Finally finished HP and the HBP. Some people have said that this is her best book yet, but for me, it didn’t measure up to Azkaban or Phoenix. In fact, reading this directly after a re-read of Order of the Phoenix, I found HPB a bit jarring. “Phoenix” was jarring the first time I read it, too, because there was such a distinct change of voice. The whole aura created by Rowling’s word choices was darker, more adult. At the time, I praised it as a meta-reflection of the growing maturity of the point of view character, Harry.
In HBP, Rowling returns to her more whimsical writing style, and I’m not sure how to react to that. Maybe it’s an indication that Harry himself is regressing a bit, becoming a bit more flippant about his circumstances now that he’s not the scapegoat of Wizarding society anymore, but its “great hope.” But he hardly seems blasé. He spends a lot of the book stomping around quite self-importantly, trying to solve the great mystery behind Malfoy’s behavior. Dipping a bit into irresponsibility with the Potions book. And as ever, having the crazed hate-on for Snape.
Speaking of Snape, I have mixed feelings about his apparent “Death Eater” status. Taken at face value, it makes a once gray, morally ambiguous character with intriguing contradictions quite black-and-white. Which is disappointing. But…and maybe I’m too used to the Jossverse here, did anyone close the book wondering if they shouldn’t take Snape’s apparent “evil side” status at face value? Sure, he’s a “double agent”–but who is he double-crossing? The fact that Malfoy is confident Snape is on the Death Eater’s side, and Harry never gives him the benefit of the doubt for a second makes you think maybe Rowling will do the whole subversion thing and have it turn out that Snape is double-agenting for the benefit of the Order of the Phoenix.
Which takes us to the moment Snape kills Dumbledore. Dumbledore begs right before that, but it’s unclear what he’s begging for. His life? I doubt it. He’s just not the type, especially under circumstances in which he’s weak and dying already. So that got me thinking that perhaps Dumbledore needed a particular kind of death, one that would put him in some after-life position to continue his work somehow. Like, we know Wizards who have died can become ghosts, and that others end up “beyond the veil” in the Ministry of Magic. So Snape killed Dumbledore in order to place some sort of magical-whatchama-charm on Dumbledore’s death. Anyhow, I doubt we’ve seen the last of Dumbledore.
On the other hand, if Snape were evil, it would show that Dumbledore had an actual flaw, a blind spot. But jeez, at the expense of a character as complex as Snape? I hope not.
I’ll have to re-read this again without the “Order of the Phoenix” lurking in the back of my brain.
Author Nancy E. Shaffer 
What I like about the HBP is how, while on the surface, for the main characters not much happens, there’s a lot going on for other characters. It’s all in the negative spaces, in the things that Harry doesn’t notice but observe. I found that fascinating because it made great character developments for aspects of the book that had been negliged before.
It lacks the appeal of the Ministry as an adversary that OotP had, but it’s making the world a bit deeper.
HBP is the book that convinced me that Snape is the true main character of the serie :p
did anyone close the book wondering if they shouldn’t take Snape’s apparent “evil side” status at face value?
I only know of one person who actually did think Snape was evil and nothin’ but, everyone else including me is going with Snape as following D’s plan all along.
So do you think he’s working for Voldemort, or the OotP??
Glad to hear that. I’d be very disappointed if Snape has suddenly been revealed to be a “Death Eater all along” (which would make a great deal of his behavior in earlier books make little sense at all). Snape is interesting precisely because he wants to do the right thing (prevent Voldemort’s rise to power), but at the same time, he has such bitter personal animosity towards quite a few members of the OotP, and Harry, the one who will probably ultimately do Voldemort in. Plus he has personal and professional loyalties to members of Slytherin house, the house that seems to have the most Death Eaters in it. And an interest in Dark Magic himself, because it is a way to regain the personal power he lost against the jerks that made his adolescence so painful.
I *like* my Snape complex.
