Half-Blood Prince Review: Up to the Next Level

Let's get the obligatory review paragraph out of the way first. I agree with Melissa (who finished the book about 8 hours after I put our copy down): this is the best book in the series since Prisoner of Azkaban. The story J.K. Rowling wrote for this volume is both thrilling and tragic, and more importantly, it does exactly what it needs to do: it takes to the whole tale of Harry Potter to the next level, and beyond....only you may not realize it until you're nearly finished with the book.

Okay, now on to discussion. There's a lot that needs to be said about this book, and you can't say it while worried about spoilers. You've been warned.

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I mentioned in my "Pottermania" post last year that:

"the next book simply must be some kind of 'Battle for Hogwarts'-type story....[H]ow could Rowling make us believe that another year could go by, with Draco and Co. occasionally attempting to kill Harry, or at least being suspected of such, without everything coming to some sort of crisis? I can't see how she could do it; for Rowling to put off some sort of internal Gryffindor/Potter/Slytherin/Malfoy showdown (with Snape playing a fascinating, unclear role) until the seventh volume would be untrue to her overall story, to say the least."

My reasons for feeling this way were numerous, but they all boiled down to my conviction that ever since Voldemort was resurrected at the end of Goblet of Fire, the wizarding world, and in particular Harry Potter's part of it, was living on borrowed time. He's here, and determined to kill Harry Potter--even with the protection of Dumbledore and all sorts of powerful magic, how can the world of Hogwarts, the environment through which Harry moves and grows, remain an oasis? In Order of the Phoenix, Rowling was able to stretch things out by creating dissension among the ranks of wizards; in terms of the overall plot, the fate of Hogwarts and Malfoy and Snape and all the rest of the elements of Harry's world were caused to teeter but not go over the edge, solely because Voldemort was presented as wishing to make use of the doubt surrounding him and Dumbledore. The result was a satisfying, but also frustrating, adventure: you kept waiting for everything to come crashing down, and in the meantime so much of the book, despite brilliant characters and plot devices, seemed plodding and overwrought. The final climax, with the fight with the Death-Eaters, Sirius's death, and the revelation of the prophecy by Dumbledore to Harry, gave us what was necessary, but not what was sufficient. My impression, and the impression of many others, was that Order of the Phoenix was about clearing away brush, getting the final stage set up. It was good, but too long and not terribly rewarding; still, it got the job done and now, finally, with the sixth volume, we'd see Harry's world truly change.

By the time I was more than halfway through Half-Blood Prince yesterday, I thought Rowling wasn't pulling it off. Yes, I was intrigued, excited, and gratified by all the scenes with and information about Snape, Malfoy, and Voldemort; learning about Tom Riddle's history was fascinating, the introduction of the horcruxes was mysterious, and the tension with the Ministry over the war with Voldemort's followers was persuasive and affecting. But still, this exposition-heavy tale seemed sometimes like a retread from the first three books of the series: Dumbledore mysteriously sharing, and then withholding, of information; Harry's friends and allies still misunderstanding or distrusting one another; etc. I thought: Rowling doesn't get it; she doesn't see what kind of action she needs to bring on to live up to the stage she's unintentionally set; she still wants it to be a nice kids-at-school, growing-up book, when actually she's taken apart every reason to believe such an environment could sustain the weight of Harry's story; and so forth. I was liking it, but I was also disappointed in it. Despite all the new stuff--the appearance of new characters and relationships, and the sidelining of others--a lot of it felt like another Order of the Phoenix or worse: just treading water, while we await some new marker to tell us that the real finale is that much closer.

And then I hit the mid-point of chapter 25.

