in British plumbing!)

Carol earlier: 
> > > or trying to account for Sirius Black's letter being at 12 GP.
> 
> Mike:
> Well, Sirius had is own place after Hogwarts, courtesy of his Uncle
Whatshisname. After he was sent to prison, what would you suppose
happened to his stuff in his place? Do you suppose the Ministry would
let his flat be turned over to the Muggles without someone going
through there to take all the magical or magically related stuff out
of there? And the letter and moving photograph would certainly  qualify. 
> 
> I doubt that the Ministry would simply destroy all of Sirius's
possessions, so what would they do with them? Send them to his next of
kin seems the logical choice, to me. What part of this seems 
illogical or inconsistent? Like I said, not everything can make the
page, some stuff has to be assumed.
>
Carol:
That's possible, but it's a lot of trouble to go to in order to figure
out how the letter could have ended up at 12 GP. It wouldn't have been
sent there and he himself would not have saved a letter written to him
when he was twenty-two at the home he hadn't entered since he was
sixteen. And the Ministry certainly didn't return his possessions
after he escaped from Azkaban; he was a wanted fugitive. It's
*possible* that they thoughtfully sent all his personal possessions
(though the Minisrty, with the exception of Bob Ogden, doesn't come
across as thoughtful, particularly in Barty Crouch's days), to his
parents, but would the parents who resented their rebel son have kept
his possessions (a personal letter, a photograph of the Potters, of
all people, and even his confiscated wand) in anticipation of the
"little swine's" return? It defies belief.

As for leaving it to the reader to find a logical explanation, clearly
some readers (at least two <wink>), enjoy that sort of thing. I don't.
It's one thing to present a mystery, complete with red herrings, which
the reader can attempt to solve along with the characters (and there
are many such mysteries in the series). That's a perfectly legitimate
tactic and, for me and for many readers, one of the enjoyable aspects
of the series. I admire her for blending genres. And the books aren't
just mystery stories. They blend genres, making them worth rereading
even after they mystery is solved. So far, so good. Figuring out what
makes characters tick is also another matter. She hasn't told us
*everything* about Snape or Dumbledore, and even what she's told us is
subject to interpretation. Great. That's the way it should be.

But a letter that appears where it shouldn't be or a Hand of Glory
that the characters somehow "know" that Draco has obtained when they
don't know any such thing (Ron acts as if he's seen it, which he
canonically hasn't) is, IMO, mere carelessness on the part of the
writer. It's the opposite of a Chekhov's gun that doesn't go off.
These guns go off without having been hung on the wall. (The secret
room under the Malfoys' drawing room is an example of a Chekhov's gun
that *does* go off--five books later. Nice planning there, JKR!) Oh,
and there are those skulls that Harry describes as being in the
Slytherin common room. Funny. They weren't described when he and Ron
entered that room in CoS, yet the Snatchers (whom we're apparently
supposed to think of as Slytherins) act as if he's described the room
correctly (which it would be foolish *not* to do under the circumstances).

You and Pippin evidently enjoy figuring out how such details could be
made consistent with the rest of the story. Other readers, no doubt,
skip right over them without noticing the consistencies (or noticing
them but not caring). To me, such inconsistencies are annoying and
distracting.

Carol, who thinks that it's the author's (and editor's) job, not the
reader's, to get the fictional facts straight