After reading the book, I have decided to post some form of a book review without giving away any spoilers.
My copy of the book arived from Amazon.com the day it hit the bookstores. (Amazon posted its largest ever presale of an item.) The book arrived via USPS in a package labeled with several warnings on not to ship before June 21, 2003.
The book itself was a good read, very enjoyable. As it compares to the rest of the books in the series it was quite good, the same quality as the other books.
After reading all of the above nodes and everything posted on the web, the rumors and stories, I did not know what to think. I have heard the stories about someone dying in this book, someone falling in love and also the brief part about Albus talking with Harry. In fact, part of me kept waiting to read the sections. Trust me it comes at the end of the book.
There were some parts that suprised me about this book, things I never saw coming. I was wrong about who dies and I was also wrong about who falls in love. I enjoyed getting to know the characters on a deeper level, in fact character development is greater in this book then any others. The amount of magic was greater in this book then any of the others.
I was disappointed by some of the language in the book. There were several examples of the word damn in the book. As a children's book, or at least a book geared towards children, I find that word is not acceptable. This book was just like the rest of her books, they stall after about a quarter of the book. While the four other books stalled around 100 pages, this tome died around page 200. It lost its track and found me wishing for something to happen. (This is a problem I feel with all of her books, in fact out of the five people I spoke with about Rowling work agreed with me.)
But besides that point, a great book. I hope everyone enjoys it as much as I did.