Book Review

On the run, on the quest

Harry and his friends draw on all their resources in the final book.

By COLETTE BANCROFT Times Book Editor
Published July 22, 2007

Most great children's books are really about growing up.

In the first six Harry Potter novels, J.K. Rowling told the tale of the boy wizard's education. In the seventh and last, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, she sends her hero and I do mean hero out into the world for the final exam to end all final exams.

From the first chapter, it's clear Harry and his readers are far outside the enchanted halls of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters gather around a table whose centerpiece is a torture victim, slowly revolving in midair.

This is not the Hogwarts Express, boys and girls.

In fact, Harry and his best pals, Ron and Hermione, don't go near their beloved school until a climactic, thrilling battle near the novel's end.

For most of its 759 pages, they are on the run. Voldemort, the evil wizard who killed Harry's parents and nearly lost his own life trying to kill the infant Harry, is back in full power. The Ministry of Magic and the Daily Prophet newspaper are openly under his control, Dementors and Death Eaters operate with impunity, a "pure blood" campaign persecutes wizards and witches whose family trees are besmirched with nonmagical Muggles.

The danger extends into the Muggle world, where a member of the good-guys Order of the Phoenix is serving as a bodyguard for the British prime minister. Rumor has it that some Death Eaters are hunting Muggles for sport.

More than anything, of course, Voldemort wants Harry dead. The boy to whom he is so powerfully, mysteriously connected is the only obstacle, or so he believes, to his own immortality.

Voldemort will do anything to defeat Harry - and the feeling is mutual. Harry, however, is concerned with much more than his own hide. He has been set a task by his mentor, the late great Hogwarts headmaster Dumbledore: to track down and destroy the Horcruxes, magical objects in which Voldemort has stored shreds of his own soul.

Harry soon learns there is another set of magical objects he must seek, the Deathly Hallows of the title - and Voldemort is on the hunt for them as well.

Much of the book is an enthralling series of escapes, invasions and battles, starting with Harry's breathtaking exit from Privet Drive and the home of his unpleasant Muggle aunt and uncle. From there, Rowling takes us through a spectacular robbery at Gringotts Bank and the final battle for Hogwarts, for which the author rolls out practically every character she has invented.

But Harry's quest is no mere action movie. He needs much of his courage to face what he learns about some of those dearest to him. The strain of chasing Hallows and Horcruxes while evading Voldemort almost cracks the bond among the three friends. Harry even discovers that Dumbledore, his longtime hero, had personal secrets that shock and dismay him.

Coping with such discoveries about the complexity of human behavior is one of Harry's most difficult tests, and one all young people share: learning that those we admire probably have feet of clay. If we really understand the lesson, we come to realize, as Harry does, that imperfection does not preclude wisdom. As his godfather Sirius once told Harry, "The world is not divided into good people and Death Eaters."

Hogwarts has taught Harry many other lessons that prove valuable. He certainly couldn't do what he does without the support and loyalty of his friends and teachers.

Speaking of teachers, it will warm their hearts to see how emphatically Rowling makes learning and research key to Harry's quest. Voldemort's greatest weakness may be that he doesn't do his homework about some of those magical objects, and Harry - with massive help from Hermione, of course - does.

Rowling was not kidding when she said several weeks ago that Deathly Hallows was "a bloodbath." At least nine major characters, good and evil, die. I won't tell you which ones this soon after the book's Saturday release.

But Rowling does answer many of her readers' major questions, not just about the fates of Harry and his friends, but also the burning question of whether Snape is good or evil and the related questions about Snape's relationship with Lily, and why he killed Dumbledore.

A few detestable characters slip by unpunished; tabloid journalist Rita Skeeter publishes a "biography" of Dumbledore so dreadful I was cheerfully looking forward to her stumbling into the Forbidden Forest and becoming a snack for a giant spider. Alas, no.

But some get their comeuppance. What happens to the odious former headmistress Dolores Umbridge is particularly satisfying. Others surprise us, including nasty old Dudley Dursley, Harry's cousin.

Readers who have questioned the rather patriarchal structure of the wizarding world will find satisfaction. Molly Weasley, the main maternal figure in Harry's life, presides formidably over her son Bill's wedding as the book begins and roars into Hogwarts' Great Hall at the end to kick Bellatrix Lestrange's fanny. Professor Minerva McGonagall leads the charge in the final battle. Dreamy Luna Lovegood turns out to have a spine of steel. Hermione saves the day more times than I could count.

And, of course, there is Lily Potter, who died to save her baby son and still has a role to play.

The book's epilogue will have shippers (fans who hope to see certain characters become couples) around the globe sighing in satisfaction, but it has a higher purpose than indulging romantic fantasies. Rowling's portrait of her characters in the future is not a slice of operatic heroism but a glimpse of the everyday. They have faced the extraordinary with wisdom and courage and come to know what they were fighting for all along - not fame or fortune but family, friends, and the power Dumbledore valued above all: love.

Editor's note: This review reflects the writer's opinions and contains some basic plot summary. It does not include spoilers, but does discuss some of the story line.

[Last modified July 21, 2007, 21:50:20]