Friday, July 20, 2007

11:52pm

Oboe-Wan lies awake, the excitement of the day still playing in her head. "Why don't you get dressed & go buy it?" Hubby-Wan grumbles, tired of listening to her flick through channels on the t.v. while he's trying to sleep.

"I don't know..." she whines, flicking quickly away from Discovery Health Channel showing some disgusting surgical procedure up close & personal.

"I know why you're not going right now: because you don't have a Hermione costume to dress up in!" He starts laughing & rolls over, promptly falling asleep.

He's right, she thinks to herself. If I'm going to be at Barnes & Noble at midnight I need to be costumed. But Padawan-Wan's Harry Potter glasses don't fit my fat head... She shuts off the t.v., images of happy readers snatching up their new copies of the book dancing in her head.

Saturday July 21, 2007

6:45am

Oboe-Wan bounces out of bed, grabs whatever clothes are closest to her, throws play clothes on Padawan-Wan & dashes out the door. The grocery store down the street should have copies of the book, and one of them surely has her name on it! At 7:15am, a brand new crisp copy of "Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows" is in her grubby paws. She drives Padawan-Wan to the park to spend an hour or two playing, while she pulls up a camp chair under a shady tree and begins reading...



I decided I would have to embark on a speed-reading marathon this weekend just so I could finish the book before spoilers began popping up on the internet and before any of my middle school students broke the ending to me. My mantra became "I must finish before Monday, I must finish before Monday."

I managed to read 350 pages by 5pm on Saturday (with an almost-6-year-old running around the house, this is no small feat!), but stowed the book in my instrument bag to bring along with me to "Phantom of the Opera." I would have plenty of time during breaks in the music to read bits & pieces of the book. And sure enough, I managed to read an extra 75 pages during & between the shows. Of course, answering (or not answering) questions from the other musicians curious as to what was going on in the book.

Here in Vegas, the temperatures soar in the summer, so my "winter reading list" is now my "summer reading list"! This being my 2nd summer here, I knew what to expect - being stuck indoors out of the heat & sun. Miraculously exhibiting some skill for planning ahead, I'd already spent the last month reading Harry Potter books 1-6 to be ready for the new movie & the new book. And man was I ever ready!!! I was able to easily finish the book in 2 days - closing it last night around 11:35pm, promptly hopping on the computer to email the one person on the planet I knew who would be finished with the book before me: Mirax7. In her secret prison, she finished the book even quicker than I did!!

I'm trying very hard to not give away anything here! I'll just say my theories on Professor Snape turned out to be true - much to my pleasure. I think it's important for me to tell you he is one of my favorite characters. Yes, I love the over-the-top portrayal of Snape by Alan Rickman. Next in line as a favorite character is Professor Lupin - I loved him the moment he stepped on to the pages of Prisoner of Azkaban & have adored him since. Of course, these are both adults. I don't believe any girl can say she doesn't love Hermione or Ginny or Luna or any number of other girls at Hogwarts!! We certainly have our pick of role models for our kids, don't we?

There were several deaths of characters with recognizable names - some of which elicited an "oh no!" from me, but one in particular brought tears to my eyes. The action saw very little interruption - there were times when Harry, Hermione & Ron did a lot of conversing or just "sitting around" waiting for the next adventure to come their way and I did wish more was going on or that the lulls were skipped. But, nothing like the stops in action that book 6 suffered from.

Mysteries were solved, questions were answered, the action was intense, relationships strengthened, rediscovered or mended and the ending was....

Well, I'll let you read it & decide for yourself. But speaking for myself, I am satisfied with the ending. I have been a Harry Potter fan right from the beginning - in fact, I worked at a Borders Books & Music the year HP1 hit it big. I know these books are aimed toward middle school aged kids, but they have really awakened my imagination. The first 2 books seemed written with that demographic in mind, but as the books progressed so did her writing style. Unfortunately, that also means that the last 5 books are each 600 pages longer than the first 2!

An interesting revelation, something I knew to be true on some level, but not entirely sure, is that this series takes place from 1991-1997. Harry was born in 1980. Can you believe it? It's weird to think that I am just a few years older than him - I mean, I *know* he's not real, none of this is real - but it's cool to know this all takes place during my young adult years, just like Harry.

It saddens me that the series is over. It's been an awesome ride & read. The Epilogue gives us a small glimpse into the lives of the characters after the story ends. But it's not quite enough. I have so many questions & I'm sure that JK Rowling won't be coming to my house any time soon to answer all my questions. The biggest one is: "Will there be a prequel series featuring the adventures of Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot & Prongs?"

Is it all really over? We still have 2 more movies to go.... I guess I'll just have to reread the entire series.





FRODO LIVES!!

oh, wait... wrong books....



POTTER STINKS!!!

WEASLEY IS OUR KING!!!!

LONG LIVE HARRY POTTER!!!!










_______________________________________________

-=EDIT=-

There are many spoilers being discussed in the comments. If you don't want to read the spoilers, then just comment w/o reading those before yours! I will forgive any repeat statements for skipping spoilers!