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The characters certainly are badly characterised a lot of the time - it's as if Rowling doesn't quite know what to do with them when they're not advancing the plot, and so they tend to flop about a bit. Cho is just *awful*, and having Hermione explain why she was behaving like a series of programmed responses after every encounter hardly helped. Nice touch to have Ginnie stop fancying Harry, less nice touch to see that she is turning into yet another bloody wise-before-her-years woman-child.
In general, though, I enjoyed this far more than I expected, partly perhaps because it is moving onto some of the big, reasonably important things finally, although in doing so reveals further the rather embarrassing fact that Rowling is making up the entire world as she goes along. There are some really nice set pieces, and some occasional moments of definite "yay!", such as the point where Fred and George go postal, and the further moment when, after everyone has mocked Hermione for two books solid for her attitude to house-elves, Dumbledore comments that actually they are victims of institutionalised and internalised oppresion (doesn't stop him having them doing the cooking, though...). Too many characters who didn't do enough, though - Zacharias Smith (for FUCK'S SAKE), Tonks, and once again Snape and Malfoy are criminally wasted, Malfoy in particular - and did the writer forget that she ended the *last* book with Malfoy getting humiliated by curses on the train home? Is this going to happen every time?
Going into "Ounce of Sense" territory, I might hope that next time around, since Malfoy's father has been discredited and thrown into Azkaban (a rather short-sighted policy given that it is now completely empty of guards), and his family name utterly besmirched, and that he is a member of a house which represents only 25% of the student body, the rest of whom all think Harry is wonderful again, Potter could feel a little less fucking put-upon. I'm just sayin'. There's a lot of really interesting stuff about Malfoy - how he might feel about his father, how Snape might be affecting his upbringing, what role he will have now he no longer represents the wizarding élite but a disgraced house. In fact Slytherin, as it is represented only by a series of thugs and pugs, is being annoyngly underexplored.
I do rather wish that Dumbledore hadn't exonerated Gryffindor Princess Potter of all wrongdoing *again*, also; if he had not been such a shitty student, topping it off by rifling through the memories of another human being, and one who had on more than one occasion saved his life, and is risking his life to help protect him, then Sirius Black would not have died. Simple as that, really.
And, as has been mentioned, the prophesy was weak, weak, weak.
Good fun, though. I do still wish she was a more rounded and able writer, but her capacity to create readable and involving plots with sketchy but largely engaging characters, if nothing more, deserves props.
And, like Southey, she has inspired great work through her example.
The classroom door banged open with a crash, and Harry Potter half-fell into the room. He was staring-eyed, and his robes were smeared with what looked like luminous yellow paint. He glared at Flitwick. "SO WHAT IF I'M LATE?" he bellowed. "WHAT RIGHT HAVE ANY OF YOU TO JUDGE ME?"
"Potter's in a strop again," muttered Draco wearily.
"Well, he's got a lot to be upset about," said Neville indignantly.
"Oh, shut up, Longbottom," said Draco.
Unfortunately he had spoken so loudly that he had attracted Harry's attention. Harry stared at him in fury. "WHY THE HELL IS MALFOY ORANGE?" he demanded of no one in particular. He glared around at his silent classmates. "FINE, DON'T TELL ME. NOBODY EVER TELLS ME ANYTHING."
"Mister Malfoy," Flitwick squeaked. "Ten points from Slytherin for upsetting Harry and coming to class orange. Now sit down."
I want to write a story in which, during their sixth form, Draco and Goyle start dating, but, realising that he cannot possibly introduce him to his insane and thoroughly bigoted mother for fear of losing what remains of the family assets, Malfoy concocts a plan to trick her into giving her blessing by using polyjuice potion to disguise his lover as patsy Parkinson.
This story shall feature the line "Goyle, I want to take you to a gay bar".
And the line "Goyle, you'll be a woman soon."
That is all. |
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