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

Re: Here via the snitch

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

Thank you for your thoughts! The contradictions you mention, especially for the Slytherins, shouldn't go unremarked. I remember prior to coming to internet fandom, after reading GoF, thinking, "I suspect she's setting us up for Harry finding a Slytherin in his alliance--perhaps as a romantic interest?--and him wrestling with with that, after all he's come to mistrust in Slytherins." Silly me, thinking the moral/not moral stuff was going to head in that direction. Sigh.

Re: here from the snitch

[author-by-night.livejournal.com]

Yeah, well - I do still have hope. I mean, the MoM was questionable from book two, yet it wasn't until book four that it might be a tad morally off was shown, and even then, everyone assumed it was mainly Fudge until OoTP.

And the other thing is - I know a lot of non-fandomers who can perfectly accept that Slytherin is the "bad house". You werern't one of them, but I also get the feeling you really analyze books. I mean, I always thought it was off, but shrugged it off.

Then again, I always thought the "new DADA teacher every year" thing was just a quirk as well, so as I said, we may be surprised yet.

Re: here from the snitch

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

I read an interview with JKR where she said something that surprised me but made sense: I think she does perceive that the Slytherins are the "bad guys." We readers try to romanticize Slytherin house, make it what we want to think she means of it--that its members are sly and ambitious but not bad--but she seems to see them as characters who are NOT nice or good, but whom you don't want to exclude because they will definitely work against you if you exclude them. If you keep them with you at least you have a better chance of making something good of them. Or at least can keep an eye on them. This is disheartening but it fits her storyline and shows deeper thought on her part than we may have credited, even though we may not like its direction.