Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Finally finished it! The ten year hype bubble is over.
I should probably post a spoilerful review at some point, but I'll just note for now that I found Book 7 the best written of the whole series and I think I can finally forgive Rowling for her giga-fame. When the movies started up while the series was still in motion, I wasn't at all sure that she could pull it off, but she seems to have stuck to her guns, delivered a multi-volume story with a clear beginning, middle and end, and increasing emotional resonance. The series still isn't anywhere near the best writing of its genre - calling it derivative would be kindly, Rowling made a whole new art form out of a sort of deliberately misty-eyed retro pop-cultural remix - but. Well. Somehow, despite all odds, she made the style her own, and made the darned thing in all its Frankensteinian glory work. And somehow resurrected the young adult fantasy genre so lots of better writers (and plenty worse) could at last put something interesting on the bookshelves again after the dreary waves of grim Real Life Issue (tm) teen melodramas that flooded the 90s.
For that alone, the publishing world owes her a debt. But fortunately the last book is a good read, it's intelligent, it moves fast, and takes a few risks, and it ends... in the way it needs to.
And that's that.