OotP, as in duh. I could believe he was playing the middle against both sides prior to HBP, but with this book he burns all his bridge and sacrifice everything to whatever the fuck is Dumbledore’s plan. Poor Snape, he’s so going to die in book 7.
I just made a post with reccing essays and reviews of HBP which talk about those theories and others (such as RAB = Regulus Black) if you’re interested ^^
I’m a bit leery of wandering too far into HP fandom. I belong to a couple of the more “academic” HP communities, but so much of the fandom seems obsessed with the romantic relationships, which is funny, because they’re so non-existent in the HP books, really. Hardly any of the adult characters are actually coupled or married (esp the Hogwart’s teachers), and up until HPB, the kids saw very little action at all.
But it finally occured to me that’s *why* HP fandom is so obsessed with ‘ships. Partly to make up for the little crumbs of romance that Rowling offers, and partly because romantic relationships are such a blank slate that you can write any ‘ship that you want and not go against canon.
Well, until HPB.
Yeah, I honestly can’t see the point of Snape as a character unless she goes with the complex yet good route. Snape and Harry both have to get past their prejudices. It will be interesting if the suggestion that Hogwarts will be closed comes to pass, since really Snape’s problem is that he can’t leave his school experiences behind.
Yeah, I agree. The fact there were so little romance made it all the more fun to expend upon, especialy for the adult characters
Don’t worry the posts I linked to were all done by sane and level headed people – mostly.
I don’t know if HBP is going to stop that so much seeing how badly the romance part was written, really ^^
I think, given the general construct of series–that this is the story of Harry’s seven years at Hogwarts–that Rowling is sort of just playing. Hogwarts will be open and Harry will complete his seventh year there. It’s just, it makes *sense* that the faculty would consider closing it for safety’s sake after the events of HPB, and so they have to talk about it and be on the verge of it just for realism’s sake. But something will happen at the beginning of the seventh book that will make the school year go forward more or less normally.
Plentiful canonical ‘ships never stopped non-canon ‘shipping (nor the bad writing thereof) in Buffyverse fic!
As someone who is fairly deep in the HP fandom, it can get pretty scary at times. And there is a lot of obsession with the romantic relationships– I have said on many occassions that I would rather face a roomful of Bangel and Spuffy ‘shippers than any group of HP ‘shippers, because I would be less likely to get hurt in the crossfire.
I think the fact that the HP books are less likely to be expanded upon than the Buffyverse makes people a bit more competitive about canon. In the Buffyverse, things changed all the time just because there was so much opportunity for it over 250+ episodes, the comics, the books, etc, while HP is limited to seven books. And everyone wants to be RIGHT.
I do recommend , which is the daily HP newsletter. It tends to highlight important and insightfl essays in the fandom… Of course, I may just be saying that because they’ve covered me several times.
Oh, and JKR has said several of the Hogwarts teachers ARE married. It’s just not something that has ever come up, because it’s not really something Harry would notice.
I don’t know if HBP is going to stop that so much seeing how badly the romance part was written, really
Top topics of conversation in the HP fandom right now:
(1) Why Ginny Weasley is the devil.
(2) Why Tonks is the devil and going after a so obviously gay werewolf and is now being used as a beard.
(3) Why Fleur is the devil.
(4) Why Ron and Hermione are perfect for each other.
(5) Why Ron and Hermione are terrible for each other.
(6) How Harry’s obsession with Draco was really just his mind trying to deny how in love with Draco he is.
(7) Why Harry continually pointed out how HOT Tom Marvolo Riddle was.
(8) How the monster in Harry’s chest was really just the remanents of Tom Marvolo Riddle left over from Harry’s contact with the diary and Tom is deeply in love with Ginny…..
