Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is the seventh and final of the Harry Potter novels written by British author J. K. Rowling. The book was released on 21 July 2007, ending the series that began in 1997 with the publication of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. This book chronicles the events directly following Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2005), and leads to the long-awaited final confrontation betweenHarry Potter and Lord Voldemort.

• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was published in the United Kingdom by Bloomsbury Publishing, in the United States by Scholastic, in Canada by Raincoast Books, and in Australia and New Zealand by Allen & Unwin. Released globally in ninety-three countries, Deathly Hallowsbroke sales records as the fastest-selling book ever. It sold 15 million copies in the first twenty-four hours following its release, including more than 11 million in the U.S. and U.K. alone. The previous record, nine million in its first day, had been held by Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. The novel has also been translated into numerous languages, including Ukrainian, Swedish, and Hindi.

• Reception to the book was generally positive and several awards were given to the novel, including the 2008 Colorado Blue Spruce Book Award, and being listed as a "Best Book for Young Adults" by the American Library Association. A film based on the book is split into two parts, with each of the parts being released eight months apart: the first part was released in November 2010, and the second part is to be released in July 2011.

• Throughout the six previous novels in the Harry Potter series, the main character, Harry Potter, has struggled with the inherent difficulties of adolescence along with being a famous wizard. When Harry was a baby, Lord Voldemort, a powerful evil wizard, murdered Harry's parents but mysteriously vanished after attempting to kill Harry. This results in Harry's immediate fame, and his being placed in the care of his Muggle, or non-magical, relatives Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon.
• Harry re-enters the wizarding world at age 11, enrolling in the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He makes friends with Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, makes an ally in the school's headmaster, Dumbledore and grows to respect and fear the talented misfit, his nemesis, schoolmaster Severus Snape. Presently Harry is confronted by Lord Voldemort, who is trying to regain physical incarnation. Returning to school after summer break, there are several attacks on students after the legendary "Chamber of Secrets" is thought to be opened. Harry ends the attacks by killing a Basilisk and defeating Lord Voldemort's "memory" stored in an enchanted diary. The following year, Harry hears that he has been targeted by escaped murderer Sirius Black. Despite stringent security measures at Hogwarts, Harry is confronted by Black at the end of his third year of schooling and Harry learns that Black was framed and is his godfather. Harry's fourth year of school sees him entered in a dangerous magical competition called the Triwizard Tournament. At the conclusion of the Tournament, Harry witnesses the return of Lord Voldemort to full strength. When the next school year begins, the Ministry of Magic appoints Dolores Umbridge as the new High Inquisitor of Hogwarts. After forming an underground student group in opposition to Umbridge, Harry and several of his friends face off against Voldemort's Death Eaters, a group of Dark witches and wizards, and narrowly defeat them. In Harry's sixth year of school, he learns that Voldemort has been using Horcruxes to become immortal. Horcruxes are fragments of the soul that are placed within an object so that when the body dies, a part of the soul remains and the person can be regenerated or resurrected. However, the destruction of the creator's body leaves the wizard or witch in a state of half-life, without corporeal form. When returning from a mission to discover a Horcrux, Professor Dumbledore, the Headmaster of the school and Harry's mentor, is murdered by Severus Snape, a teacher at the school with whom Harry is consistently at odds and who Harry has suspected of being a Death Eater. At the conclusion of the book, Harry pledges not to return to school the following year and to search for Horcruxes instead.
• Following Dumbledore's death, Voldemort has completed his ascension to power and gains control of the Ministry of Magic. Harry, Ron, and Hermione leave Hogwarts to hunt and destroy Voldemort's remaining Horcruxes. They isolate themselves to ensure their friends and families' safety. They have little knowledge about the remaining Horcruxes except the possibility that two are objects once belonging to Hogwarts founders Rowena Ravenclaw and Helga Hufflepuff, and the third may be Nagini, Voldemort's snake familiar. The whereabouts of the two founders' objects is unknown, and Nagini is presumed to be with Voldemort. As they search for the Horcruxes, the trio learn details about Dumbledore's past, as well as Snape's true motives.
• The trio recover the first Horcrux, Salazar Slytherin's locket, by infiltrating the Ministry of Magic. They then find Sword of Godric Gryffindor, among the few objects able to destroy Horcruxes (having absorbed Basilisk venom), and they use it to destroy the locket. The trio continually encounter a strange symbol, which an eccentric wizard named Xenophilius Lovegood (father of Luna) tells them represents the mythical Deathly Hallows. The Hallows are revealed to be three sacred objects: the Resurrection Stone, a stone with the power to summon the dead to the living world; the Elder Wand, an unbeatable wand; and an infallible Invisibility Cloak. Harry learns that Voldemort is seeking the Elder Wand, but is unaware of the Hallows and their significance. The trio determine that finding Voldemort's Horcruxes is more important than procuring the Hallows. They break into Bellatrix Lestrange's vault at the Wizarding Bank Gringotts to recover another Horcrux, Helga Hufflepuff's cup. Harry learns that another Horcrux is hidden in Hogwarts. Harry, Ron, and Hermione enter the school and find the Horcrux, the Diadem of Ravenclaw, and also successfully destroy the cup and the diadem.
• The book culminates in the Battle of Hogwarts. Harry, Ron, and Hermione, their many allies, and various magical creatures, defend Hogwarts from Voldemort and his Death Eaters. Several major characters are killed in the first wave of the battle. Harry discovers whilst viewing the memories of Severus Snape that Voldemort inadvertently made Harry a Horcrux when he attacked him as a baby and that Harry must die to destroy Voldemort. These memories also confirmed Snape's unwavering loyalty to Dumbledore and his role as spy in Voldemort's camp. Harry surrenders himself to Voldemort, who casts the Killing Curse at him, sending Harry to Limbo-like state between life and death. There, Harry sees Voldemort's destroyed soul shard, then meets Dumbledore who explains that when Voldemort used Harry's blood to regain his full strength, it protected Harry from Voldemort harming him; the Horcrux inside Harry has been destroyed, and Harry can return to his body despite being hit by the Killing Curse. Harry returns, the battle resumes, and after the last remaining Horcrux (Nagini) is destroyed, Voldemort is defeated.

