Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

28Jul2005 [books]

Just finished reading Potter... Much earlier than I expected actually, but I found the book cheap so grabbed it; easy way to kill a few hours... All very typical Rowling really, at times a bit too long without anything actually happening (although at least shorter than Order of the Phoenix), a few ideas ripped off-of other fantasy, and all told with just enough tongue-in-cheek to keep going. And in typical Rowling fashion, there was no guessing who the Half-Blood Prince was, among other mysteries, as she doesn't reveal very many clues - she explains things with reference to earlier pointers, but the latter were not clues, merely careful continuity (better than nothing!)...

Some comments on plot points:

• The crying-wolf over Snape as bad-guy-no-good-guy ever since Philosopher's Stone has always been annoying
• Gandalf the Grey anyone?

And finally, an awesome quote from Dumbledore: "Let us not deprive Molly any longer of the chance to deplore how thin you are" (p80 in my hard-cover British version)