Okay, that last one isn’t a frequent topic of conversation. It’s just my own attempt at a ridiculous shipping theory. But the other ones are all true…
Since HBP has come out, there has been an exorbinate number of essays and rants and conversations about the different ships. Of course, I shouldn’t cast stones, seeing as I myself wrote an essay on Remus/Tonks and how I think it is a non-relationship (But that was mostly so I could convince myself that Tonks wasn’t such a sad sack and her reasons for being so mopey had more to do with being unprepared for war than it did pining for Remus… But, ah, I go on).
I think people were starving for shipping and then they were bombarded with it so they don’t really know how to react. Before book six, people had to come up with their own ‘ships because there were so few in canon. And now 80% of them were proven wrong, so they’re devestated. Romance of any kind is totally a double-edged sword. And JK really didn’t handle it well. A lot of people got cut to shreds. Oh well.
I’m giving it a few weeks. I think people will calm down soon. I mean, it didn’t take them long to get over Sirius and just figure out ways to bring him back. I’m sure soon people will just settle back into their own little corners and ship whatever relationship to their hearts content.
Oh, and JKR has said several of the Hogwarts teachers ARE married. It’s just not something that has ever come up, because it’s not really something Harry would notice.
I wondered. It’s one thing to skirt the romance issue with the students, who are pre-pubescent or just entering puberty for so many of the years of the books. It’s another to have all those old maid and bachelor teachers, not to mention so many other adults apparently having no romances, either. I suspect Rowling just doesn’t want to deal with that much in books that are ostensibly for kids. But just a random mention of McGonnegal’s husband or Random Adult Character’s girlfriend wouldn’t waste any words.
Oh, come on, there’s been as many essays about Snape, is he evil or not, RAB=Regulus Black !, Horcruxes in general (Harry is a horcrux ! No, Ginny is a horcrux ! No, the sorting hat is a horcrux ! No, Hogwarts itself is a horcrux ! No, The Maraudeur Map is a horcrux, ad nauseam), Dumbledore is still alive, etc. etc. Plot theories are not burried under the shippers’ rants (from what I saw and I read almost all the essays recced on daily snitch and hogwats today)
You know, I do rather like Tonks, and… I want her to be on the side evil, because she’d be much cooler a character like that ^^
Oh, yes, I do trust them for that. They already started in my little corner of OTP ^^
I’m trying to re-read HBP so I can form more coherant thoughts on the subject. Right now, I’m still in the “WTF?” stage. I was like that with OotP. It took me a few reads to really get it.
I think JK has really messed herself up with the Snape thing… Either Snape really IS evil, in which case bye-bye five books of interesting grey-area character build up. On the other hand, if he ISN’T evil, than I think Dumbledore was way too omnscience. Then, I’m not a huge Dumbledore fan. I think he’s manipulated way too many situations to his own advantage and even if he is entirely good and pure he tends to use people as pieces on a chessboard (and, I suppose in HBP, he realized it was just time for him to sacrifice himself for the good of the game). Either way, I’m not overly thrilled about it.
One thing that has been pointed out to me that I think is a valid point is that JK really ISN’T a character-driven author. Her characters don’t dictate the plot, but the plot dictates the characters. Which makes for some shakey characterizations and means she has to explain A LOT of what is going on with characters through interviews. Personally, as someone who always worries about characters first and plot second, it drives me a little crazy. And, I think as the books progress and the plot gets bigger the characters are suffering even more.
Meh. My thoughts are barely coherant. I really need to finish my re-read and post a thought-out review. But my mind is yelling at me to finish TNP 1×20. So HBP will have to wait.
OK, I suck at the subtext, so of course while I noticed that the Ron/Hermione thing practically had a neon blinking sign above it since Book 2, most of this other stuff is just non-existent for me. Probably because of the whole not caring factor.
Why Harry continually pointed out how HOT Tom Marvolo Riddle was.