• The novel, the last in the series, closes with a brief epilogue set nineteen years later, in which Harry and Ginny Weasley are a married couple with three children: James Sirius, Albus Severus, and Lily Luna. Ron and Hermione married and have two children, Rose and Hugo. The families meet at King's Cross station, where a nervous Albus is departing for his first year at Hogwarts. Harry's godson, Teddy Lupin, is found kissing Bill and Fleur Weasley's daughter Victoire in a train carriage. Harry sees Draco Malfoy and his wife (revealed on Rowling's website behind the door as Astoria Greengrass) with their son, Scorpius. Neville Longbottom is now the Hogwarts Herbology professor and remains friends with the two families. Harry comforts Albus, who is worried he will be sorted into Slytherin, and tells his son that one of his two namesakes, Severus Snape, was a Slytherin and the bravest man he had ever met. He adds that the Sorting Hat takes one's choice into account, like it did for Harry. The book ends with these final words: "The scar had not pained Harry for nineteen years. All was well."
• In an interview, online chat, the Wizard of the Month section of her website, and during her 2007 U.S. Open Book Tour, Rowling revealed additional character information that she chose not to include in the book. The first bits of information were about the trio and their families, starting with Harry.
  Rowling stated that Harry became an Auror for the Ministry of Magic, and was later appointed head of the department. He also kept Sirius Black's motorcycle, which Arthur Weasleyrepaired for him, but he can no longer speak Parseltongue after the destruction of Voldemort's soul fragment within him. She revealed that Ginny Weasley played for the Holyhead Harpies Quidditch team for a time, leaving to establish a family with Harry. She later became the lead Quidditch correspondent for the Daily Prophet. Ron Weasley worked at George's store for a time, Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, then joined Harry as an Auror. Hermione found her parents in Australia, and removed the memory modification charm she had put on them for safety. Initially, she worked for the Ministry of Magic in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, greatly improving life for house elves. She later moved to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and assisted in eradicating oppressive, pro-pureblood laws. She was also the only member of the trio to go back and complete her seventh year at Hogwarts. Rowling also said that Dumbledore's relationship with Gellert Grindelwald extended beyond mere friendship, that "Dumbledore is gay, actually", and harboured romantic feelings for Grindelwald. Voldemort, she said, was forced to exist in the stunted form Harry witnessed in the King's Cross limbo after his death, as his crimes were too severe for him to become a ghost.
  Rowling also explained the fates of several secondary characters. George Weasley continued his successful joke shop and married fellow Quidditch player Angelina Johnson. The couple had two children: a son named Fred, in memory of his late twin brother, and a daughter, Roxanne. Luna Lovegood searched the world for odd and unique creatures, eventually marrying Rolf, a grandson of the famed naturalist Newt Scamander, writer of Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them. The couple had twins called Lorcan and Lysander. Her father's publication, The Quibbler, returned to its usual condition of "advanced lunacy" and is "appreciated for its unintentional humour."
  Other character histories revealed by Rowling included that of Draco Malfoy, who married Astoria Greengrass and had a son named Scorpius. Percy Weasley married a woman named Audrey and had two daughters, named Molly and Lucy. Firenze was welcomed back into his herd, who finally acknowledged the virtue of his pro-human leanings. Dolores Umbridge was arrested, interrogated, and imprisoned for crimes against Muggle-borns. Cho Chang went on to marry a Muggle. Neville Longbottom became professor of Herbology at Hogwarts and married Hannah Abbott, who became the landlady of the Leaky Cauldron. Bill and Fleur Weasley had a total of three children, a younger son named Louis, and two daughters, named Dominique and Victoire.
  In the wider wizarding world other changes included: Kingsley Shacklebolt became the permanent Minister of Magic, with Percy Weasley working under him as a high official. Among the reforms introduced by Shacklebolt, was the removal of Dementors from the wizard prison Azkaban. Harry, Ron, and Hermione were also instrumental in reforming the Ministry. At Hogwarts, Slytherin House became more diluted and no longer held the title as the pure-blood bastion it once was, although its dark reputation lingered. Voldemort's jinx on the Defense Against the Dark Arts position was broken with his death, and there was a permanent Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher appointed. Harry also is said to come to the Defense Against the Dark Arts class to lecture several times a year. Lastly, Rowling revealed that a portrait of Severus Snape, who briefly served as Hogwarts Headmaster, had not appeared in the headmaster's office, as he had abandoned his post. Harry later ensured the addition of Snape's portrait, and publicly revealed Snape's true allegiance to Dumbledore.