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Sometime a week before Book 7 came out, someone commented (I can't find it now) that Harry would , but then come back. I think most everyone on the site thought it was a silly idea. It sparked something in my brain though, I told several people at that time that I thought that just might be the perfect solution, but I couldn't figure out how J.K. could make it work. J.K. is J.K. of course, and she did!

So, the half of the Harry Potter fans in the world who thought Harry would were right! And the other half who thought he would live were also right!

For me, as I was reading, the book seemed to drag at places, it seemed like they spent a lot of time waiting around. Looking back now, I see I was just being impatient, wanting to know the end of the story. J.K. got them through the horcruxes little by little, with the other intrigue of the Three Hallows thrown in to disrail them, and ended up tieing all the loose ends nicely.

Here on this site, I was right all along, Dumbledore was , but as I've maintained for years, he was ed by Snape on Dumbledore's orders, as a part of some as of yet unexplained grand plan. We finally know what that plan was.

On the other hand, there were several points that fans have been adamant for months and months about that I refused ever to believe. Harry was a horcrux, and even though I said I never thought that was true, I also said the only way it could have possibly happened was by accident, which of course is how it turned out it happened.

All the Snape/Lily shippers are this morning both incredibly happy (that they were right) and incredibly sad (that in the end, Snape had to without reconciling with her only son, Harry). I always believed Snape was ultimately on our side, but never bought the Snape/Lily thing for a second.

We were ALL wrong about about what I had named, for lack of anything better, the Septology Symbol. I thought we had nailed it, the Greek letter Delta (a triangle) and the Greek letter Phi (a circle with a vertical line through it) standing for Dumbledore (Delta) Phoenix (Phi). It, of course, ending up being the anti-Dumbledore symbol, the symbol of the Three Hallows.

Nobody got anywhere near guessing anything right about the Hallows, as far as I know.

Mostly everyone got it right that the UK Children's cover was a Gringott's vault, and they were probably there looking for horcruxes. And even though opinion varied widely on this, I was strongly in the camp that the being on Harry's back on the UK Children's cover was a Goblin, not a House-Elf, because of the ears and the fingers, although I couldn't imagine why Harry'd have a Goblin on his back. (Rob Gringott's? You'd have to be mad!)

I'm still not exactly sure what is pictured on the US cover... Most of the conversation about it here revolved around the fact that neither Harry or Voldemort had wands, but in both of thier confrontations at the end of the book, they are using wands. Is the picture the ultimate moment, when Voldemort has just done the AK, and Harry has just Expelliarmused the Elder Wand?

We do finally know why Dumbledore smiled when Harry told him about Voldemort using his blood in Goblet of Fire. Dumbledore knew his plan was complete when he learned that, and that even though Harry had to , Harry would be safe. Only J.K. Rowling could take such a complicated series of events and make it sound so logical and simple.

Some people we cared about d. Madeye. George disfigured and now missing his twin, who d doing what he did best, making a joke. Lupin and Tonks. Poor Teddy has to grow up without parents. But he has a godfather who knows what that's like.

And in a strange bit of irony, actor Jamie Waylett's birthday was yesterday (July 21), so his character, Vincent Crabbe, d in the book that came out on his birthday!

But Percy came back at the last minute to stand with the Weasleys. Narcissa redeemed the Malfoy family and saved Harry by lieing for him. And Neville took his proper heroic place in the prophecy.

A fairy tale ending for the greatest fairy tale of our generation that live for many generations to come. Thank you, Jo.

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Published July 22, 2007

This article is Copyright © 2007, David Haber, and may not be reproduced on other web sites or in print, in whole or in part, without expressed permission