Think about Neville

[mooseming]

--- In the_old_crowd at yahoogroups.com, "Eustace_Scrubb" <dk59us at y...> 
wrote:
> 
> >  > Eustace_Scrubb:
> >  > Ah, now this is very much to the point.  The "why" of the DEs 
> >  > visit to Frank and Alice seems very likely to be Neville.> 
Yeah, that's a good thought, too.  I'll take that and add it to my
> notion that Frank and Alice may _not_ have been in hiding, but that
> Neville _was_.  So perhaps Bella's group tortured Frank and Alice 
not
> merely to discover where Voldemort had gone to, but where Neville 
was
> being kept.
> 

Except on JKR's official site in the latest rumours section there is 
this: 

10/12/04 

The Lestranges were sent after Neville to kill him.

'No, they weren't, they were very definitely sent after Neville's 
parents. I can't say too much about this because it touches too 
closely on the prophecy and how many people knew about it but the 
Lestranges were not in on the secret.'

So not after Neville, which begs the question why bother with them 
at all? Why would JKR make the attack happen after Voldy is repelled 
by Harry. Why debunk *this* harmless rumour at all? Oh its all too 
fishy with the Longbottoms.

I've just reread PS and CoS and it seems to me that JKR is working 
very hard at making us remember Neville without drawing attention to 
him. Why have a second boy fingered by the prophecy, why write it in 
there only to brush it aside so quickly and flippantly? No Jo, I 
smell a rat?

Regards
Jo