Harry needed an invitation. Corpstaker needed one as well when he was a ghost at least he told so to the fomor servitor but if I remember correctly after he ate all those ghosts he could possess Butters without one.

After he ate all the ghosts he could manifest a body and do the eye-contact spirit swap with Butters. Butters jumped into the manifested body but didn't have the ability to maintain the manifestation.

Not when he first jumped into Mort and threw up a shield he didn't, he did get booted out within a few seconds though.

I thought Harry accidentally landed in Mort, and Mort basically grabbed him, used Harry to throw up a shield, then booted him out. That gave Harry enough knowledge to realize later that he could possess Molly (with permission) and use his magic through her.

I'm currently thinking that Mab hasn't altered Harry's memories, like we thought.  I think it was the Parasite, who I think is Lash.  I think Mab and Lash have been working together longer than we thought.

Oh, I really, really like that. First, it would explain why the WG interfered to help restore Harry's memories. Second, it would dispose of neuro's conspiracy theory about Mab tricking Harry into a false belief that he can resist by disposing of the evidence he uses for arguing Mab can safely tamper with Harry's memories. Third, it provides a link between the SmF and Turn Coat headaches that would suggest Lash, not Mab, might be responsible for keeping Harry from using LC. Finally, it would tie in the SmF "cheats" with the theory about Uriel restoring Lash. I believe the headaches start before Harry uses Soulfire. Thus, Uriel could have restored Lash to Harry in response to the capturing of Marcone (first cheat) and then nudged him to activate the Soulfire in response to the attempt to capture Ivy (second cheat).

Stone Table

The stone table is actually part of a larger theme regarding the consumption of others' power. We see this in SK (stone peril), GP (Kravos), DB (darkhallow) and GS (eating other spirits). I'd also say it applies to Lea's collection of hounds and to what we've seen of the Fomor.

I'm thinking of labling this thread "Harry Fights for Rehabilitation & Empowerment" (HFfR&E)

That works for me.

The Hand burn is significant.  I've been tossing around how to include it, but the thing is, I have already written up a great reference about Harry's Power Ups, that does a great job of emphasizing the significance of that event... I think I might add a reference to that topic near the top of this reference and let it serve as the reference for any events that touch on Harry's power as a thread in and of itself.

I agree the hand burn is significant. Harry seems to get power ups in two forms - increased assets (Bob, Lasciel's coin, soulfire, sanctum invocation, mom's pendant, WK mantle) and more significantly from patching weaknesses. The hand burn is an example of the latter, where Harry is putting his experience to use to improve his skills. It belongs in a category with improving veils from teaching Molly, the use of dual elements, learning to build stronger foci, and becoming less dependent on foci. Personally, I think this latter type of power up is more significant because it represents the growth of Harry as a character.

The hand burn is also significant for another reason - it highlights Mavra as one of Harry's most dangerous opponents. Many of Harry's enemies are just doing their own thing and Harry gets in the way, but Mavra actually takes the time to study Harry and learn his weaknesses. There are only a few other instances where enemies have tried to do that. Bianca showed some understanding of Harry in PG (but could have been coached by Mavra) but she ultimately proved she didn't truly understand him when she tried to trade for Susan's life. Nicodemus has demonstrated an even better understanding of Harry, but ultimately underestimated Harry (he didn't expect Harry to actually defeat and change Lasciel's shadow - although to be fair, I'm not sure anyone would). Mavra has arguably been the most successful in understanding and manipulated Harry (she burned his hand, escaped with incriminating photos and successfully blackmailed him later). Lea and Marcone should also be considered, although they are quasi-allies, while Mavra thus far appears to be pure enemy.

Not if what the Gatekeeper is seeing is a finite set of possible futures, from which he can select one by an exercise of his free will, but which, once selected, are then deterministic absent other acts of free will.  Which is a model that I think fits as well with what we know about time travel, and from Uriel about most humans using free will rather rarely, as any other.

