Half-Blood Prince: Chapter 7: The Slug Club

[handhfan]

This is my first summary, so be easy on me. :) Sorry if this is a little long, I think I got carried away…

Chapter 7: The Slug Club

Harry is spending a lot of time over the last week to figure out why Malfoy was in Knocturn Alley, and why he was in a good mood. He came up with an irrational suspicion that Draco could be a DE. To make matters

Comments

[geezer_also]

I will make a note to check it out when I re-read, but I didn't get the feeling that, Harry had never even noticed McCragen or Zambini before. I just felt the intros were in Slughorns personality. (altho I do like the idea, of JKR calling up central casting, and asking for a rival for Ron, needed for just one book)Sometimes I get the feeling that some of you want too much, and while I agree we could always use more info and back story, it would take 2 books for each year (at least the length of GoF) to get it all in

[cadesama]

Eh, better Harry than anyone else on the good guys' side (possibly barring Snape). Harry actually recognizes danger when he sees it, unlike everyone else. And, really, his plan failed due to cockiness not stupidity. Harry is so used to sneaking around in his cloak that he never considered that he might need a plan. His plans, when he actually has them, usually work out fine (saving Buckbeak, random DA times, Felix Felicis, etc).

[house_elf_44]

Harry spent his last week of summer wondering about Draco. Hermione says it’s fishy, and there can be a lot of explanations. Hm, just like readers of HBP. The trio is sitting on/near the window in the twins bedroom, and Harry is trying to figure out what Draco is up to. Ron is fixing his broom, and scraping dirt off the handle. So, if we can assume that there are still flowers in a vase near that window, (the boxes of stock are still there and presumably so is the smell like gunpowder) I think there’s room to think that "the woody scent of a broomstick handle, and something flowery he thought he might have smelled at the Burrow" from Amortentia fumes are related to his time at the Burrow. It could have been from when he figured out Draco is a Death Eater, with the vase of flowers and Ron scraping a broom handle right there. Or previously I was thinking it was from playing Quidditch over the Weasley’s garden for weeks with his friends

[pilly2009]

Harry and Hermione are interpreting Malfoy’s behavior in Madame Malkins differently, which might be a first. And I think they’ve switched roles a bit. Hermione was rash in trying to question Borgin, and has become more emotional than ever in this book, and Harry is the one thinking and figuring things out.

I know, and I think this might be a good part of the problem cadesama was talking about with Hermione earlier. Harry has begun incorporating thought into his recklessness, and could even be said to be growing intellectually, and therefore growing away from Hermione (who has always had to do his thinking for him). In some sort of thematic retaliation, Hermione in HBP acts on her emotions more than she has ever before. The reason I say Harry could be growing away from Hermione is because...well, following thought with recklessness has ended successfully for Harry -- it's the first time ever that his initial suspicion has been corect. Yet allowing emotion to rule her behaviour has NOT worked out for Hermione in HBP, has in fact gotten her

[house_elf_44]

...she has nothing particular anymore to offer Harry...If she was her old self she does. She still has the skills it took to organize SPEW, the DA, think things through, figure things out, solve a logic puzzle, finagle an article in the Quibbler, and control Rita Skeeter - she just didn't use them this year, except for researching that Eileen Prince was the HBP

[house_elf_44]

except for researching that Eileen Prince was the HBP.

oops...you know what I meant.

[fraught]

Ginny is so cool in this chappie! Not only does she hex Zacharias Smith for the grievous crime of asking questions (wooo! go, Ginny!), she doesn't even get a detention for it! Instead, she gets invited to a super special elite club! And then -- she calls Blaise Zabini a "poser". *gasp* What a terrible insult! No wonder Blaise had nothing to say to that; bet he's still smarting from that one.

*eyeroll*

Gimme a fucking break. Dear Ginny Sue, I hope the monster in Harry's chest eats you whole in the next book. No love, auster.

I absolutely adore the scene where Draco beats the shit out of Harry. I love me some Harry, but it was high time for Draco to get the last word (or in this case, stomp) in for a change. Also love how he didn't let on having spotted Harry entering the compartment. <3 Draco.

[trash_addict]

I sincerely hope I can resist spending the rest of a chapter a day bashing Ginny, because she's a character I genuinely liked in OotP. But she is a bit of a bitch. And I think the tripping-over-Ron incident is a pirme example. She can be cruel, and maybe that's a requirement for survival in the Weasley house, having a defence mechanism when you're up against Fred and George, but it's hardly endearing for the girl we're all meant to be happy about Harry ending up with. Ugh.

I was laughing my ass off when Draco stamped on Harry. Horrible? Yes, but it was so nice seeing Draco have a friggin backbone. And, well, Harry was an idiot. Bad things happen when you're not careful, and he surely should have learnt that by now. There's only been 5 years of proof, after all.

[woman_ironing]

I wasn't amused to see Harry having his face stamped on - it seemed very vicious to me! Although H/D shippers seem to be quite happy about it, I thought JKR was emphasising the gulf between Harry and Draco and reminding us that Draco is nasty. I guess Draco could have done worse, though, and wonder what held him back. Harry's reaction was embarrassment rather than anger - just a successful Malfoy schoolboy prank.

Another great fanfic moment: Draco reclining with his head on Pansy's lap.

Hey! There's only one girl I'd be happy for Harry to end up with ... (cough)! Lol.

[schtroumph_c]

I can't answer for everyone, but Ron told Fred and George, and maybe his other brothers, hopefully, not his mother, what the fandom think of Ginny

[house_elf_44]

and Harry begin her third relationship, not her.

She came running to fling her arms around him with a blazing hard look. Where did that come from? We had seen signs that Cho liked Harry, but there wasn't anything like that for Ginny. I say Ginny made the first move, and Harry reacted.

[annearchy]

I've read a theory recently that Harry in HBP has become something of an empath. He's incredibly open to the feelings of people around him, particularly if he is sensitized to them in some way. So, suppose that Snape, instead of really trying to teach Occlumency to Harry, was actually doing things that would open Harry's mind further to Voldemort's thoughts? What if that led to Harry being more open to the feelings of people nearby? And what if somehow he had been given and/or was frequently, but sporadically, being dosed with small amounts of love potion? That might account for him having these "monster in the chest" (really, much lower;) thoughts about Ginny at very sporadic times throughout HBP. I mean, for a guy who is CRUSHING on a girl, he barely thinks of her except when she is around him or someone mentions her. VERY odd behavior for a crush-er. But if his mind has already been opened to let him sense other people's feelings, maybe that makes him more susceptible to Ginny's crush on him. She does say at the end that she never

[cadesama]

Actually, a Mary Sue isn't necessarily a self-insertion, because a self-insertion isn't necessarily a Mary Sue. A Mary Sue, on the most basic level, is a non-main character who distorts the plot and other characters around himself or herself. Hermione isn't a Mary Sue because not every character instantly loves her with no substantial explanation from her textual behavior. Fleur is sort of a mockery of a Mary Sue, what with the swooning from men that always instantly occurs -- yet, even she isn't a true one because Harry reacts to her as a real person, and the female character aren't nearly so endeared to her.

Ginny though . . . why is she (to all appearances) popular in OotP? Nothing of her personality that had been established in PS/SS-GoF would lead us to think that she's a spunky, charismatic leader among her peers. Why is do even the Slytherins think she's hot in HBP, when we've heard no descriptions of her looks, nor seen her as attracting much male attention before? Why are things that many in the fandom perceive as