Dawn's Reading Blog

Having finished the last Harry Potter book, I decided to make good on an old vow and read the whole series back to back. It only took about two weeks–which is saying something about how addictive they are–and I was sorry to be finished. I think I became more attached to the series as it went on.

Certainly the series became more adult, and also darker. I was surprised on re-reading the first one to remember how humorous and harmless it was. Rowling has said that her books grew up with her readers. The theme gets progressively more serious as the stakes are raised. In the first book you can hardly believe anyone will ever die; by the last book they’re dropping like flies. Harry grows up while remaining true to his character. His development as a reluctant hero is well planned and executed. The only thing that doesn’t advance much is romance. Seventeen year olds are a little more sexually active than the occasional “snog” but she does move them along the timeline from ick to interest.

I was most interested in seeing how the plot hung together. I’ve heard that Rowling plotted the entire series right from the beginning but that was hard to believe. I was sure I’d spot a lot of holes, but I didn’t. If anything, I discovered more complex ways in which the series of events were linked.

For example, at the end of the last book, Neville kills the snake using the sword of Gryffindor. On my first read, I barely registered that fact. I liked that she’d used Neville but didn’t worry about how he’d come to have the sword. As I started re-reading, enjoying how the Neville character had been developed, I realized that Griphook had the sword by the end of the book. Aha! I thought, a major mistake on her part. It wasn’t until I got back to that spot in the last book again that I realized Neville pulls the sword from the sorting hat (which Voldemort has mockingly caused to be placed on his head), just like Harry pulled it from the hat in the first book. Dumbledore told Harry that only a true Gryffindor could have pulled the sword from the hat. So Neville, whose place in Gryffindor was intially questioned, bravely confronts Voldemort; Voldemort, who doesn’t understand the nobler emotions, gives him the hat; and voila! the sword is there, the snake gets killed by a magical weapon, and it’s not deus ex machina, it’s inevitabile. And hugely satisfying.

So either Rowling intended all along for Neville to kill the final horcrux with Gryffindor’s sword after pulling it from the sorting hat, or she kept really good track of clues and loose ends and pulled them all together at the end in a blazing act of inspiration. Either way, my (sorting) hat’s off to her.

I was never a Harry Potter maniac but I’ve read and enjoyed the whole series. One of them got me through my first week of quitting smoking (and I heartily endorse them for that purpose).

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was a fitting finale for the series. She really tied the ends together and gave plenty of opportunities for joyful tears. I particularly liked Neville Longbottom’s contribution to the ultimate showdown. My only complaint is that I’d have appreciated a longer “wrap-up” because I was sorry to see the characters go and wanted to relish their happiness a little longer. I’d also have liked more Harry/Ginny interaction because what little there was was so nicely done, but perhaps that’s the secret to a good romance.

Getting down to the dregs here. All I remembered about So Long and Thanks For All the Fish was that it was too much Arthur Dent. I understand he’s nominally the main character, but he’s never been the good character. He was a straight-man to the others’ riotous insanity. So you take away the riotous insanity and you’ve got the sound of birds chirping as no one makes a joke leaving no one anything to react to. Arthur Dent is no comedian and Arthur Dent is no hero.

I re-read it once Steve was done with it (he said it was OK for the first two thirds, which is generous of him) and discovered nothing to change my memory. I found myself skimming frequently.

Four down and one to go. About Mostly Harmless I remember nothing except the quip on the cover: “The fifth in the increasingly inaccurately named Hitchhiker’s Trilogy.” Sadly, I suspect that’s the funniest line in the book.

Steve continues reading the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series and I continue following along behind him re-reading them. Life, the Universe & Everything was his favorite so far but it’s never been one of my favorites. It’s got a bit too much plot and the humor is recycled.

Steve finished the second book in the Hitchhiker trilogy, Restaurant at the End of the Universe, so I had to read it too. He found this one silly but I think it was always one of my favorites. The Total Perspective Vortex, for instance, and the cow that wants to be eaten are pure genius. And one of my favorite quotes is “I get weirder things than you free with my breakfast cereal.”

Then there’s the whole bit about the man who rules the universe. “Who can possibly rule if no one who wants to do it can be allowed to?” Steve tells me that was originally Socrates or Plato or someone but all I know is I heard it from Douglas Adams first.

Who didn’t read The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy in high school? I can remember, after being turned on to the first one, how eagerly I awaited new installments. A big bag of sour apple-flavored Jelly Belly’s and a book so funny that if my stomach didn’t hurt from too much candy, it hurt from laughing so hard. That was my “happy place.”

But apparently my boyfriend missed the memo. He was browsing my books the other day, looking for something “not depressing,” and picked up this one. I warned him it wasn’t his sense of humor, but I was wrong. We were able to share a few favorite quotes. When he returned it to me, I couldn’t help reading it again. I’ve probably read this book more often than any other in the world and it can still make me laugh out loud. Now if I could just remember not to panic.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was a good one. I didn’t like the last one so much but I raced through this one, trying to limit myself to a hundred pages a day but failing in a final scramble to the end. The ending was disappointing. I guess it’s getting hard for Rowling to find a satisfying place to stop, but this one ended on a particularly strong down note. Well, I’m sure she can count on a big audience for the last one. When it comes out I’m going to go back and read all of them one after another to see how well they hang together as a continuous story. I read them so far apart that I sort of lose track of the story from one to the next.