That's not time travel then. He's not going against the flow of time and he's not changing the past, he's just guiding the future. The problem of course is then the Gatekeeper practically becomes the master of time and the single most powerful individual in the entire universe. Unless there is some strange reason his perfect knowledge of all possible futures is limited to specific events. Even then, given the importance of those apparent events, he would be way more powerful than JB has ever hinted.

How many of those very powerful entities have free will, though ? In the precise significant sense that humans have it, rather than the "I do what I am supposed to or I become Lucifer the Second" sense that Uriel does

See, that's exactly what I mean. Now the Gatekeeper has absolutely no peers because not only does he have the same knowledge of all the other powerful entities, he's the only one with the free will to actually control outcomes as he sees fit. It's not even a competition, now, Gatekeeper can wipe the floor with Uriel, Mab, Ferrovax, Drakul.

And all of those outcomes are deducible from a full knowledge of the state of all the cards at the beginning of the game plus sufficient intelligence.

Yes, but you don't know which result you will get. x - 2 - 2 = 0 always results in x = 4, no matter what order you perform the steps, the outcome of solitaire however, is not predetermined, only the possible outcomes are.

If information from the future were changeable to that extent, why all the careful working around the possibility of paradox ?

Precisely because the future is changeable. If it wasn't changeable paradox would be impossible and it would never be a concern.

Your logic there feels to be skipping over some steps in the assessment.

Sorry, I think I touched on the missing information in some of my earlier posts, but didn't flesh it out here. Basically, let's call the accident as a means of delay as plan A. There was a lot of intervening time between the accident and the use of LC, which leaves a lot of time for someone else to screw up the plan. I think any entity savy enough to design plan A would also be able to design plans B - Z (one of which is manipulating the time of Molly's phone call). Plans B - Z would all have less intervening time, increasing the odds of the plan being successful because other entities would have less of an opportunity to interfere. Thus, because Plan A is comparatively easier for someone else to defeat, Harry's benefactor would have used a different plan. Thus, I believe the car accident was unrelated and someone actually did use a different plan (specifically, someone influenced when Molly would call).

Perhaps.

Perhaps, alternatively, Lash is thinking the same way I read Mab as thinking at the end of GS; that the best way to lull Harry into a false sense of security, and to successfully manipulate him longer term, is to give the impression of trying to manipulate him in some less subtle way and failing.

I would accept that if PG had just been written. However, hindsight and WoJ clearly indicate that Lash actually changed, which in turn suggests the key moments where we saw Lash being perplexed by Harry (such as in PG) were actually key moments where Lash was being changed by Harry's perspective.

I am sorry, i am totally failing to parse how you derive that from my suggestion.  Could you expand on your logic here.

Will she ?  Or will applying pressure every time only incline him to balk whenever she suggests anything at all ?

Basically, I think Lash's behavior in WN and Dead Beat are generally consistent and that her behavior in PG by secretly fixing LC would be an outlier. I don't think her actions are consistent with a strategy of not applying pressure whenever she has sufficient leverage. Honestly, I could be wrong, because I can't clearly recall every conversation/negotiation that Harry and Lash have.

Interestingly, I notice that I am arguing against both Gatekeeper and Lash as the entity that fixed LC. It would seem likely either you don't think Gatekeeper arranged the accident or that you don't think Lash knew about the flaw in LC. Of course, the two arguments aren't necessarily inconsistent (Lash could have known about the flaw but Gatekeeper fixed it), but it does make me wonder if you actually believe everything you are arguing.

Also, one other thought. WoJ tells us it would take the whole White Council to defeat Mab outside of Winter. Rashid is a member of the White Council. We've also seen some of the other members of the Wouncil are very powerful. Thus, we can infer Rashid isn't nearly as powerful as Mab and by extension isn't nearly as powerful as her peer, Uriel. Since it would take a creature with the knowledge level of Uriel to enact plan A, and since Rashid is not as powerful as Uriel, I believe it is unlikely that he could have so perfectly set up the crash.