That one I’ll grant you. Although looking at it from Rowling’s POV, she was pointing it out as the author in order to make clear how Voldemort’s looks deteriorated as he divided off parts of his soul. The only problem is, Rowling doesn’t have the freedom some writers do to interject a lot of details into her story because she’s writing from the third-person subjective point of view, rather than the omniscient or objective point of view. In other words, she can’t write about anything Harry isn’t privy to, nor anything he doesn’t notice. Which ends up having the comical sub-textual side-effect of having Harry notice how pretty Riddle is.
; )
See, I wanted Tonks to be gay. So I’m gonna go with the theory that Tonks and Lupin are *each others* beards, and that Tonks was just deteriorating because of her guilt over having a role in Sirius’ death.
; )
Ah, you can ignore me. I’m really cynical and so much of my f-list has been going crazy with shipper rants… But that MIGHT be because so many of my friends are Remus-lovers and they either hated or loved the idea of Remus/Tonks.
I know there have been a lot of other really good stuff posted, I just like being a bitch. Personally, I’m surprised there’s so much debate on RAB. I actually thought it was Regulus BEFORE I reached the initials, just because he was mentioned twice in HBP as being killed by the Death Eaters and usually JK doesn’t bring up things unless they’re important.
I’m a fan of Tonks myself and her portrayal in HBP made me sad, just because she seemed so darn pathetic. I would have been a lot happier if her patheticness was because she wasn’t ready for the war or she was upset about Sirius… But JK gave the impression it was just about Remus. Now, I love the wolfboy, but that’s just sad.
And evil makes any character cooler! Hence my obsession with evil!Ginny. I loathe good!Ginny, but evil!Ginny… Now that’s a pony I can back.
Ha! I had that theory myself! Thought I wonder WHY Remus would need a beard, since Sirius is dead (unless you live in my mind in which he’s just stuck in a closet in the Ministry of Magic).
Of course, I will have any theory as long as it means Remus and Tonks are not together. I had this whole brother-sister relationship built up in my head. Having it turned into something romantic makes my inner Remus and Tonks shudder.
My theory for Tonks to be evil involves a lot of Bellatrix/Tonks, I admit ^^
I do love my blackcest…
No, I think you have a point there. While Harry is character-driven, growing, changing, flawed, very few other characters are. Ron and Hermione stay fairly consistent across books, but mostly because they’re a bit cardboardy. They have a role to play in the “Harry support team” and stay consistent with that. The other characters also have a role they play in the plot that they stay fairly consistent to.
Snape was (is) an interesting exception to this, the question mark character, and I’d rather see his complexity be saved than Dumbledore have one tragic flaw.
Yeah, Tonks was WAY cooler in OotP. She’s just shook up because her friend Sirius died and she feels bad about it.
Maybe she and Professor Sprout are an item.
I was sitting here trying to think who I’d ship Tonks with if she were gay, and that’s the *first* person who came to mind.
*eek*
To be honest, most of the time people need to point out the subtext to me, because I really don’t care for canon ships (except for Molly/Arthur, ’cause there just cute). Sure, I ship in fandom, but that’s a completely different story. I really don’t care about people getting together in the actual text. And I know for sure I wouldn’t change my mind if by some miracle I DID ship ships that did come true… I was kind of hoping by the time hormones started raging there would be too much war with Voldemort to really have romance.
It’s the thing I found the most jarring about the ‘shipping in HBP. It was just ALL OVER THE PLACE. I realize the kids are growing up and noticing that kind of stuff now, but… MAN, there were some hormones aflyin’. And I really don’t think JK did it right. I felt really beat over the head with “THEY’RE IN LOVE!”
*nod* That is a valid point. The story (unless it’s chapter 1 of PS and GoF or chapters 1&2 of HBP) are from Harry’s POV, thus everything kind of comes from Harry. And, let’s face it, Tom M. Riddle was pretty. We knew that already. And she did want to show the deterioration. But it IS a point brought up a lot in conversations. Personally I find it amusing, but not particularly telling about Harry. But then, I do follow the Whedon idea of “bring your own subtext”, so that if you want subtext you’re going to get it.
