cymbaljack

Sunday's Pioneer Press featured an article that purported to predict what was coming up in the final Harry Potter book, but the article was disappointing: mostly it was review; the few predictions were vague and obvious.

But I'm willing to be more bold. Here's what I think is coming, drawing on my considerable expertise as someone who's read most of the series once and skimmed through the rest:

(This entry may contain spoilers, but I don't know if it does--that's the point.)

• Snape is vindicated. Whatever he did to big D proves to have been at Dumbledore's request, and it won't actually be fatal. All along Snape has been doing the most dangerous task: acting as double-agent.
• The prophecy has always been about Neville, not Harry. Neville sacrifices himself to defeat Volde once and for all. Harry feels angst over this, but learns something when he realizes that his heroics were not the result of destiny, but of acting on good values and being brave and all that. Plus it's hard to be down when Ginny is in love with you.
• The house elves are freed or well on their way to being freed, and all the "old order" is pretty much turned upside-down. Magic society becomes more muggle-tolerant and Hermione is set to become a teacher and someday Headmistress of Hogwart's.
• Harry faces a dark choice and seems about to give in to a desire to do something really bad (kill somebody, probably) but then relents at the last minute.
• Harry somehow gets his parents back, probably through magic connection across time, but maybe through some kind of resurrection. Poor Neville only gets his parents back by dying to be with them in the afterlife.
• By the end, Harry pretty much turns his back on magic. If he doesn't lose his power, he puts his wand away for good.
• The book takes a good 800 pages to get to the end, of which only about 420 is necessary to actually tell the story, and yet millions of people are sad that there's no more of it.

So there's my guesses. We'll see if I ever manage to get it read to find out how close I was.

Labels: Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling, predictions, reading