Thoughts, and a neat-o link

[stephanometra]

Okay, the link is actually going to come first: The SS/PS chess game as a metaphor for the entire series thus far. I liked it, anyway.

The fic is already cropping up.

My first, and the overlying thought with regard to this book: OH MY GOD MY SEVERUS WHAT HAVE YOU DONE JKR YOU FUCKING WHORE HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO MY BABY H8H8H8! I love Severus Snape desperately, and this book did nothing at all but fucking yank on my heartstrings from start to finish because OMFG. I mean, as satisfying as it was to see him tell that slag Bellatrix off in "Spinner's End," this entire book (really, a lot of the series up to this point) hinges on the fact that he's not free to make his own choices. He chose to join the Death Eaters, and then he chose to defect, and everything else, someone has decided for him. There was no way he could have gotten away with refusing the Unbreakable Vow, not with Bella two feet away. I am absolutely convinced that the tiny interlude wherein he and Dumbledore are staring at each other in the Astronomy Tower was a telepathic conversation, and that Dumbledore ordered Severus to cast the AK in order to save Draco and preserve Snape's status among the Death Eaters.

Explains the violent reaction to Harry calling him a coward, doesn't it?

I am pretty sure that we're going to see redeemed!Draco in Book 7, but I'm way, way more sure that Peter and Severus are going to repudiate their life-debts and suffer messy death. Snape will probably snark something about Gryffindor idiocy as he expires and then I will cry and laugh and then cry some more.

I hate Ginny. Her only worth in this whole damned series is as a Mary Sue and a caster of particularly nasty Bat-Bogey Hexes. If Harry was going to end up with a girl (which of course he is, presuming that he doesn't die in Book 7 - which is not a sure thing in my mind), I'd much prefer it to be Luna, for obvious reasons.

Luna. OMG. I was hoping that she'd have a little more booktime, but I must say that I am not displeased with what little she got. The "it's almost like having friends" line KILLED ME DEAD, and then her Quidditch announcing killed me again.

I'm planning on dressing up as Luna for Halloween, by the way. If anyone else wants to match, that would be :coal: with me.

There's a Harry-as-Horcrux theory that's going around that I'm not sure I buy completely, but which gains more merit the more I think about it. What if Voldemort didn't mean to kill Harry at all, but some quirk in the making-a-living-thing-into-a-Horcrux process fucked up and discorporated him? Granted, there are some problems with this; Lily's death is portrayed by Tommy-boy himself as being unnecessary - he tells her to stand aside, silly girl - and I'm not sure a noble self-sacrifice qualifies as the honest-to-Gods murder you need to make a Horcrux. However, I like this explanation for the bond between Harry and Voldemort a lot better than the "oh he must have accidentally transferred some of his powers to you when he tried to kill you." It rings a lot truer to me, and it makes more sense, as Harry would naturally have absorbed some of Voldemort's qualities as a receptacle for part of the latter's soul. But I don't know. Definitely need to think more about it.

REGULUS REGULUS OMFG. It has to be him. Has to be. In which case, I am now much fonder of the younger Black than I ever was of Sirius. Foiling Voldemort's plans from within is way, way cooler than being part of an organized resistance. Infinitely more Slytherin, too, and if you can't say anything else good about Salazar's House, you have to admit that they have style.

Hopefully Dung hasn't nicked and pawned the locket that nobody could open from OotP, as I bet that's our real Horcrux. I wonder if Regulus fucked up any of the other Horcruces as well? I hope so.

Remus/Tonks I hate because Remus is gay like a really gay thing and OotP Tonks came off as a huge dyke to me. There are no shippy loyalties here; I just don't like the pairing because it seems completely out of left field. I also seriously disapproved of Tonks' behavior while she was lovesick. Way to act like a stupid 15-year-old slut, Nymphadora.

But whatever. Can't really do much about canon ships.

I was hoping for more MWPP flashback scenes and was disappointed, but the Voldemort backstory made up for it. Also was hoping for more Mad-Eye, because old Alastor is always good for a laugh, but didn't get that either.

Am happy that Ron and Hermione have gotten some of their shit straightened out, because the UST was killing me.

But really, the overlying sentiment about this book is all about Severus for me. I loved it, really I did. Enjoyed it much, much more than I have any of the other books, and I don't think that it's all because I'm so much more into it now than I was when I first started reading Harry Potter in the first place.

But still, my poor Severus :(

In other news, it stormed spectacularly here, and I'm getting restless.