I forgot about that, and I realize now that I misread what shamrock227 had said. My previous post on this subject was all wrong.
I don’t know… we have a pool here at work to see if he will die (I work at a college, we really have better things to be doing.)
It would seem to me that if he does go, it would be in some sort of redemption type of scenario…
I hope so anyway, I don’t want to lose my five bucks.
Dunno about Draco – I think Pettigrew and Snape are both marked for Big Redemptive Deaths, and three of those would probably be one too many. I can see Draco and / or Percy redeeming himself in some lower-key way and getting to live, though, since neither of them has done anything particularly bad as yet. (I do think redemption is going to be a major, major theme of this last book.)
I don’t think any of Harry, Ginny, Ron, and Hermione will die – the Big Deaths are more likely second-tier characters. I have a feeling either Neville or Dean, but not both, is on the chopping block, for the following reason:
Since Dean’s story line seems to have been more or less “replaced” by Neville’s, they strike me as likely candidates for characters whose original fates ended up changing.
Perhaps we’ll have Fudge, Scrimgeour, Umbridge, Wormtail, Percy, Draco, and Snape all joining forces together and dying en masse in a giant redemption-o-rama, leaving Harry stunned and speechless for a whole chapter. 
Oh, and about Dean’s story line: I know Ms. Rowling has said that she might write a Potter encyclopedia about the characters. I would prefer that she edit an “annotated Harry Potter” with footnotes, the footnotes being all the background that she made up but never included. Similarly to the “scholarly” footnotes in the book Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell - a wonderful book about magic in 19th-century England.
I wonder: could the cover of the UK children’s version be of Harry’s vault at Gringotts? We know that Harry is fabulously rich.
I was just rereading this book, and now it has me wondering. Could Snape have been there with Voldemort? Was Harry really hearing Snape’s voice in the memory, and just assuming it was Voldemort? Something about the dialogue seemed very unlike Voldemort; he’d squash Lily like a bug, not get irritated and start arguing with her. But I can see Snape saying, basically, hey my Master’s not here for you, girl, just the baby, so get out of the way before he notices you and kills you.
An upset Snape says the same words (“stupid girl!”) to Hermione at the end of the same book. I’m wondering if Rowling did that intentionally as a clue.
I don’t think Harry is “fabulously rich”… probably he has about as much money as Arthur Weasly. But Arthur has 7 children to look after, and Harry doesn’t.
Well, we know that his vault at Gringott’s has a lot more gold in it than Arthur Weasley’s. I also wondered about whether that could be what was on the cover, though - perhaps the armor is a Godric Gryffindor relic that belonged to James and Lily?
My idle speculation.
I think that both Dumbledore and Sirius died, essentially to protect Harry, will be significant in either the final battle, or in recovering the Horcruxes. Rowling has said that Sirius had to die for some reason. Perhaps to provide an extra layer or two of "love protection." There is little doubt that both men felt a measure of love for Harry
We know that Harry isn't Griffindor's heir, but perhaps Dumbledore was (that's why he had the sword, which isn't a horcrux). His brother Ableforth is the barmand at the Hog's Head so often mentioned
Don't subscribe to the theory that Harry, his scar, or his gym shorts are horcruxes.
Ginny will survive to marry Harry (think about it, red hair, and Harry would go from being almost a member of the Weasley family, to an actual member). Not before she gets to be the "damsel in distress", after being nabbed if not by Voldy, then by Draco or Snape.
Snape is a very bad man. Dumbledore knew this, and chose to exploit him as a double agent.
As for who will use magic, the candidates are either muggles (the Dursleys) or squibs (Mrs. Figg, or Filch). Rowling herself has said Petunia is not a witch, and that Dudley "is just Dudley". So my guess is one of the squibs. Perhaps Mrs. FiggI’m still holding out for Neville to exact vengeance on Bellatrix for his parents, and dies in the process. A long shot alternative is that he has a hand in or is ultimately responsible for Voldemort’s end, because of the birthday link to the prophecy.
Yes, it was I who pointed this out last fall in a previous Harry Potter thread, but I must put on my pedant hat for a moment to say two of the relics do correspond to suits of a Tarot deck, and the other two… may yet. It is certainly a suspicious conjunction — four houses, four suits, and two of the symbols line up.
My predictions for Book 7 attempt to line up Harry’s typical school routine with the tracking of the Horcruxes because, yes, I do think he will go back to school. He’ll have to.
Horcrux Event #1: Gringotts Bank
[ul][li]Harry gets his money from Gringotts every year.[]Gringotts is the safest hiding place in the world.[]In the first book someone suggested Gringotts could even have a dragon underground.[]Gringott’s is run by goblins, no friends to wizards.[]Gringotts is a bank; therefore it stores coins.[]Coins are a symbol of Tarot.[]Coins can fit inside a locket.[]There is a locket at the Black residence that none of them could open: it may be empty.[]Bill Weasley is a curse-breaker… for Gringott’s bank.[]Bill Weasley specializes in breaking into places like Gringotts.[]Charlie Weasley is a specialist in dragons.[]Harry is attending Bill Weasley’s wedding right before he goes to look for the Horcruxes, and right before school starts.[/ul][/li]Therefore, Horcrux Event #1 will begin at the wedding, where Harry learns some vital bit of information and enlists Bill (and maybe charming Fleur) to help break into Gringotts to take Voldemort’s Coin.