From that point (Harry's conversation with Trelawney) until the end, without let-up, Rowling rips one assumption (delusion?) out of the way after another. We learn that Snape's betrayal of Harry goes back to the original, fatal betrayal of his parents; we see Dumbledore weak and fearful in a horrifying scene of evil magic in the cave, and dependent upon Harry to complete his task; finally we see that everything that Harry has been obsessing about and warning people about for the entire book--and really for the entire series if you think about it--is correct: Snape is an agent of Voldemort, his betrayal is total, he has been guiding and manipulating Draco, and who knows who else, against Voldemort's foes from the very beginning. I re-read chps. 27 and 28 over again, searching for any sort of hint that there is some level yet hidden, some machination guiding the action. (Perhaps Dumbledore was pleading for Snape to kill him, because the potion he had drunk was slowly and painfully killing him? But that doesn't sound like Dumbledore at all, and anyway, how would Snape have known where Dumbledore and Harry had been?) I don't think there is. I think Rowling told us the score right from the book's beginning, when Snape makes the Unbreakable Vow to complete Draco's task; it is we, the readers, who listened to Dumbledore and trusted him, and assumed--along with everyone else, except Harry--that such an evil pact must not be the whole story, that the truth is yet to be discovered, the last shoe yet to be dropped. Well, guess what? Harry was right, we--and everyone else--was wrong. Harry had made the leap to the next level; it was the Ministry, Professor McGonagall and all the rest of the Hogwarts faculty, even Ron and Hermione, even Dumbledore himself, with all his lectures and assurances, who hadn't. I think this is something Rowling intended us to realize, once everything (literally in the case of the tower!) came crashing down: we readers were looking for something that was right in front of our eyes all along, which we still didn't see, because we allowed ourselves to believe (for reasons not dissimilar to those of all of Rowling's fictional characters) other than our most obvious impressions. The incredible, tour-de-force chapter "The Flight of the Prince" might be the best thing Rowling has ever written--yes, in a sense it's just another magical shoot-out, but thematically, with the chaos and confrontations, the fires and explosions, Snape and Potter screaming defiantly at one another, tearing away at every duplicity and bit of false decorum that Rowling had woven into their relationship for six years....it left me in shivers. Yes, she takes it to the next level all right, and does it in a way that leaves as shocked and wounded as her characters themselves. I couldn't have asked for anything more.

As for details--well, obviously my guess about the identity of the Half-Blood Prince was completely off. Snape was one of my suspects, but I was thinking about the prince as someone related to or involved in Voldemort's immortality; that he would have an entirely different significance in the book was completely off my radar. I was gratified that Draco's fate was made so central to the story, since I would have loathed for Draco to senselessly remain a bit player in Rowling's story (and I'm very anxious to see what becomes of him; like Peter Pettigrew, I suspect that he may, in the end, turn out to be an ally). The horcruxes are close enough to the means I imagined for Voldemort's immortality that I'll claim I got that one right. And, of course, with Dumbledore dead, Draco and Snape having fled, and Harry determined to move on, the central complication of Hogwarts in the story has essentially been resolved (or at least rendered moot). But who cares about all that now? What of the final volume?

Melissa reminds me that there are still a couple of important things we need to learn about Snape before the end. In particular, while we agree that Rowling is not pulling readers' legs, and really does consider Snape to have been essentially and fully revealed, it think it may be still important to understand how he came to take that Unbreakable Vow: was he happy to assist in Dumbledore's murder, a true "believer" in Voldemort, or was he a selfish and wretched man who kept playing both sides, until in a moment of challenge (Narcissa's pleading request, with Bellatrix suspiciously watching) he committed himself because he could imagine no other choice. (Perhaps part of the loathing Rowling says was in Snape's face when he killed Dumbledore was a hatred that comes from his self-deluded belief that Dumbledore's (mis)use of him had brought this on himself?) I also suspect that somewhere along the line, it'll be revealed that Snape, back during his student days, had been crazy about Lily Evans--and perhaps had hated himself for loving a Mudblood like her--which of course made her marriage to James Potter, Gryffindor hero, all the more galling, and his particular hatred of their son that much more clear. (My evidence for this guess? Apparently, Lily was very good at potions, Snape's area of expertise....) Of course, there is also the new mystery of "R.A.B.," who we learn has already stolen one of Voldemort's horcruxes and (perhaps) destroyed it. My guess is that it will be someone we've never heard of before, someone utterly disconnected from Harry's and the Ministry's world. And why not? Are we to think that Voldemort, through all his years of terror, made no other crusading, determined opponents besides those associated with either the Ministry of Magic or Hogwarts? Speaking of which....I think Rowling will have Harry be true to his final words in Half-Blood Prince; I think that Harry's relationship with Hogwarts in the final book will be, if not merely marginal, than highly unusual: perhaps he'll become a teacher (someone has to replace Snape!), or will only use it as a base of operations. I just don't think Rowling, having delivered this powerhouse wallop, will back off and return her story to "normal"; I expect the final volume to feature a very different Harry, acting on his own or with his friends and allies (perhaps a reformed Draco? a revealed R.A.B.?) to carry out his mission. Freed from the Hogwarts routine, I hope we finally see a lot more of characters who deserve a chance to shine: the now wounded Bill Weasley and all the rest of Ron's older brothers, Luna, and Neville, who I strongly suspect and fear is down on Rowling's "won't-make-it-out-alive" list. (And while we're at it, bring back Victor Krum!) Harry Potter, badass? Well, after this book, I think it's about time, don't you?