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Saturday, August 11, 2007

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by JK Rowling

It is entertaining to read, but did not evoke in me any laughs out loud or weepy sadness. This book was more like a final reassembling of a puzzle. Tying up of loose ends. As I read the book, I got the sense of a bit of arbitrariness of the rules of magic and magical items set out by the author. Fans of the books, might argue it's just like the real world; surely I could comprehend there are exceptions to every rule. A key item in this book and, in fact, in the whole series, is a magical cloak with unfailing invisibility, impervious to other spells. This alone is a super powerful item and allows huge sections of this last book's storyline to move forward. It is analogous to the One Ring of Tolkien's series (that item interestingly also bestows invisibility, but also much else). Still, the cloak isn't really given the full lore than perhaps it deserves. And I think (and probably many would agree) the writing here is nowhere near as good as Tolkien's. Overall, Harry Potter's world is a bit fragile and doubt took hold of me with the least inquiry into its workings.

Link A NYTimes opinion piece along similar lines.

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