"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows"

"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" is the seventh book in the "Harry Potter" series by J. K. Rowling. After having read the book, the answer seems to be a mixture of "yes" and "no" - yes, the hero prevails and evil is vanquished as expected; no, the resolution as it plays out cannot really be called satisfactory. At least as of now, this book is supposed to be the final book in this series. So it was natural for me to wonder before picking it up whether it would provide a closure and a satisfactory resolution for this saga.

Unlike the previous books, the action in this book starts right away and the author more or less keeps the pace throughout (except for some boring pages describing the preparations for a marriage and perhaps too prolonged a description of the camping efforts of our heroes while on the run). It was a gripping read for me almost all the way through.

The book has quite a bit of violence and several deaths. In fact there are some seemingly-gratuitous deaths as well. As the characters have aged, their thoughts and dialogues have matured. As their circumstances have become worse, the narrative has also become darker. What started off as a series of books for children can no longer be called that.

For a plot that the author says has been forming in her head for several years, it has several glaring holes that become difficult to overlook. As has been the pattern in the previous books in this series, the heroes overcome seemingly-insurmountable hurdles through some very convenient and contrived turn of events. For example, the sword of Gryffindor becomes available to our heroes through some very contrived twists in the plot that is not even explained satisfactorily anywhere in the rest of the book. As another example, magical objects like wands or snitches that had one set of properties in the previous books suddenly acquire new and very convenient properties in this book that just happen to solve a particularly vexing problem facing our heroes.

The "Harry Potter" series certainly makes for an interesting read, but the tale could perhaps have been told in fewer books and with a tighter plot without losing its charm. Granted that you have to willingly suspend disbelief to enjoy such fantasies, but even within that world there has to be a certain logical consistency for you to be able to sustain that joy.

Of course, capturing the collective imagination of children and adults alike and sustaining it over the course of ten years and about 3,500 pages is no small feat. Hats off to Joanne Rowling for pulling it off.