On the subject of Tom Riddle, I’m so pissed off that he seems to have been “born bad”. That’s so lame. I wanted it to be a CHOICE, but it seems like it was in his DNA to be a bastard. *sigh*
*nods* I do think all the R/S shippers ranting where being cry babies. Dudes, it’s slash; it’s all about finding subtext and holes in the canon to subvert, that’s what makes it fun !
*nods* Yeah, noticed that about Regulus in the reading as well (then again I’m Regulus obsessed) but only made the connection when I read the little note. I’m not usually good about figuring plot though, so I’m proud of it.
Oh, I’ve seen several essays trying to deepen Tonks’ characterization too (heh, maybe one was of by you, i wouldn’t remember the name of the author ^^)
I do agree that it being all pinning after her man leaves us very flat. Then again, HP has seldom been known for its progressive feminist point of view *sighs*
evil!Ginny rates second best in my heart after evil!Tonks. I did like Ginny, and how bitchy she was, in HBP. That girl was so made to be femslashed. I hope my friend will write us some dark!Ginny !
Not just a friend! But her way cool cousin who is the only Black family member she’s ever spoken to! No doubt it devestated her!
Here’s my essay on Tonks and Remus, which is pretty much me trying to lay on a lot more psychological complexity onto Tonks than I think JK intended.
Great minds think alike !
It’s either Bella/Tonks or Tonks/Ginny in my mind. Or well, Moody/Tonks on the het side. I never saw the leasy chemistry between Remus/Tonks *sighs*
I’d really like to find some Bella/Tonks. Some sort of wicked, cruel fic called “The education of Miss Nymphadora Tonks” you know ? So far, no luck, maybe i’ll end up writing one, but I’m not the best writer…
So, yeap, it was yours. Thought there were also all those by violet_quill ^^
*shakes head* I think if Sirius DYING didn’t stop shipping, a little POTENTIAL relationship with Tonks shouldn’t stop them (and it’s not even definitely. They held hands at a funeral! It’s not like they’re married).
I love Regulus Black. Most of that probably comes from ‘s portrayal of him on our old Marauder-era RPG. He’s just such a fascinating little mention. I want to know more about him.
My essay probably was one you read. It’s been passed around the HP fandom quite extensively since I posted it. And you’re right, HP isn’t really great for the feminists. But I REALLY just wanted to slap her around a bit and tell her to grow a pair.
I dunno why good!Ginny bothers me. I guess it’s because she was such a non-entity until Harry
started to have wet dreamsnoticed she was growing up. I would have liked more build up for her to turn into this bitchy, sassy, Quidditch playing wondergirl. I much prefer the idea of her lurking in the shadows, all corrupted by her experence with the diary.*nod* Exactly. Harry changes because he IS the plot. But there’s not really a lot of growth from the other characters. They only get development as far as they need to for Harry’s journey.
JK also suffers from a glut of characters. She introduces a lot of great characters who are just FABULOUS when they’re first introduced and really serve the plot of that book, but afterwards she doesn’t really know what to do with them because their plot is “done”… Lupin, Wormtail, Moody, Tonks, Charlie and Luna all seem to suffer from this. They either disappear completely with no real explanation… Lupin in 4 (this ALWAYS pissed me off because Harry formed a bond with him and Lupin didn’t once bother to show up to the Tri-Wizard Tournament… Sorry, my inner Lupin-lover coming out), Wormtail in 5, Moody in 6. Poor Charlie has barely been mentioned in books five and six. I sometimes feel that JK only put him in to make Ginny the seventh child or the seventh son and the seventh daughter (which JK has said in an interview is important). I don’t think she really knows how to balance.
I would much prefer Snape be under deep cover than Dumbledore to be too trusting. But either way I think JK handled it wrong. Or maybe it’s just that book 6&7 are pretty much part one and part two of the same book, so I’m just frustrated by the lack of answers at the moment.
