Harry Potter and the half blood prince

Lite · **I'm lite... and I'm fantastic!**

Harry Potter and the half blood prince

HaloBurn · **Dad** Yarrr...

who dies?

ddvmor · **I am the Jammie King!**

I haven't read it, but probably will, soon enough.

I hate spoilers - unfortunately about 3 days after it came outj one of the bosses in work sat down and started discussing important plot points (including the aforementioned death) with one of the girls - right next to me.

l had to bollock him for his singular lack of consideration!

Calvin · Really Bored Member

I loved it! There were a few twists that took me by surprise (like that *** was the half-blood prince) but I wasn't surprised so much about who got killed. However, Copper and I had a discussion about Snape. I think he's evil and completely behind Voldemord, but Copper thinks he needs a "hug" and it was a plan that he would kill ***, so that his cover remains intact.

Lite · **I'm lite... and I'm fantastic!**

Cant say I really loved it...
It was a fun read and I enjoyed the charactor devolopment alot but I also found the book amaesingly annoying. I found it increadibly baddly planned... the action coming in one or two lumps at the begining and end with pritty much nothing happening inbetween. Surely it would have read better spread out alittle more? I the other books there was always something going on though the whole book... a big snake loose in the school.. the tri-wizard toriment, what do we get in this one? Malfoy -may- be up to something... woooo *yawn* To entertain the reader instead we get lots of romantic stuff... which i found annoying too! The complete lack of discribing words while the romantic stuff was going on was amasingly annoying. I wont say who.. but when Harry finaly kisses the girl he's liked for the whole year the only thing we get is 'Harry kissed her'. Hello! we want details! I had this disction with a friend of mine and she told me that because its a childrens book you dont get details of kissing.. but -something- would have be better then that! pritty much anything would.. grrr

The bit I enjoyed best about the book was when Dumbledore explaned the natrue of Harrys curse, telling him about how love is stronger and what not. That was very sweet and touching.

Please discuse!

Copper · **Superhero Extraordinaire**

Loved it! Children's fiction is great - pure, unadulterated fantasy you can read in 2 days.

...and the bad guys just need hugs...

ddvmor · **I am the Jammie King!**

Lite wrote:

... when Harry finaly kisses the girl he's liked for the whole year the only thing we get is 'Harry kissed her'. Hello! we want details! ...

You mean like the details in all those nasty porno books you read?

BrianS · Still Number One

I agree with it being poorly planned out. It is almost as it JK is on autopilot at this point. It also was a change in the fact that she did not explain and reintroduce every character at length like she usually does in every book. This was nice in the fact it made the book shorter but I found myself having to look back in previous books to know who the heck she was talking about. The next book seems like it could be more adventurous than any of the previous books, like there is more of a "mission" already laid out for it. With all the previous books you had no idea what to expect in the next installment.

Lite · **I'm lite... and I'm fantastic!**

Maybe in the next book potter will become rebalous and gothy!

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oh my! What will the perents think!

ddvmor · **I am the Jammie King!**

Ew. Scary.

ddvmor · **I am the Jammie King!**

Looks like Terry Pratchett is suffering from a bit of sour grapes:

Pratchett anger at Rowling's rise

Author Terry Pratchett has complained that the status of Harry Potter author JK Rowling is being elevated "at the expense of other writers".
Pratchett, one of the UK's most successful novelists with 40 million books sold, said the media ignores the achievements of other fantasy authors.
He also took a sideswipe at Rowling for saying she did not realise Harry Potter was fantasy until it was published.

His comments came on Rowling's 40th birthday, also Harry Potter's birthday.
In a recent interview with Time magazine, Rowling said she was "not a huge fan of fantasy" and was trying to "subvert" the genre.

The magazine also said Rowling reinvented fantasy fiction, which was previously stuck in "an idealised, romanticised, pseudofeudal world, where knights and ladies morris-dance to Greensleeves".

Pratchett, whose first fantasy novel was published 34 years ago, wrote to the Sunday Times saying the genre had always been "edgy and inventive".
"Ever since The Lord of the Rings revitalised the genre, writers have played with it, reinvented it, subverted it and bent it to their times," he wrote.

I seem to recall Terry getting the same sort of publicity (possibly not quite as hyped) shortly after the Discworld novels started coming out. He wasn't complaining then! I'm a big Pratchett fan and I think Rowling is infinitely overrated, but even I find this sort of outburst somewhat disappointing.

