I always have a basic plot outline, but I like to leave some things to be decided while I write.

In March several of the Mandrakes threw a loud and raucous party in greenhouse three. This made Professor Sprout very happy. “The moment they start trying to move into each other’s pots, we’ll know they’re fully mature,” she told Harry.

He couldn't know that at this very moment, people meeting up in secret all over the country were holding up their glasses and saying in hushed voices: 'To Harry Potter - the boy who lived!

Fame is a fickle friend, Harry. Celebrity is as celebrity does. Remember that.

I was just sitting on the train, just staring out the window at some cows. It was not the most inspiring subject. When all of a sudden the idea of Harry just appeared in my mind's eye.

He had no memory of ever being hugged like this, as though by a mother. The full weight of everything he had seen that night seemed to fall in upon him as Mrs. Weasley held him to her. His mother's face, his father's voice, the sight of Cedric, dead on the ground all started spinning in his head until he could hardly bear it, until he was screwing up his face against the howl of misery fighting to get out of him.

Just because you’re allowed to use magic now you don’t have to whip your wands out for every tiny little thing!