Finis

I finished the book at 1:00 this morning. I should have taken pictures of the state of my house since I first started reading this weekend. Dishes in the sink, laundry on the floor, rats scurrying into the dark corners of my kitchen as I turned on the lights. Ok, there were no rats, but as predicted every obligation and responsibility was forgotten as soon as the book entered the house. Autumn’s almost two years old and hardly too young to fend for herself. I sometimes wonder why she hasn’t gone out to earn her keep and help pay for the food she so happily flings on the floor.

I don’t want to give away any of the secrets of the book, though I know the two or so people who read this aren’t into Harry Potter. Anyway, I loved the book. I didn’t weep buckets as I did when I finished the last one, but I did get misty eyed and sighed deeply as I read the last pages. It was a fitting end to the fantastical world JK Rowling had created.

I came late to the party, only having read the series two years ago. I started book one in January 2005 on a flight out to Las Vegas and finished it on the flight back. To this day I consider that the highlight of my trip; reading Harry Potter and The Socerer’s Stone on the plane. A few weeks later I found out I was pregnant (no, she wasn’t conceived in Vegas but shortly after) and continued to read the rest of the series through the spring and into the summer. I finished the Half Blood Prince when I was six months pregnant. For that reason alone I think the books will always be very special to me.

I was thinking that in a few years I would start reading these books to Autumn, a chapter a night before bed, but now that the story is complete I think it’s one that she would enjoy more if she read it herself. As confident as I am that I can produce a decent English accent, I think she would be better served by the voices conjured by her own imagination as he reads on her own. Unless, of course, she’s like George Costanza and can’t stand to read a book because every voice she hears is her own. Heaven forbid!

So anyway, the story’s done and Rowling can take a much deserved break. She gave us a great gift and I have to say, at the end, it was so freaking sweet to finally see Molly Weasly kick some magical ass.