HBP thoughts three months later.

[amanuensis1]

What will my reaction be to Half-Blood Prince after the last book?

I still feel like the series peaked at OotP for me. Every volume has felt better than the last except for this last one--I'm still wigged that anyone, Rowling included, believes that Snape's motives are ambiguous, justifying leaving Harry in suspense at the conclusion of this book. I found Harry and Dumbledore's pensieve jaunts puzzlingly expository, and was waiting--am still waiting--to find out what was going on during those. Tom Riddle's history could have been related in two pages; what the heck happened in those pensieve jaunts that made them so crucial? I want there to have been more motivation on Dumbledore's part than exposition, or the idea that Harry had to see those moments for himself to gain understanding of Voldemort and of himself. It's not enough.

I loved the main plot of the book, the main plot being the Half-Blood Prince. Did I know who it was? Hell, no. The concept that "Prince" was a last name never crossed my mind--even when Hermione brought it up I couldn't see how that fit in. I didn't get it until I saw the chapter title "Flight of the Prince."

But I still believed that Slughorn gave him that book deliberately. Bah.

Will the last book draw it all back together for me? Will those unanswered questions finally fall into place? Or will I be happier admitting that HBP was the weak moment in the series for me and let it be?

Comments

Man, I won't say that HBP blew chunks...

[jazzypom.livejournal.com]

because it didn't - not in the sense of a tight plot, or a cheery turn of phrase. After the bloat that was OoTP, Ms. Rowling enrolled her muse on a pilates course and a string of slow release foods - and how! It's just at times... I felt a bit rushed by the book, if you know what I mean? This after reading it four times for various metas I still felt as if I were being pushed through the pages, because the author seemed impatient to have done with it. On the plus side, all the spaces in that book seemed to be filled in, whereas in OoTP there were certain gaps that only fanfic could fill, you know?

But I've found that my appetite for fanfic decreased after HBP, because all actions by all personalities were accounted for (and also, I can't be getting all involved in the characters to just have my heart broken as they are reduced to a plot point)).

I'll be reading the seventh book out of intellectual curiousity, not necessarily because I'm dying to see what will happen, in the sense that I've invested all this time in a series, and I need to get some closure.

Re: Man, I won't say that HBP blew chunks...

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

It's interesting that HBP has made me want to see less fanfic that is "what could happen" and more of the kind that is focused on "what won't happen but damn, this would be fun, wouldn't it?" Before HBP I would have said that I liked both kinds, but now I'm more firmly in the latter category.