Chris's review
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7)
by J.K. Rowling
Chris's review
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7) by J.K. Rowling
Chris's review
I'm not giving this one a star rating yet. Maybe after a re-read in a month. Some spoilers.
As a Harry Potter book, it's as consistently exciting as PoA or GoF (the best installments for my taste) but lacks their sense of awed discovery. It shares the leanness of HBP, keeping the unwieldy-but-entertaining plot moving at all costs. Xenophile's printing press is our metaphor here: It's noisy, old-fashioned, and rather charming, but the most important thing about it is whose face it leaves on the magazine cover.
As a conclusion to the series, it's got The Sound of Inevitability. I'd compare this book to The Last Battle in that respect, and . . . ah . . . in others as well. Lewis was a blunt allegorist, so of course his book had to end with the Second Coming. Rowling works her way into her overt Christian piety more gradually; I'm not entirely sure she earns it, and I want to give the HBP-DH arc a full rehearing before I make that call. The thematic weight here felt li...more
As a Harry Potter book, it's as consistently exciting as PoA or GoF (the best installments for my taste) but lacks their sense of awed discovery. It shares the leanness of HBP, keeping the unwieldy-but-entertaining plot moving at all costs. Xenophile's printing press is our metaphor here: It's noisy, old-fashioned, and rather charming, but the most important thing about it is whose face it leaves on the magazine cover.
As a conclusion to the series, it's got The Sound of Inevitability. I'd compare this book to The Last Battle in that respect, and . . . ah . . . in others as well. Lewis was a blunt allegorist, so of course his book had to end with the Second Coming. Rowling works her way into her overt Christian piety more gradually; I'm not entirely sure she earns it, and I want to give the HBP-DH arc a full rehearing before I make that call. The thematic weight here felt li...more
