Retro? Should we kill him?
I just put a hex on him. ;-)
I've read all the Harry Potter books and enjoy the series. I just thought it was a great line.
I have to admit I was disappointed after reading book 7, although the book itself was well-written. If it's okay to talk fantasy on a sci-fi thread, here goes:
Several of the plot devices were very clunky. in Prisoner of Azkaban, Dumbledore, Snape and Lupin all knew the Shrieking Shack was a hangout with a path directly to Hogwarts, but nobody thought to check to see if Sirius was using it. In Goblet of Fire, anything could have been used as a portkey, but Voldemort and Crouch work out a plan that requires Harry to win a tournament in order to get him to touch the Triwizard cup? Why didn't Moody (Crouch) just give Harry a detention one night and make him go out to dig onions and make the shovel a portkey? Even in small things, there are irritating inconsistencies. For example, in Order of the Phoenix, the twins are in Harry's room, and they hear Mrs. Weasley trying to sneak up the stairs, so they apparate, which creates a loud crack. Why can't she hear a loud crack when they can hear a soft step on the stairs?
Despite the flaws, Rowling writes characters brilliantly, and that's the strength of her work. The reader believes her characters are alive, even the minor ones are incredibly well fleshed out.
By the way, another thing that bugged me, besides the whole Dumbledore is gay thing, is that I read an interview where Rowling was relating a conversation she had with Daniel Radcliffe. It was after she'd seen him in Equus, but before she'd written book 7. She said she told him she was writing him a nude scene in HP 7. She ended up writing three nude scenes, one involving seven Harrys. She's like 40, and he just turned 18. That's a little creepy to me.