Horcrux Event #2: Diagon Alley
[ul][li]Harry goes to Diagon Alley every year.[]Ollivander’s is in Diagon Alley.[]Ollivander sells wands, the other Tarot symbol.[]Ollivander disappeared and may have been kidnapped.[]Harry’s and Voldemort’s wands cannot directly duel each other.[]Voldemort may have abducted Ollivander, who makes the best wands, to replace his phoenix-tail wand with something else.[]Fred and George also have a shop in Diagon Alley.[]Fred and George make very, very convincing fake wands, good enough to fool experienced wizards. This could play a role, but I don’t know what.[*]Harry guessed in Book 4 that they would all need a good laugh before the end.[/ul][/li]Therefore, Horcrux Event #2 will involve what I suspect is the wand of Ravenclaw and a possible substitute wand made by Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes. The issue of Priori Incantatem between the two wands complicates the notion of a Ravenclaw Horcrux, and it’s hard to sort out the intertwining possibilities.
Horcrux Event #3: Hogwarts
[ul][li]If the above reasoning is correct, that the Cup of Hufflepuff is a Horcrux, and that therefore Ravenclaw is a Wand and Slytherin is a Coin (or a Pentacle), then Gryffindor’s Sword must play some role. My educated guess is that Percy Weasley must have some part in this, though precisely what, I don’t know. Weasley is a Gryffindor, though a persnickety one, and he’s got to find redemption somehow.[/ul][/li]Horcrux Event #4: Voldemort
[ul][li]Obviously.[/ul][/li]
The above is all complicated by the Weasley Clock, which shows all members of the family at Mortal Peril and has done since Voldemort returned… and Molly’s greatest fear is the death of one of her children. Therefore it is my guess that all the Weasleys, the so-called traitorous purebloods, will all have to help Harry with this quest.
I think the pentacle (not coin) will be on the locket, and that the locket is in the cupboard under the water heater at 12 Grimmauld Place, where Kreacher hid it. And it was lucky he did, since otherwise Mundungus would have sold it. It goes with the overall themes that Rowling has developed in the book. Kreacher’s evil act turns out to be for the good, and the whole world is saved by the rottenest house-elf of them all.
So, is there any difference in the ‘adult’ version beyond the cover? No, not that. Just are there differences like the word changes in the American version?
This is something I really like about her writing. And she likes to do the opposite, too. For example, the Weasley twins, in a particularly ugly maneuver in book 5, stuffed some Slytherin boy in one of the Vanishing cabinets, not caring about what happened to him. This gave Malfoy the idea to use the cabinets as a secret entry into Hogwarts for the Death Eaters in book 6, and we all know how well that turned out. In a roundabout and indirect way, you might could say that the twins are responsible for Dumbledore’s death.
Uh, you do know why Ron, Harry and Hermione are called the Trio, right?
One of my hopes for the next book is that Ron and Hermione will really shine. Rowling tends to give a bit too much of the good stuff to Harry when the chips are down, but I agree that everyone will do something unbelievably heroic in the last book. Neville will surely take out Bellatrix.
I can’t really figure out what Ron will do, though it will be a great sacrifice of some kind. Sort of like how he knew he’d have to go down in the chess game so Harry could do what needed doing in book 1.
I’d love to have a scene of the entire Order fighting Death Eaters, but a fairly large number of bad guys bypass the adults and go after the three. Then I’d love to see Hermione use some of the magic she knows but cannot usually put to use. She’s the cleverest witch of her generation, and I think she should get a chance to really call down some lightning (or some other such thing that you’d usually only expect Dumbledore to be able to do), leaving a bunch of Death Eaters who thought of her as an inexperienced kid unable to get past her.
Of course, Harry will have to fight Voldemort alone.
She’s been there, done that. But that was when she was a newby first-year. Now, with five years training under her belt (plus all of her unofficial training at the hands of her brothers), I pity the villain who tries to put that damsel in distress. They could, I suppose, try to trick Harry into thinking she’s in danger and needs to be rescued, but they already did that with Sirius, and I doubt Harry will fall for the same trick twice. More likely that Harry would end up as the, um, damsus in distress, and Ginny will have to rescue him.
They’re generally thinner with denser text. They definitely don’t use all those various fonts and such that you see in the American Scholastic versions. I don’t know how they compare in that way to the UK normal version.
I’m more positive than ever about the Tarot connection — a pentacle is also an amulet work around the neck. A locket?