The Deathly Hallows

Well, my 14 yr old says it's the best book he's ever read in his entire life, including 1 thru 6.
He finished it last night, and he's going to start it all over again.
So, I'm guessing it's pretty damn good.

best book in the series in my oppinion

i was not really thrilled with the epilogue, but it did wrap up the story fairly well

rowling has promised no more harry books, but now we have about 7 or 8 kids she could focus on for new stories

interesting to see what she does

The verdict is still out as to how I would rank the book against the others, but I do think Chapters 31 and 33 are among my favorite individual chapters in the whole series.

I enjoyed it and I was right on 2 of the major outcomes - about Snape and a Horcrux (shan't say more 'cos it would be a spoiler)


I agree the final wrap up was a little weak but sort of satisfying


I liked the development of the characters and the way they matured and it'll be interesting to see the films that come out of the books as the actors are now older too.

I was right about Snape and Harry being a horocrux but wrong about everything else.

I did get kind of confused about the Elder Wand thing though. Didn't it say that Neville was the rightful owner? How did it come to be burried with Dumbledore? How did Draco get it?

Or am I just really, really mixed up.

dumbledore had the elder wand, he won it in a fair fight so it was his wand, draco was supposed to kill dumbledore and the wand should have been his, voldemort assumed that the wand was tied to snape because snape actually killed dumbledore, but since he was meant to kill dumbledore (at dumbledore's request) the rules binding the transfer of power for the wand were broken


unless i missed something neville had nothing to do with the elder wand

Well crap. I am confused. Typical.

My copy of the book is packed as we are getting ready to move so it will be at least three weeks before I have a chance to look at it.

Maybe it said Draco was the wand's owner and that got me confused.

If I recall Harry says something about "I disarmed Malfoy so the wand passed to me".

But that couldn't be because Voldemort got the want from Dumbledore's crypt.

It was right at the end during the face off between Harry and Voldemort....

Grr. I may have to unpack it. Whatever it said it got me confused.

i think you're confusing the part where harry is asking the wand maker which wand he should use after they escape the malfoy's mansion

olivander tells him that since he captured draco's wand it should work for him, that wand was not however the elder wand

I was disappointed by the epilogue. I was sure Harry would end up as the professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts, but I don't think the final chapter mentions what he does for a living? It hardly seems likely he would end up as an insurance salesman or stock broker. Did I miss something?

Also, how did Neville get the true sword from the goblin Griphook?

I'm going to do some re-reading when my current (noisy) house guests go home.

Oh! Maybe that was it --- how Neville ended up as the owner of the the sword.

And okay -- I went out and dug out the book. At the top of page 743 Harry says "The true master of the Elder Wand was Draco Malfoy".

Why was Draco the true master?

Draco was the true master because he bested the previous master--Dumbledore--when he disarmed him at the top of the tower at the end of Book 6. As DJJD mentioned, this does not mean that Draco went on to own the Elder Wand (which he probably knew nothing about); it simply means that Draco was its true master, not Snape, as Voldemort had erroneously assumed. Even though Voldemort got possession of the real Elder Wand, it might as well have been any other wand because he was not the true master of it.

But of course, Harry bests Draco earlier in the book and so mastery over the Elder Wand passed to him. This is why Harry says "The true master of the Elder Wand was Draco Malfoy"; it's another way of saying "Snape was never the master of the Elder Wand." This is also why Harry is able to use the Elder Wand to repair his old wand.

I still want to know how that sword turned up in the middle of the battle. I thought Griphook might show up with it, but instead it's like Neville did a summoning charm or something. It seems like such a large plot point to just leave open.

Yeah, it did seem a little improbable, just as it did when Harry did the same thing at the end of Book 2. I guess were supposed to assume that the Sorting Hat has the ability to summon Hogwarts items when the wearer has real need of it. When Harry conjures the sword in Book 2, Dumbledore says "only a true Gryffindor" could have pulled it out of the Sorting Hat. I guess Neville is a true Gryffindor too. It makes me wonder if the Sorting Hat works for the other houses as well; could a true Hufflepuff have pulled out some relic of Helga Hufflepuff--the Hufflepuff cup, even?

What I also wonder out more generally is why Book 7 is named after the Deathly Hallows, which seemed to play a minor role in the story. I haven't thought it through completely yet, but didn't the Hallows only serve to tell us more about Dumbledore's past? Why did Dumbledore leave Hermione the book of fairy tales? How did it help in bringing about Voldemort's defeat?

Oh thanks, Shapeless, for explaining the wand thing. It was driving me nuts! Now it makes sense.

And the sorting hat providing the sword makes sense too -- they had crammed the hat over Neville just before.

The only thing I can figure about the fairy tale book is because it had the story of the brothers getting the items from Death.

True, but I haven't figured out why that story was useful in Harry's quest. Suppose Dumbledore hadn't left the book for Hermione or the hidden ring in the Snitch for Harry. Would this have affected Harry's chances of defeating Voldemort?

Harry and Ron are aurors, and Hermione is in a very high place in the department of defense, of something. I dont think its called that, though. (JKRowling said it in an interview.)

Neville pulled it out of the sorting hat, i think.

yes, Neville got the sword from the sorting hat


and as Dumbledore explained 'death' was a story but the 3 brothers were real, just clever wizards who created the Hallows.

Harry needed to go for the Horcruxes over the Hallows but needed to understand the Hallows and their powers - his understanding of the Elder wand, and the fact that he was its master as he'd defeated Draco, even though he hadn't killed him, was what made him able to defeat Voldemort - and the decision to do 'the right thing' in following and destroying the Horcruxes rather than seeking power with the Hallows was also crucial in the defeat. He also used the stone and his parents and Lupin helped him to pass the Dementors to get to V.

I really enjoyed it but with all fantasy you have to suspend belief and not try to over analyse the why's and wherefore's - or you'd ask why they hadn't done something like ask the portraits for information earlier!

I agree with Vivian about the necessity of suspending disbelief.

Adding the Hallows to the Horcruxes and throwing in the bureaucracies of both the Magical and Muggle Worlds (and Hermonie's Book of Fairy Tales) helps with the symbolism that Harrys struggles with evil are only one part of a complicated world with complicated choices.

The Deathly Hallows
Shapeless - The mark of the Hallows was over the title of the Three Brothers story in the fairy tale book, and of course Dumbledore knew that Hermione couldn't resist getting every last possible of meaning from a book, so he could be pretty sure that eventually she would spot it.

Others - yes, I was a bit disappointed in the Epilogue - if Harry and Ron became aurors, I think Rowling should have said so in the book, not an interview.

And what a sneaky mind Rowling has - that whole Snape/Lily thing was a real surprise, rather complicated, but very logical. And now it's obvious why D kept saying "I trust Severus Snape".

Now that I've read the whole thing, I can get out my folder of Harry Potter?Deathly Hallows articles and read them too. I didn't want to do that until I finished the book.