It was Aug. 3 at precisely 10:38 AM when I finally finished ‘Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince’, written, of course, by the world’s richest woman, J. K. Rowling. Now, I was one of the many, many people who lined up at 12:01 AM on July 16 to get my copy of the book, expecting to crack it open tout de suite. So why did it take me so long to read the darned thing, you ask? Well, it turns out I’m pretty low on the old totem pole in my house, as I was allotted the number three spot when it came to reading what has since become the fastest selling book in history. Yup, I kid you not; not only were there two others in line in front of me, but one of these individuals chose to take the book away on holidays for a week – reading only one chapter while away! I was outraged!
Finally, I got my hands on the penultimate book of the series, only to spend the first few chapters going, “Who? What? Hunh?” Sadly, you see, I had read the fifth book two years ago – and had completely forgotten most of it. So it took me a few chapters to get back into the swing of things, as they say… And about those few chapters: now, maybe I was completely out of touch with the world of HP, but whatever the case, I found the first few chapters a bit slow. Once we got back to Harry though, things picked up and flew – so much so that I logged 400 pages in one day (certainly not a world’s record, I realize, but significant when you consider the logistics of my schedule that day).
With all hands pointed toward ‘Mortal Peril’, this HP kicks off in high alert – and frankly, the parallels between Harry’s world and the current war against terrorism are kind of frightening. Whereas the last book satirized the educational system, this book makes some insightful political comments that speak to the increasing maturity of Harry, the character, and JK Rowling, the author of said character. ‘Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince’ examines the past of Voldemort in greater depth, revealing a character even worse than before. As well, Harry chances on a old textbook called “Advanced Potion Making”, which had previously been owned by someone who mysteriously referred to himself as ‘The Half-Blood Prince’; love blooms and hormones rage at Hogwarts; the increasingly public followers of Voldemort continue to wage war against all that is good and pure; more and more people spend their time reading the obituaries; and life (and Quidditch) go on.
Now, I’m not going to let out any big secrets here (like who falls in love with whom or who the Half-Blood Prince really is), but what I will say is this: love figures prominently in this book, and does so in both the mundane, totally expected sort of way; as well as in a very unexpected – and fundamentally important – sort of way. Thematically, the power of love becomes the key to Harry’s problems – let’s just hope that the fellow who now refers to himself as “Dumbledore’s man through and through” realizes exactly how important love will prove to be.
I’ll be interested to see how everything is wrapped up in the final book – and between you and me, I’m expecting a few ‘surprises’ (maybe some of the things that happened at the end of the sixth book aren’t exactly what they seem to be...)
With 6.9 million copies sold within the first 24 hours, and sales already in excess of $100 million, the movie version of this book (planned for 2008) will likely be a blockbuster, as well.
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