Harry Potter fans?

[Nefarias]

Any other fans on the site? Considering it's the like, the biggest global news story, I'm surprised there hasn't been any talk of it here. I had to painstakingly choose it over Waterbury.

Oh, and please no Deathly Hallows spoilers, for those that haven't finished yet. But feel free to post non-spoiling thoughts!

[Dante]

I picked up the book saturday morning and was home reading by 10:30am.  I finished around 4pm.  I had to tease my wife because she didn't finish until 6.   

Considering the hype, I thought it was well done and .....appropriate.  Can't really say much more without spoiling.

[pyr0ma5ta]

I read it when it was leaked on Monday.  I had to resist yelling spoilers as I walked home from work on Friday, forcibly swimming through seas of high school female geeks.  It was pretty much what I expected, and even the biggest surprises were (in my opinion) somewhat predictable.

[policehq]

I almost started a thread after I finished reading the book, but it's so difficult to discuss without ruining it for people that all the restrictions limit the entertainment of doing so.

For instance, I take issue with pyromasta's last sentence.

-hq

[Illissius]

I also read it as soon as it was leaked, to get in before the spoilers. (In a single sitting, which I wasn't expecting. Took 11 hours). Twas pretty good, much better than the 6th, at least. I really hated the epilogue.

[Ephraim]

The epilogue was very disappointing.  Nonetheless, I consider 'Deathly Hallows' to be a suitable conclusion to the series.  The ending of the book, which was my greatest concern, was facilely executed.  The quality of the writing was up from 'Order of the Phoenix' and 'Halfblood Prince,' both stylistically and with respect to pacing and characterization.  I hope that it is not spoiling anything to say that I am glad that she cut back on the melodrama from the previous two books.

[Dr. Sylvan]

I also read the whole thing on Saturday---noon to midnight because I'm a slow reader---but most of my thoughts on the book are heavy on spoilers.

Suffice it to say I give it an A-. I think it is sufficiently vague to say I felt the book was driven by a plot device which, while written well, seemed not to build on the history of the series (i.e., felt contrived or forced). Still, I liked it a lot and anyone who's liked any of the preceding volumes should obviously try it for themselves---it's not like it'll be hard to find people to borrow it from.

[Implacable]

What impressed me most, as it did Ephraim, was the quality of the writing.  I have always felt that Harry Potter was an extremely popular series that featured fairly amateur writing.  This book was not a step above the others; it was on an entirely different plane altogether.  The only problem that I had with the book was the awful Epilogue.

[Nefarias]

I pretty much agree with everything that's been said here. The beginning was a bit slow, but the ending tied most of the loose ends pretty well. The epilogue did indeed suck.

[jcb193]

That's funny.  I thought the quality of the writing in this book was very poor.  I had to re-read almost every action scene to make sure I understood what was happening.  That said, the patience and pacing the reader felt was well aligned with the movement of the story.

I think the epilogue was done to insure nobody else picks up the Harry Potter quill. 

I only had two gripes (ones of which will spoil, so i'll keep it quiet), but the other:
1. I thought the whole Dealthy Hollows sub-plot seemed forced and somewhat irrelevent.  It felt like she re-wrote the entire last 25% of the book after laying a strong foundation. 

[Matt]

SNAPE KILLS DUMBLEDORE....AGAIN!

[/spoiler]

[Klep]

In a stunning, come-from-behind victory, the Quidditch cup is won by the New York Mets!

[/spoiler]

[xthexpunisherx]

I really enjoyed the book as much as I could, I didn't so much read the book as I devoured it.  I was able to get alot out of it but the fear of being told the ending and basiclly barring myself from the internet for a few weeks made any time I wasn't reading the book a worry that it would be ruined.

My best freind summed it up best "It ended the only real way it could" and I agree.  I feel it was very well written (but of course my litterary experience is mostly from comic books) and did what all of the harry potter books did: Make you go back and reread one of the other books because you missed somthing that is now a central part of the story.  But there were definatly parts where I felt great emotion for the situation which is all I can ask for in any form of entertainment.  The story wrapped up well but still gave a large number of topics to debate and discuss, somthing I always enjoy.

[Anusien]

Because not properly attributing things is frowns, http://xkcd.com/.
-Klep

Also, spoiler warning: JK Rowling gives more post-book details

[nataz]

spoiler - maybe - not really, but still, why take the chance. 


meh-
its hard to talk about the book w/o spoilers. I'll try not to be specific, but you might want to skip my post if you are worried about it.

I manged to finish the book in about 4 hours in what was essentialy one sitting. I do this with the potter books because I want to treat them as entertainment, rather then something to reflect on as your work your way though. That being said, the middle 200 pages or so were terrible, and almost made me just set the thing down and give up reading it. The last 200 or so pages were interesting, but I would have liked more of that, and less of the previous. There was so much that you could have built on at the end that would have been more interesting and less forced then the whole random deathly hollows thing.

ah - how bout more on snape and big V, or more on the other magical races, or more on harrys past, or more about the war and the people involved with it. W/e, the 250 or so pages of random bitching killed it for me.

the end was passable, and could have been a lot better/worse. The whole thing was kinda "meh" for me.

That said, I also finnished the Mars series this weekend by Kim Stanley Robinson. That was epic, and the ending was one of the best I have read in years.

[Meddling Mike]

I liked the book, the story dragged at times, wasn't particularly inspired by the epilogue, but not exactly sure what I was hoping for with regards to a wrap up, so it's hard for me to be very critical. Think I'm going to make a "spoilers welcome" mirror thread to this.