I don't see how you get from "he didn't know about Demonreach" to "he can't have known about LC".

Gatekeeper would need to know a lot more than just the existence of LC to set up the accident-delay plan. He would need to know LC has a flaw, that Harry will use LC in response to his message to look for black magic, and that Harry will receive a phone call from Molly at <time>. Then, he would need to know exactly how much time Harry will spend preparing to use LC in order to devise a means to delay Harry long enough to make sure he can't use LC before the phone rings, but not so long that Harry doesn't make it home in time to accept the call. Selecting an accident as his method, Gatekeeper needs to find a way to insure the accident causes just enough damage to make sure Harry can't drive home without injuring Harry and would need a method for determining precisely the amount of time he will be delayed by the cops (including Murphy). That is an awful lot of knowledge. Thus, the fact that Gatekeeper incorrectly predicted the outcome in TC because of a lack of knowledge about Demonreach being Harry's sanctum is strong evidence that the Gatekeeper also lacked the knowledge to set up the accident as a delay.

Here's another problem with the accident-as-delay theory. Why didn't Harry's benefactor cause the accident and then immediately go fix LC? They even could have disconnected Harry's phone to prevent the interrupting phone cal. Why wait until sometime after Molly calls and before Harry needs to use LC to find her? Granted there are possible explanations (e.g. the fix occurred while Bob was gone and the benefactor couldn't have fixed it earlier because Bob/Mouse was still there), but it adds yet another complication to theory. Do we really think the Gatekeeper can secretly access Harry's apartment and fix LC but that he can't find a way to do it while Bob/Mouse are there?

I'd note that the car-bomb in WN is, i think, not confirmed as having anything to do with the plot of that book, so it's not impossible mysterious random killer strikes twice in two adjacent books.

I'd have to read WN again to discuss this in detail, to see if there is some tie we missed, and I don't have time to do that. Even if it is a case of random killer strikes twice in two adjacent books, it would still make sense if something in PG set those events in motion and the attack in WN arises from those events, rather than just being entirely random.

Indeed, we could be Occamian and suspect Uriel of that intervention.

Yeah, I've seen the Uriel did it theory passed around. I reject it largely because it doesn't fit Uriel's M.O. of using tools rather direct action and there is also no evidence of a prior cheat. I realize we have differing opinions on Uriel, but I don't think we need to get into those here, because you are arguing for Gatekeeper, not Uriel, and I don't think Gatekeeper has the same level of knowledge as Uriel. Uriel, for example, probably knew about the Sanctum invocation.

Some of us believe it is already that to a large extent; that Harry's free will is all the more significant for being a thing he uses really rather infrequently.

Not to be too reductionist here, it is ultimately going to be a series of novels in linear text with only one endpoint, so there are levels at which I do not find that metaphor inapt.

There is definitely evidence that greater powers are warring to use Harry as their pawn. The point is, if there are so many powers all try to use them, there ought to at least be competition where they can interfere with each other's plans. If the eventual outcome is already defined and their competing efforts are futile to change it, then it's a math problem, not a story. The difference is, the math equation only has one solution regardless of whether you know it or not, while the ending of a story is subject to change until it is actually written, regardless of how unlikely it might be too change.

Also, Harry might use his free will infrequently, but the case books are the situations where he is using free will, so those are the situations where a person can't rely on a complicated accident-delay plan when simpler methods are available. The difference between a novel and a mathematical proof is that a mathematical proof always only has one endpoint regardless of whether you know what that is. A novel doesn't become definite until after it is written

At a telling-a-good-story level, given that Jim has explicitly introduced characters who have the degree of ability to out-think a human angels have, it would seem inconsistent and unconvincing to me for any that are interested in Haryy not to mostly be able to play him much better than he knows or can see coming.

