Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix opens today. I went so far as to Fandango.com my tickets. I am ducking out of work a little early to see it (well for matinee rates). I am also awaiting the last book in the series Harry Potter and the Deadly Hollows.
I never really considered myself a big fan of HP, but if you look at my behaviors I definitely am.
I picked up the mugglenet book on the seventh book. It has been very interesting reading. I am impressed with the rational and well constructed arguments within the text. The mugglenet book also makes me realize that JKR is a nut who has put way too much time into the world of wizards.
Not that I don’t enjoy the detail, but wow – overkill!
The attic full of mysteries is almost beyond measure. There are about 20 chapters, each with a mystery (or cluster of mysteries) that needs to be explained in the 7th book.
Some of my personal favorites.
à The pieces of Vold’s soul. Where are they and what are they?
-The Diary
-The Ring
-The Locket
-The Cup
-The serpent
-Unknown
-Is there a Seventh?
à Is Harry one of those pieces?
à The realization of the prophecy.
All of these are cool. The level of detail in the arguments surrounding the issues is also amazing. Mugglenet dissects the books, but also collects transcripts from interviews, copies of chatroom discussions. New release test, and anything else that could be useful. If I were JKR I would be just a bit creeped out by the level of scrutiny. I would also me very flittered it the depth of interest in a piece of fiction.

I am personally interested in the idea that JKR has a Christian theme to the story. Mugglenet has adopted a theory about allegory to authoritarian legend. These links centers on the analogy to the greatest Christian artifacts and the parallels with HP. Holy Grail, Lance of Longinus, Stone Tablet, etc…are all represented in the founding wizard houses. JKR has been nearly silent on the ideas of Christianity and her writing, but her critiques have been more than outspoken (annoyingly loud – free speech and all). As the characters celebrate all the regular Christian holidays (although Easter is conspicuously absent and Halloween is notoriously present) the issue of religion is less than a minor theme.