Ramping up for HBP...

Really, I'm feeling what I did last time, a mixture of excitement that there will be new material to work with and dread that I'm going to have to plow through the whole bloody book. I have very ambiguous feelings about canon. Since before OotP I've viewed it more as source material for fanfic than something I really am all that fond of in its own right. Awful, isn't it? At any rate, I'll be getting the book sometime in the afternoon, since a good friend has generously purchased it for me from Amazon.

None of my standing completed fics will be retconned, though this means that Amid My Solitude and, quite likely, Sweet Home will both be outdated. Laocoon's Children and Stealing Harry may be retconned slightly to account for any major upheavals the books may cause but, as it's AU, I don't hafta if I don't wanna.

NEENER NEENER NEENER.

I DO NOT PROMISE to post no spoilers, though of course I will be cutting and warning any spoilers I post in fanfictional form. I will probably not post any discussions of HBP. That's what I use fanfic for.

But, because someone recently passed on some rumours and they made me think long and hard about whether to believe them, I decided I might as well post what I believe will happen. I'll cut it, just in case you think I'm psychic.

You will also note that I am posting this publicly and you will no doubt want to return to ridicule me when my theories are blown to shit. :D These are not things I want to happen in all cases; these are things that I think are likely. In some cases I hope I'm wrong.

1. Ron/Hermione: No, it's not canon. But I think you'd have to be blind to think it won't be by the end. The foreshadowing is strong and heavy, and it alienates Harry even more (or rather, will when it happens). I don't ship the kidlets much, so I don't really care, but I do think it's true.
Commentary post-hack: Check; though I don't think it alienated Harry necessarily.

2. Harry/Ginny: I don't feel as strongly about this as I do about Ron/Hermione, but I do feel that JKR wouldn't have written four books' worth of buildup for nothing. Ginny rarely has ever stood on her own as a character; everything we see of her is in romantic relationship either to Harry or to eight zillion other boys in OotP. Yes, she is the Heir's Assistant in CoS, but even then we don't see much about her until the very end. This probably won't happen in HBP; I imagine Harry will start to Notice Her after returning from his summer hiatus between books six and seven.
Commentary post-hack: Check, again sort of; it did happen in HBP but then he dumped her. Way to go, Harry.

3. Draco: As I said in regard to Information Received recently, I don't think Draco will Turn Good or even Be Important; he might be an annoying little prick in canon, but he's almost never been of pivotal importance to the plot. He's consistently been a red herring and an ineffectual bully whose actions rarely impact the major storyline (although sometimes; there's his narking in OotP, of course). Sorry, Draco fans. He's a great character to fanfic with, but he's a horrible little person in canon.
Commentary post-hack: I suppose you could say he was instrumental but he did such a fucked-up job of being instrumental, it's hard to give him any credit for it.

4. Lupin: I think he'll survive the books. It's his track record, after all. :D To be forthright about it, of course I hope he doesn't die as well as believe he won't, but I don't think JKR will take away Harry's one quasi-positive (for a given value of "positive") role model.
Commentary post-hack: Well. Fuck.

5. Dumbledore is going to die. Albus Dumbledore is Obi-Wan Kenobi. His destiny is to be wise, annoyingly cryptic, semi-manipulative, and then die.
Commentary post-hack: AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAcheck.

6. Who is the Half Blood Prince? Well, much as I hope it will be Lupin, my gut tells me I am probably wrong. For my money, the strongest candidate is an entirely new character. Also strong candidates, don't laugh, are Snape, Lupin, Arthur Weasley, one of the Lestrange brothers, and Krum.
Commentary post-hack: Well, he's listed as top for strong candidates!

So those are my thoughts. Not profound, really, but prolific. :D