My review (jumbled thoughts really more than a proper review)

[pennylin]

Hi all --

Ergh.  Am still trying to digest everything and absolutely must, must, must
do a re-read immediately.  But, is anyone else absolutely & utterly
*DRAINED?*  I feel as though I lived through those events with Harry.  It
was the most intense experience with a book I've ever had.  Weird.  I do
*not* remember this reaction to GoF, and I can't quite decide if it's
because OoP was that much more intense or if it can be attributed more to my
intense fandom involvement for the 3 intervening years.  Anyone else feeling
just utterly wiped out and weird?  I just can't seem to shake it off.  In
fact, I'd almost say I feel *depressed* today.  I suppose that might be a
normal (or semi-normal!  Please?) reaction to let-down.  Sort of a
"Ah.......3 years of anticipation and .......er........*now* what?"  It does
make me incredibly nervous about what my reaction to Book 7 might be.  I
might need therapy.  <g>

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I think it was worth the wait, and I think this book absolutely explodes our
insights into canon on many levels.  I hate to say that it is my favorite of
the lot, because it was decidedly lacking in any light moments or humor at
all (IMHO).  It was a tense and dark book throughout, but yet, it may well
be my favorite because the characters are becoming so much more richly
complex (as if that were possible!).  I'm hearing that a number of people
found it to be dark and hopeless and bleak, and while I think it *was* all
those things on some level, I'm still quite taken with it.

Just a few jumbled opinions as they occur to me:

1.  SIRIUS -- Well, I can't say that I was utterly shocked beyond measure,
because JKR certainly laid the groundwork for that one throughout this book
(and let's face it, he was a primary contender for this death all along
since Rowling herself loved him so much).  But, I was *shocked* that she
didn't reverse course; I thought it was going to be another one of her
classic shifts of course and that it would be Neville or Ginny or even Luna.
Like Mike, I was absolutely sick with worry about Hermione at that one point
(she did a good job of making us think that she *might* kill off Hermione,
there for just a short while).  Sirius was my #3 favorite character, so I do
find this devastating.  But, not shocking.  I need to re-read that whole
sequence again though, as there are some things I don't fully understand yet
I don't think.  Need to re-read it and try not to blotch the page with my
tears.

2.  SHIPPING -- Ah, Jenny, you want my views?  :--)  Sure!  I'm delighted.
Delighted.  Absolutely, positively delighted.  Whatever Rowling said to
Couric (and there seems to be some confusion over the exact transcript
within the fandom at this point), there was *no* R/H in this book.  Not
really.  GoF was a much better book for the R/H shippers.  I didn't get
explicit FITD (damn), but I see some very, very good signs for H/H in this
book.  Yes, despite the fact that Hermione's *seems* so helpful toward a
Harry/Cho romance.  <g>  As Pippin so sagely predicted earlier, JKR didn't
really give us any resolution on any ship.  No death knells for any of them,
except I think Harry/Cho is pretty well dead (though I won't go so far as to
declare it completely irreversible).  There are some things on the shipping
front that I'm just absolutely delighted with, definitely.  Details later
when I'm coherent.

3.  HARRY -- I loved the complexities that we get out of Harry in this book.
I do agree with Cassie's LJ review that the lasting image I'll take away
from this book is Harry's bloody hands from Umbridge's detentions.  It made
me love him so much more though.  :::schnoogles Harry:::::::

4.  HERMIONE -- She really gets a chance to shine in this book, and I think
her characterization, together with McGonagall proving herself time and time
again, ought to make some critics ease up on the gender issues.  I do want
to re-read the book with an eye to whether Hermione was *too* perfect or not
(I've seen that one charged already).  It didn't strike me that way on first
read-through.

5.  RON -- I liked him much better.  He won't maybe ever be one of my
favorite characters I don't think, but I liked him again.  I definitely
liked him again.  I'm glad he got a chance to shine, and I'm glad that we
can see that it seems to be a real confidence issue with him.  I think
getting made prefect did alot for Ron (and it did alot for Harry too to see
how he would react to that sort of situation), and I'm glad he finally got
his act together on the Quidditch field.  I hated seeing him taunted like
that.  [I do still think that there are utterly fundamental problems with
any R/H ship though, because I think Rowling went out of her way to
emphasize that the R/H "bickering" is really arguing, not witty banter, and
that it's *unpleasant*]

6.  GINNY -- Okay, I must completely recant my previous stance on Ginny.  I
like her.  I'm no H/G shipper, but she has matured and she is more fully
fleshed out.  However, like Cassie, I found it grating that Rowling slipped
us facts about Ginny through other characters, as if she realized that she'd
done an absolutely lousy job of laying any groundwork for Ginny to be more
involved in the plot (which she had).  I also had a strange sensation of
Ginny trending a bit too close to the Super!Ginny of fandom that I could
never fully appreciate.  But, I do have to note that Ginny's "bigger role"
was really not all that big, on balance.  She wasn't integral to the plot,
and she wasn't nearly as well-developed as so many other characters.  But,
she's come a long way.  A *long* way.

7.  UMBRIDGE -- Oh, I detested her beyond all measure!  I was *glad* to see
that she wasn't *really* a good guy in the end.

8.  PERCY -- A big disappointment for this P.I.N.E. fan.  I'm convinced that
he must be under the Imperius Curse or some such, because I cannot believe I
was *that* horribly wrong about him.

9.  SNAPE -- I agree with Amanda -- despite the teasers, we didn't seem to
learn all *that* much more about him in this one.  I don't, however, agree
that Harry necessarily owed Snape an apology.  He might owe it eventually,
but Harry's still sorting out a number of complex feelings about his parents
and their friends.  I'm not surprised that he didn't take that step yet.
Not being an obsessed Snape fan, I'll leave it at that.

10.  DUMBLEDORE'S ARMY -- I absolutely loved this.  This was just fantastic.
I loved that we learned so much more about some ot the other peripheral
students.

11.  LUNA -- Still not sure what I think about her.  It was *weird* to have
her introduced like that at this juncture.  I couldn't quite get my arms
around what I thought of her.  I might be a Ron/Luna shipper soon though.
:--D

Okay, that's enough from me for now.  I'll have more coherent thoughts when
I re-read it and/or get out of this weird funky state I'm in.  And, I'm off
to watch that interview now.

Penny