Whatever I think of the quality of her books (and even I'll read the new one eventually), I certainly don't begrudge her the zillions of pounds she's made off them. In Terry's place, I think I'd just be quietly smug, knowing that I wrote better books than her!

ddvmor · **I am the Jammie King!**

Here's something to consider: Why is Harry Potter so phenomenally sucessful? It seems that almost every household has a copy of the latest book with something like 30 million copies sold.

Now, in my opinon, Rowling isn't a great writer. There's nothing original about the HP books - boarding school (Just William - any number of Enid Blyton books), hero with a tragic past (er... pretty much any story with a hero in) etc - Rowling's writing style is nothing special - in fact in places it's downright amaturish and sloppy. The books are pretty bland and each one is pretty much the same - they don't break new ground (within the story) or significantly advance the plot with each book.

Compared to something like Phillip Pullman's Dark Materials trilogy they're utter trash.

(Yet despite all this, I'm still gonna read and enjoy the new book at some point, despite feeling slightly 'soiled' whilst doing it.)

My own opinion is that it is the product of a phenomenally successful marketing campaign and nothing more.

Discuss...

Susan · Tickle me, Elmo! I'm Roger Moore's Stunt Double!

Looks like this is a safe place to say that I found the last HP book a bit of a
I took a breather about half way through and tried to recall what had actually happened; in short, not a lot.
I was disappointed that the book had no real ending, just a 'you have to buy the next one to finish the story'. It wasn't even a cliff hanger. I know they're written for children, but there's nothing intelligent about them, nothing to stretch the imagination ar make the reader think for themselves; it's all spelt out too easily, all very convenient.

Now the Dark Materials trilogy - there's a set of books worth reading: intelligent, interesting, imaginative. I think I might just start reading them again right now.

HaloBurn · **Dad** Yarrr...

I have not read any of the Potter books and thought the films were so-so in so far as you can see the Author has ripped off just about every fantasy author that went before her.

In my opinion she can’t even be classed in the same respect as Pullman or Pratchette, both of these authors have more inventive ideas and creative talent in the tips of their little fingers than Rowling could ever hope to achieve.

BTW they are making a film version of His Dark Materials only I hear they are taking out all the references to God to appease any backlash that the material would invoke from the American Bible belt.

ddvmor · **I am the Jammie King!**

HaloBurn wrote:

In my opinion she can’t even be classed in the same respect as Pullman or Pratchette, both of these authors have more inventive ideas and creative talent in the tips of their little fingers than Rowling could ever hope to achieve.

Heh. Except for the fact that she's sold more books than both of em put togther and multiplied by the square root of infinity. I agree with you though. Just not the book-buying public.

HaloBurn wrote:

BTW they are making a film version of His Dark Materials only I hear they are taking out all the references to God to appease any backlash that the material would invoke from the American Bible belt.

Yeah. Thats gonna be a tricky one, but could still be cool. Interesting to see how they get around it.

Lite · **I'm lite... and I'm fantastic!**

Having read most books that Pullman, Pratchette and JKR have written I do wish they wouldnt fight. I like to that that Pratchette's comments were aimed more at the media then anything else really.

I also hope that children that read JKR books will go on to read the more advanced and enterating books such as Prachette and co.

I'm not really looking forward to the Dark Matters movies, I feel they will be made very PC and rather boring... When you read them yourself you get the feel that the writer was really trying to make comments about our socity.. may which I agree with. It seams to me most of them will be removed and it will be left as just another teen-adventure movie.

Copper · **Superhero Extraordinaire**

I am going to be controversial.

Pratchett, although a good read, really isn't high brow fiction either... In fact, some of his recent stuff is awful. I might even suggest that Pratchett is less suited to a broad age range than HP.

In defence of HP, I think any author who can engage a global audience in anticipation of every novel has done wonders. ALL fiction is a montage of other works (Helloooo, Pullman and Paradise Lost??!!), and she has done a great pastiche of previous childrens fiction (TS Elliot, Tolkien, Malory Towers, Enid Blyton etc etc).

Fair play to the woman! I, along with millions of others, await the next book.

ddvmor · **I am the Jammie King!**

Copper wrote:

Pratchett, although a good read, really isn't high brow fiction either... In fact, some of his recent stuff is awful.

On the other hand, I think he's just getting better and better. Just a taste thing.

Copper wrote:

I think any author who can engage a global audience in anticipation of every novel has done wonders ... Fair play to the woman! I, along with millions of others, await the next book.

This right here, is covered in my point above. Good luck to her. But it doesn't tell me what this magic thing is that makes her books so popular.

Copper wrote:

ALL fiction is a montage of other works (Helloooo, Pullman and Paradise Lost??!!)

Heh. No giant talking bears in Paradise lost, methinks....