I was working on a essay that gave Dumbledore some more flaws– Mostly that he’s a manipulative bastard who uses people to his own advantage for his own idea of “the greater good”. If you haven’t already guessed, I’m not a big fan of Dumbledore.
Regulus is currently struggling against his brother for the spot of favourite character in my mind(poor Sirius is trying to argue that fanon chatacters shouldn’t count, damnit !) I don’t know why but I utterly adore him, and he’s got a very definitive personnality in my imagination.
As a Death Eater who got coldfeet he was an interestingly grey character. As a snotty arrogant Black spawn, he’s doomed to catch my interest (I have a collective crush on the Black family). As Sirius’ younger brother… well, poor Regulus. I adore Sirius but I wouldn’t wish him on anyone as a brother. Regulus had to be caught crossfired between hero worship, his own uncertainties and his parents’ expectation.
I want to know more about it, but at the same time I’m frightened about what JKR’s going to do to my perfectly fanon favourite character ^^
Hey, Ginny even admits to Harry that it’s because of Voldemort that she loves him. If that doesn’t spell Ginny/Tom/Harry to us, I don’t know what does ^^
The one Ginny essay I liked lately was this one by _elektra Ginny as someone who is angry, it makes a lot of sense and gives us much possibilities.
Would you mind if I friended you ?
Ron did seem to go to “I’m oblivious to girls” to “let me spend the entire book with Lavender’s tongue down my throat”. That was a bit jarring.
The Harry/Ginny stuff came a bit out of left field, but wasn’t a whole lot different in style to the way he noticed Cho in earlier books.
As for Voldemort being born or made, I didn’t mind the fact that he was born that way. I think it’s telling that there’s this “bad blood” among the pure-blood families that he inherited from his mom’s side. That the pure-blood families have probably interbred so much that they’ve gone a bit mental and that’s why they feel free to act out on their prejudices with sociopathy and murder. And, you know, general bad temperment.
They’re creating their own demise by giving birth to the Voldemorts of the world, and pissing off the non-humans and the Mudbloods. It’s delicious.
; )
Is it just me, or did Harry strike you as a lot less capable in this book? In OotP, he’s acing DADA and teaching kids two years older than him, he’s getting one of the highest grades in the school on his OWL, he’s got all these hard spells that he is learning… and then, in HBP, he can barely do the silent spell-casting. In OotP, he takes on several Death Eaters and hits some with spells and comes close to holding his own in the fight in the Ministry, but in HBP he can’t even get a single spell finished before Snape blocks it off.
Part of me wonders how much of the static Ron & Hermione is due to Harry’s lack of perception regarding people. I mean… he refuses to think differently about anyone, and people pretty much never occupy shades of gray in his eyes. Dumbledore is good. Dursleys are bad. Ron & Hermione are his best friends (not each other’s, but his). Malfoy is evil, as is Snape. End of story.
I mean, that is equally as much a reflection of the author as the character, unless the author did that on purpose, which seems way too in-depth for this series.
Give me a link to your fic if you do end up writing it.
Or finding it elsewhere!
I don’t get this extensive obsession with Regulus black. He’s been mentioned *maybe* three times in two books with hardly an ounce of back story.
Which means everything that fandom is so nuts about has to be fanon, not canon. Like they’ve invented their own character and stuck him into the Harryverse.
The whole Ron-Hermione-Lavender-whatever thing felt like a weird sitcom to me, frankly. As for Harry/Ginny… Well, JK has said that Ginny is the love of Harry’s life. I just wish we had more build up to it than “Wow, Ron’s sister got HOT!”.
Eh. I guess I always just had the fantasy that Tom and Harry could have been very much alike, if they hadn’t made the choices they did. But making Tom “born bad” kind of gets rid of that. But again it’s the putting complexity in. Having Tom make a choice to become Voldemort would require a lot more of a look into his psyche than a few dips into the pensieve. And that’s not the plot of the books. It’s about Harry defeating him. So it’s a lot safer for JK to say that Tom was born bad, or else she would be pressured into prequels.
