Newsweek Names "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" Best Book of the Year
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Posted by: Sue
December 16, 2007, 02:04 PM
The end of the year list mania continues as Newsweek magazine has selected "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" as their Best Book of 2007. In an article titled "Wizards, Warmongers and the West Coast," the magazine lists their 15 best books, with the final installment of the Harry Potter series at the number one spot. They write:
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. J. K. Rowling.
You could call it the most satisfying ending to a guessing game since the casting of Scarlett O'Hara. The seventh and final installment of the Potter series went in no radical directions [spoiler omitted here], but Rowling made it look effortless when she niftily tied off one plot line after another. The kids who grew up on these novels--and therefore can't help but take them somewhat for granted--have no idea how lucky they are.
Also, earlier Time magazine posted 50 top ten year end lists, and ranked "Deathly Hallows" at number eight on their list of "Best Fiction Books" of the year. The magazine states of the novel by J.K. Rowling:
There's no point in trying to finesse the importance of Harry Potter. In seven books Rowling proved that books can still be a true global mass medium, and that significant chunks of the known world can still embrace a single story. Deathly Hallows finds Rowling is in fine form, pulling all the stops she'd been saving up. She gives us wartime gloom, the crackling three-sided chemistry of Harry and Ron and Hermione, and an epic, cataclysmic finale, among many other minor treats. This isn't the most elegant of the Potter volumes, but it feels like an ending, the final iteration of Rowling's abiding thematic concern: the overwhelming importance of continuing to love in the face of death.
Thanks to all who emailed!
38 Comments
way to go jo!
Posted by pottershrink on December 16, 2007, 09:17 AM
it is the best book of he century not the yr only
Posted by dg_4ever on December 16, 2007, 09:18 AM
Newsweek pwnz Time Magzine here. ;)
Still mad at Time for that asinine article on the Dumbledore situation. Honestly.
Posted by Kelly on December 16, 2007, 09:20 AM
very very good book wish there was another book coming out soon very sad that fred dies very sad that alot of people die like snape etc. wish there was another book
Posted by vellton on December 16, 2007, 09:27 AM
HP6 WAS best of 2005 with all its merits.
HP7 is so far to be the best of July.
Posted by Megan on December 16, 2007, 09:38 AM
WOW! A lot of awards for DH. The posting of reviews of the Tales of Beedle the Bard and the release of the OotP DVD. That’s a lot HP to be getting on with, considering that at this time last year we didn’t even know the title of the 7th book yet!
What a year it’s been!
Posted by Glenn on December 16, 2007, 10:20 AM
i want to know, and i’m sure everyone else wants to know it too…WHO IS BEEDLE THE BARD??...i hope J.K tells us more of him, cuz if he wrote the book he’s the one who knew about the deathly hallows and the deathly hallows arent a legend, they’re real…so could he be the founder of the deathly hallows??Am i making any sense??Plz tell me what do you think od my conclusion…
Posted by Me on December 16, 2007, 10:29 AM
I disagree. To be honest. It was a HUGEseller. Which does not make a book the best of a year. Not literary terms. In many ways the book was not really as brilliant as the sales figures want to make us believe. But nowadays commercial superlatives rule what is good and what is bad. No benchmark for me though.
Posted by Marianne on December 16, 2007, 10:37 AM
Well, it was not my favorite book of the series, but without any doubt, it was the book of the year! So congrats Jo!
Posted by Aaron on December 16, 2007, 10:53 AM
these books are amazing! i’ve read so many times i quote them in everyday life.
Posted by dancer on December 16, 2007, 11:12 AM
(the books are way better than the movies)
Posted by dancer on December 16, 2007, 11:13 AM
Ugh…I’d have to disagree
“but Rowling made it look effortless when she niftily tied off one plot line after another”
I don’t think so…too many contrivances in that area. Oh, there aren’t such things as REAL invisibility cloaks? Ok… If The Tales of Beetle the Bard are so famous, why haven’t we heard of at least their name?
“but it feels like an ending”
No, it feels like any other Harry Potter book with the last five or six chapters of the ending slapped on.
Posted by Corey on December 16, 2007, 11:26 AM
@Aaron,
not to me. Tastes are different, of course. But this book was an ethics letdown.
Posted by Marianne on December 16, 2007, 12:46 PM
concrtz Jo u rock
Posted by picazo on December 16, 2007, 01:23 PM
i love Daniel redcliffe
eu amo harry potter
Posted by sisley on December 16, 2007, 01:31 PM
way to go jo!