Oh, gosh how do I do this? There’s not a lot I can talk about without spoiling the book for those of you who haven’t read it yet. This is difficult. Let me just start with this.

We now enter the conclusion of the epic tale of Harry Potter.

The Harry Potter books have become increasingly darker as it goes on in the series, and book seven is no exception. I can’t exactly say why, because that would ruin it for a lot of people. But J.K. Rowling writes every little thing so carefully it all comes into play. Everything is connected throughout the series. You might not notice it now, but there are brief mentions in the earlier books of things that are more involved in the story in the later books, and every single thing comes together in the final book. Harry has already lost his parents and can’t afford to lose anybody else now, and Voldemort will kill and kill to get to Harry. Voldemort has been targeting Harry ever since Harry defeated him as a baby, but Voldemort wants him now more than ever. Harry is trying desperately to avoid Voldemorts path, but again is worried that he might be after his family. This book is spell-binding, and is a must-read for everyone.

We dig deeper and deeper into the characters and realize that there are much more to them then we think. We are made to see that kindly Dumbledore, sinister Severus Snape and perhaps even the awful Muggle cousin Dudley Dursley may be more complicated than they initially seem, that all of them, like Harry, have hidden aspects to their personalities. When you finish the seventh book, the characters in this series have seemed like your best friend from the start, and when you turn the final page of book seven, it’s like your best friends have just all died away. You know everything there is to know about them, and you feel close to them and then Avada Kedavra! They’re gone, and it’s never the same. Reading about these characters and their struggles and their strengths and their messy noses and their torn shirts and their pet iguanas that none of them have make you somehow feel closer to your friends and want them to be as close to you as Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Dumbledore and Dobby and Malfoy and Neville and Ginny and Hagrid and Fred and George were to you. That’s what makes the characters in this book special. They feel real.

Finishing Harry Potter is like having your pet run away. You’ll never read anything else like it. Just like if your pet runs away, it’s like you’ll never hook his leash onto his collar and take him outside to his business ever again. That is, if you like doing that, which I’m not sure a lot of people do. Anyways, my reaction to closing the final book for the final time and closing the final page for the final time and reading the words Harry Potter and Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger and Ginny Weasley and Hagrid and Dumbledore and Snape and Voldemort just give me pain. I read the last page over and over until I had memorized it by heart. I couldn’t read another book for about two weeks. I needed the fact that Harry Potter was over for me to sink into my brain-and my heart. You wish Harry and Ron and Hermione were real, and you had been best friends and you were at Hogwarts and you battled Voldemort at Harry’s side, and that’s what it feels like reading these books. I just can’t believe it’s over.

I don’t want to get to much into the American cover, because for some reason I just don’t like it. If I were the cover designer, I would’ve done something that reminded me of all the books, like little snippets of every cover surrounding Harry or something. Then when I would open it, I would reminded of all the books.

And the British cover has something on the front that’s a really important event in the story, so it sort of spoils, but it doesn’t if you don’t know what it is.

Betsy Bird made this book #24 on her list of the Top 100 Children’s Novels of all time, and I definitely agree with this choice. It should totally be on the list.

If you haven’t read the series finale of Harry Potter, do so now. And trust me, you’ll be glad you did.