You’ve just hit the crux of the HP fandom, I think. The more mysterious the character the more popular they are. Just ask Blaise Zabini.
There is a huge obsession with building up small hints from HP. And yeah, that’s basically what it is. Inventing a character with a canon name and putting them in the Potterverse. But it’s a matter of fitting them in based on the little slivers we know.
We’re a strange bunch.
He’s too distracted by how hot Ginny got!
….
I am SO kidding.
But you’re right, he did seem a lot less capable. I’m also surprised they didn’t keep up the DA. You would think in a time of war they would want to keep up their skills.
Poor Sirius! Well, I do have a fondness for Regulus, but nothing will ever knock his git of a brother out of my #2 spot (#1 has and always will belong to Remus John). I wrote a short piece on those Black boys you might be interested in, focusing on Regulus My Fallen Hero. It’s always been one of my favourite fics. It definitely puts some of Regulus actions on display.
Ginevra (I call evil!Ginny by her full name) is a bit of an obsession of mine. I have an absolutely epic serial about her (AU now, thanks to HBP). I just can’t get the idea out of my head that she’s still obsessed with Tom. I mean, hey… He and Harry even look like.
Oh, and friend away! I shall do similar. I always love to have new friends.
I don’t mind Dumbledore that much. He has enough flaws to make him believable, and I think it was wise to “get him out of the way” for book 7, the way George Lucas killed off Obi-wan so Luke could become the driving force in Star Wars. Dead doesn’t quite mean dead in either story ‘verse, but it does let Harry face Voldemort more or less on his own.
I believe that at least with Snape, Harry’s the character who is blind to the gray, rather than Rowling. But speaking generally, characters are easily put in the “good” or “bad” categories in her books. That doesn’t mean some of the good ones aren’t complex. Sirius was complex, because he was very immature for a father-figure. Dumbledore was complex, because he sometimes misjudged people, and went about things wrong.
I think Rowling is trying to say something about human nature with her books, that sometimes people really *are* evil. I don’t think it’s all blind over-simplifying.
Cannot disagree with the Lupin love either *bows* I adore the passive-agressive werewolf ^^
Very sweet angsty drabble, it is ♥
I’ll probably have a look at your epic soonish then, maybe this week end when I have time
Dead doesn’t quite mean dead in either story ‘verse,
Unless you’re Sirius…
Eh. Probably my biggest problem is with Dumbledore as an educator. I think he makes really lousy appointments.
Oh, everyone should love themself the passive-aggressive werewolf. He’s just great!
Thank you. I really like Sirius and Reggie (He will always in my mind be Reggie, because the Marauders on my RP always called him that because it bugged the CRAP out of him).
Ooh yay! Someone else to read. I didn’t mean to pimp (if I did, I wouldn’t included a link), but hey… Score! “Lady Darkness” is a little daunting at 22 chapters and counting… But at least it’s not as bad at “The Nyazian Prophecies” (at 800 pages. I am a verbose little girl)
I thought it was fairly balanced between competency and struggling to learn. And I don’t think he was quite as over-the-top competent in OotP as you describe.
Didn’t read the HP section of the post…
…but I’ve been having trouble with tags today, too. Almost every one I tried to click said that there were no entries that matched the description.
I never read behind-the-scenes stuff, ever, mostly because I’m a spoiler-phobe.
But Ginny being the “love of Harry’s life”? That makes me LOLROTFL. Mostly, I suppose, because we haven’t seen much of it yet. Ginny has been such a background character in previous books (even book 2, where so much of Riddle’s plot is going on behind the scenes). The relationship needs to be explored in more depth, and Ginny as a character, before that will become the least bit evident to us readers.
I see. Well, I never read any HP fan fic and have learned to avoid the essays, so….this is new to me.