Now that I've finished HP6 --

First, Dumbledore won't be coming back to life a la Gandalf. The last 50 pages can be Anya'ed as, "Dumbledore is dead. Deceased. Shuffled off the mortal coil. Gone west. Started the long dirt nap. And, finally, dead." While JKR may be a master at misdirection, she doesn't cheapen emotion. DD's ghost/spirit may make an appearance in HP7, but he won't come back to life.

I was struck by how many half-bloods played such important roles in the book. Snape, of course. But Harry and Voldy are also half-bloods.

I don't like the idea of Book 7 dumping the school-year structure. I like even less the idea of dumping Hermione and Ron at the Weasleys while Harry hunts the Horcruxes along. So I'm hoping that Harry's plans fall to pieces.

Fred, I'd be surprised if Hermione and Ron let Harry go off on his own. I also have a feeling that Ginny and Neville will also insist on getting involved. It would make a nice parallel to the Marauders, w/ Ginny playing the Lily role.

Also, I think that JKR included the bit about Dumbledore's portrait and the other talking portraits for a damned good reason. We'll be hearing from that painting in book 7.

More analysis than HP6 is probably worth:

I started re-reading, and there's a bit of parallelism: When Harry and Dumbledore go to Slughorn's, Dumbledore says "You're safe, because you're with me." And not everything is as it seems at Slughorn's; Horace is an armchair. Later, in the Horcrux cave, Dumbledore says "I'm safe, because I'm with you." So very possibly something is not as it seems then too (I'm thinking Snape's apparent treachery to Dumbledore, but it could be something else. Heck, it could've been that the locket wasn't the Horcrux.)

And I agree, Fred. Cedric hasn't come back, Sirius hasn't come back (and Kreacher passed to Harry), in fact no one who's died has come back. So even without the fall off the tower and the pages spent on the emotion, I am not expecting Dumbledore back as such. Though I agree with Anne about the portrait.

Another item unused: Fred and George give Harry some Detonating Decoys, and to the best of my memory he didn't use them. Like the mirror they might come back later.

Anne, (1) exactly, and (2) good way to bring that into play.

HP VI -- Fred I do think that some of the action will take place at Hogwarts. This may be wishful thinking on my part to some extent, because I like the idea of Harry, Ron and Hermoine finishing their school work (it’s the nerd in me). JKR has certainly set it up for the action to take place elsewhere – at Sirius’ (now Harry’s) house; at the Ministry of Magic (where that veil and other mysteries are), at Godric’s Hollow (where Harry’s parents were killed and where I think a Horcrux was created, if not still there), etc. However, I also think that we’ll see some of Hogwarts, too. We’ve been told of Tom Riddle’s deep connection to Hogwarts. And DD’s brother is in Hogsmeade right nearby. And Ginny is there, as well as Neville and Luna.

I think Hogwarts will be the scene of the climax. Harry and his bunch at one end of the Great Hall, Voldemort and his crew at the other end, the ghosts hanging about--I wonder if Sirius can come back as a ghost--and Snape and Draco in the middle waiting to declare themselves.

I think Draco has pretty well declared himself. It's more a question of whether Voldy wants him.

As for Snape, there's one Big Question JKR almost has to answer in Book 7 -- why did Dumbledore trust him so implicitly? Until we have the answer to that, we have no idea where Snape is going to be. That may be the reason for Dumbledore's ghost to make an appearance.

But there's another question -- is Snape really the HBP? I remember somewhere that the HBP's Potions book was 50YO. That's Tom Riddle's day, not Snape's. Unless that's more misdirection because Snape could have bought it second-hand.

I'm guessing that the 50 year old Potions book was Snape's mother's. If his father was as abusive as the Pensieve memory in OotP indicates, it would make sense that he wouldn't want to spend too much money in the magical world, especially when Snape could just as well use his mother's schoolbooks.

Oooooh, good one Kathy! Also fits in perfectly with Hermione's repeated "how do you know the Prince was male?" motif.

I don't think we'll see any of our characters as ghosts, as Nick made it pretty clear that it's a kinda crappy afterlife.