Just finished the book in about eight hours. Not sure if I liked it, after the cosy feel-good themes of the first three, the change of pace in the fourth, the anxieties and discomfort of the fifth...this sixth Harry Potter books feels contrived, slow in patches, trite, and not very satisfying. The death of a major character always brings on the emotions and the odd tear, but I feel that JK Rowling has come to rely on these famous deaths to draw out emotions from her readers, but a deliberate tugging of the heart strings cannot replace a well directed plot and in-depth character development. Chamber of Secrets, my least favourite of the HP series had more continuity and back bone than this book. I felt very oddly detached from Harry and his friends, felt no fear from the war that was erupting around the central characters, and although Hogwarts now seemed a more hospitable place than in the fifth book (a widespread criticism of how Hogwarts was no longer the cosy haven in the fifth book, which I’m sure Rowling took on board), the ensuing cosiness and safety of the place seemed now to be shallow, and only there to please the hardcore Hogwarts fans. Strange that the only place where the MBP picked up was when the plot takes Harry outside Hogwarts grounds. I think the message is clear, Harry Potter is no longer a school boy. I feel that no amount of treacle tarts, frosted 12 Christmas trees, butterbeer in the Three Broomsticks, catching the snitch in Quidditch, and fumblings at the Burrow could help the seventh and final book in the HP series to become the masterpiece we expect it to be, if Rowling continues to rely on predictable deaths, and character changes and plot turns. Death is sad, it makes people cry, and unite those lilving in grief. But, death and its consequences do not make a mediocre book a good one. I don’t want to be made to cry and then forget about the book. I want to feel empathy and affinity with the characters and the plot. All in all, disappointed with this last instalment.