I am rereading HP5 right now, I forgot how truly dark this one is. Like no glimmer of hope with relentless pounding of stupidity from above ( GWB, anyone) combined with basic adolescence angst. . I was talking with C , my co-worker's daughter, and she says 5 is her favorite. I think when I read it the first time my eyes were half closed - I think I missed a lot due to the pain. ( pain for the characters)

Beth, I had much the same reaction to Book 5. It's one I have not been able to bring myself to re-read.

My DH just re-read them all, and picked 5 as his favorite (unseating 3, who previously held that honor). He says she did a perfect job writing an adolescent boy.

But, he digs Russian novels too.

Oh, and, I don't know if I posted this already, but here's the difference between me and Mallory's godfather:

Our townhouse has dormer windows on the top, seemingly indicating a third floor, but they actually go into the attic. Mal's godparents were helping me move in, and O asked "What's behind those windows?" In unison, I said "Jane Eyre" and L said "Greg Brady's room."

(and yes, I know Jane wasn't the one in the attic)

I've not been rereading my HP as I intended. I got sucked into various books due to HAVING A LIBRARY WITHIN WALKING DISTANCE! So very excited.

I'm reading Queen Bees and Wanna-Bes right now, and Joe is reading Queen Bee Moms and Kingpin Dads by her as well.

Awesome stuff. Highly rec for anyone with daughters.

Raq - do you do librarything?

Funny HP7-related story -- the UAHC recently commissioned a new prayerbook to replace Gates of Prayer in Reform Jewish synagogues throughout the country. Unfortunately, the first run of the new books had a major printing error and several pages were badly smeared. The HP link? Because the HP books and the UAHC prayerbooks use the same kind of paper, the UAHC is now in a major time crunch to order the reprints before the presses run out!

Salon gathered bunches of people to speculate on the new HP.

Finished HP5 - and honestly, after rereading - it might win for best - JKR really captured that first time when you realizes that the world is truely fucked up. I have a friend who is really suffering because his daughter has changed from a a fairly frivolous social butterfly to someone who sees all the problems in the world. He is proud of her, but she has a really hard time seeing the joy in life right now. and that is where Harry is in book 5. I am really glad I reread it. (I also found that once I got past the first hundred or so pages, it was very easy to keep going). The first is always going to have a place in my heart. It introduced me to a world that I fell head over heels for.

Sox, I started in on LibraryThing (ZoneWombat is me), but I have about 5 billion more books to input and I didn't bring my CueCat.

I'm actually thinking about starting up a separate LT account for the boxes of books I need/want to get rid of.