{"id":3971,"date":"2005-11-29T14:26:50","date_gmt":"2005-11-29T19:26:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=3971"},"modified":"2015-05-19T09:09:51","modified_gmt":"2015-05-19T13:09:51","slug":"half-blood-prince-snapshots","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=3971","title":{"rendered":"<i>Half-Blood Prince<\/i> snapshots"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe style=\"width:120px;height:240px;\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" src=\"\/\/ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com\/widgets\/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&#038;OneJS=1&#038;Operation=GetAdHtml&#038;MarketPlace=US&#038;source=ac&#038;ref=tf_til&#038;ad_type=product_link&#038;tracking_id=thesheivari-20&#038;marketplace=amazon&#038;region=US&#038;placement=0439785960&#038;asins=0439785960&#038;linkId=QNIEV22VRQWY5EW7&#038;show_border=true&#038;link_opens_in_new_window=true\"><br \/>\n<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\nSPOILERS BELOW.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; Dumbledore.  Wow.  I did not see that coming.  Well &#8211; not until they went into that horrible cave.  Then I started thinking: &#8220;oh boy &#8230; something&#8217;s going to happen here &#8230;&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; Horrible.  That awful battle at the end.  I kept thinking: &#8220;If Dumbledore is dead &#8230; then ANYone can die!&#8221;  (Sorry, Cedric &#8211; I already recovered from the shock of your death.)  I thought Hermione was going to die.  I don&#8217;t know why.  I just got it into my head that she was going to die.  And poor Bill.  Being bitten by a werewolf is certain to impact him in future years.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; But the one scene in the hospital when Fleur suddenly says, &#8220;Of course I will love him even with his wounds ..&#8221; and suddenly she and Mrs. Weasley are crying and hugging was PERFECT.  That&#8217;s just how families actually work, and it was a very touching moment.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; I understood the whole horcrux thing only while I was reading that chapter.  I mean, I get it &#8211; but I had to keep reading to keep getting it, and &#8230; it required momentum for me to keep understanding what they were trying to do and what it all meant  Bits of Voldemort&#8217;s soul split off and hidden in objects.  Okay.  Got it.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; The entire romantic sub-plot was wonderful, I thought.  It stretched out throughout the book &#8211; but never overwhelmed the plot.  It kept my interest.  It didn&#8217;t become sappy or tiresome.  I loved how Hermione was obviously trying to make Ron jealous by dating only the people that would drive Ron NUTS.  Smart girl. And Ron basically practicing his &#8220;snogging&#8221; skills on Lavendar &#8211; who is SUCH a type &#8211; didn&#8217;t we all know a girl like that in high school?  Hell, I know women like her now.  Women who can&#8217;t WAIT to have a man, so that she can then clip his wings, and domesticate the hell out of him.  I honestly do not understand women like that &#8211; I never have &#8211; but they exist &#8211; some of them are my good friends, and whatever &#8211; a lot of men must love that kind of shite, because women like that are ALWAYS in relationships whereas I am not.  Lavendar wants to &#8220;have&#8221; Ron so that he will be trapped.  I thought it was hysterical how Ron ended up hiding whenever he saw her coming. And Harry with his unrequited love for Ginny &#8211; and how she suddenly ran at him in the common room with her face &#8220;blazing&#8221; and suddenly he found himself kissing her.  The moment he had been waiting for.   I liked how it all played out.  It was subtle &#8211; and yet it was treated with the right amount of importance.  Romance is really important to people who are 16 years old &#8230; and the book reflects that.  I mean, romance is important to adults too &#8211; but that FIRST romance you never forget!  (&#8220;The first cut is the deepest&#8221; and all that.)<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; Snape.  I cannot figure him out.  WHY did Dumbledore trust him?  I am still not sure I got an answer to that.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; When Harry comes upon the pale Draco crying in the boy&#8217;s bathroom &#8211; I suddenly felt this rush of compassion and pity for Draco &#8211; while normally I just think he&#8217;s an evil little putz.  Like: has Draco been racing along on a little treadmill, being USED by Voldemort or Snape?  Does he want to get out of it but CAN&#8217;T?  Or does Draco just want to revenge his now imprisoned father (which would make sense &#8230;)  I think it would be pretty cool if, for whatever reason, Harry and Draco ended up joining forces.  Now THAT would be unexpected.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; The ending blew me away.  Harry, although he has one year left, has seen too much, experienced too much, and he has outgrown Hogwarts.  It&#8217;s over.  It is now time for him to go out and slay the dragon on his own.  His protection (Sirius, Dumbledore) is now gone.  He must fight.  He can&#8217;t sit in a classroom learning about potions.  He needs to take action.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; And the book ends on a melancholy nostalgic note.  Beautiful last sentence.  A perfect last sentence, I thought.  Knowing that innocence is already dead, knowing that he can no longer just sit around enjoying simple pleasures while Voldemort is still out there &#8230; he takes one last moment to enjoy his friendships, his girlfriend &#8230; He knows it will be the last time.<\/p>\n<p>I am in love with these books and I already can&#8217;t wait for the next one.<\/p>\n<p>\n<iframe style=\"width:120px;height:240px;\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" src=\"\/\/ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com\/widgets\/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&#038;OneJS=1&#038;Operation=GetAdHtml&#038;MarketPlace=US&#038;source=ac&#038;ref=tf_til&#038;ad_type=product_link&#038;tracking_id=thesheivari-20&#038;marketplace=amazon&#038;region=US&#038;placement=0439785960&#038;asins=0439785960&#038;linkId=QNIEV22VRQWY5EW7&#038;show_border=true&#038;link_opens_in_new_window=true\"><br \/>\n<\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SPOILERS BELOW. &#8212; Dumbledore. Wow. I did not see that coming. Well &#8211; not until they went into that horrible cave. Then I started thinking: &#8220;oh boy &#8230; something&#8217;s going to happen here &#8230;&#8221; &#8212; Horrible. That awful battle at &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=3971\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[964],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3971"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3971"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3971\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":102468,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3971\/revisions\/102468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}