anotheranon | Harry Potter

I enjoyed it thoroughly, and thought that it came up to J.K. Rowling's previous standards.

Harry's attitude - I know that many will probably complain, but jeebus, the boy is 15 now - raging hormones, evasive adults, O.W.L.s, and an evil wizard on your tail and you are GOING to be in a bad mood! I also think that Rowling did well to give the character bad qualities - perfect heroes are boring.
Cho - Cho kissing Harry was SO sweet! I can, however, understand why their date went badly and why Harry ultimately lost interest - what teenage boy could stay interested in a girl who cries all the time? Though I admit it kinda burst my sloppy romantic longing that theirs would be a teenage romance ending in marriage years down the road. Now I can't wait to see how Ron and Hermoine get together (oh, come on, you know they do!)
Neville is no longer a loser! I've watched this kid be the butt of jokes since book 1 and it's a great relief to see him "grow out of it" - rather the way awkward little kids grow out of it in real life, I suppose.
Umbridge - even though Umbridge is the kind of bureaucratic, control-freak evil that could be a good villian for any novel, I think she's the worst we've seen yet, even more so than Voldemort, just because her evil isn't magical, it's ultimately mundane. She's just a bitch!
Dumbledore - finally admits a weakness and a failure. I still think that character flaws give these characters more dimension, and ultimately more sympathy because they clearly are trying.
Sirius - once again more proof to my sister's theory that Gary Oldman will never play a character that survives! Not as major a character as I expected (I was betting on Hagrid getting the chop, D. thought it would be Dumbledore), but certainly Harry's father figure, of sorts, and I'll be interested to see how Harry deals with the loss in the next book.
The dramatic dropout of Fred and George, and their final order to Peeves to "get" Umbridge. Just beautiful!

Larger themes:

The bumbling Ministry of Magic - from my perspective, this curiously imitates the current political climate, denying the worst while pressuring the media (in this case, the Daily Prophet) to toe the official line. Umbridge's micromanagement of Hogwarts during her tenure as "Inquisitor" smacks of the failure of many school boards to shelter kids from necessary information (in the real world, it's abstinence sex ed; at Hogwarts it's Defense Against the Dark Arts with no practical application).
Harry's disillusionment with adults - I thought that Harry's growing awareness that the adults around him AREN'T perfect (Sirius' irresponsibility, Dumbledore's dithering, Snape still licking old wounds, and especially the revelation that his father was a schoolyard bully) mirrors perfectly the realizations that many teenagers come to as they grow up - parents and teachers aren't all knowing, and do make mistakes.

Will probably write more as I think of it. Overall, I enjoyed this book and highly recommend it.