Better than Harry sees coming, yes, but not perfectly and not without the possibility that other players might ruin their plans. They control Harry by predicting his emotional responses. Less emotional choices like "Do I call a cab, ask Murphy for a ride, walk, etc...." are harder to predict and can't be relied upon in setting up a plan. That's why the accident-delay doesn't work, because you don't really know how Harry will choose to get home. I also doubt you can accurately predict the precise amount of damage he will sustain in an accident that is serious enough the cops suspect it was an intentional attack.

OK, from a meta-story perspective ?

PG seems to me to be notably different from all the preceding books in terms of how standalone it is.  A larger proportion of the significant players are people we've met before, and it's the first one where rather than there being a couple of loose ends, the ending is Harry explicitly acknowledging he doesn't have a clue about what was really going on at the centre of events.  From an Aristotelian point of view, the eight book of planned twenty-plus-three is the transition between Beginning and Middle, and the differences I mention above fit with that.  So if there was going to be a book for which "here is a random snippet of arc plot that could technically fit anywhere" was appropriate, PG seems like the best one to me.

That makes sense, but rather than just "introduce random snippet of arc plot" here, it makes even more sense to introduce that random snippet by tying it into the plot of PG.

I'm inclined to think, considering how on-the-ball and well informed Rashid is in SK, that there's something specifically about Demonreach that is throwing him off in TC, rather than that TC is a reasonable standard for judging his degree of clued-in in general.  And he has specified he will not set foot on the island.

That's a good rebuttal theory. However, if Demonreach can put a blind spot in Gatekeeper's knowledge, I would think some of the other players in PG could do the same. Gatekeeper doesn't appear to be on quite the same level as Uriel and Mab and I think there is still too many things that could have happened between the accident and phone call for the Gatekeeper to have engineered a perfect delay. Honestly, I don't think Mab could have managed that either. Finally, anyone who could have done it could also have found a simpler way to do it.

Indeed. If the object of the exercise is to corrupt Harry's judgement without him knowing it - as witness the anger issues Murphy calls him on in WN, which are already showing in PG (where he concentrates on roasting the Giger-Alien fetch rather than stopping to help one of its victims, whom he then realises he might have been able to save if he'd acted differently).  It fits that pattern.

How exactly does secretly fixing LC corrupt Harry's judgment without Harry realizing it? Not fixing it and or fixing it just enough for Harry to survive would teach Harry that refusing Lash's offer to help him if he picks up the coin cost Molly her life. Secretly fixing it doesn't given Harry any reason to seek Lash's help in the future.

The latter only works if she assumes Harry will be dispassionately rational about accepting her help, which he won't, because a) he has a pretty strong conviction that accepting help from Fallen will have long-term bad effects, and b) given a), Harry being Harry is going to be extreme ends of stubborn about it.

Yeah, Harry does have pretty strong convictions about not accepting help from Fallen. That's why Lasciel needs to wait for ideal situations to offer her aid. Knowing Harry, the perfect such situation would be one where he needs Lasciel's help not to save himself, but to save the life of someone else. In other words, Harry's need to help Molly is the precise type of moment when he is most susceptible to temptation. If Lasciel had any bargaining chip to play in that situation (knowledge of the flaw) she would have played it. Instead, she appealed only to his self-interest to stay alive and the general fear that LC was a dangerous and unready spell.

Actually Lash wouldn't tell Harry, because he wouldn't have believed her. Harry would have seen her attempt to warn him about the flaw as another ploy to get him to take up the coin.

Harry isn't dumb. He wouldn't just ignore Lash. He'd bargain or try to force her to give him enough information so he (or Bob) could verify the existence of the flaw. Then he would bargain or try to force Lash to show him how to fix it (if he or Bob couldn't figure it out themselves). Either way, Lash still gains more because Harry learns that she has power/knowledge that can help him successfully perform magic that will save lives (in this case Molly's).

She also had plenty of time while using the illusions to slow him down.

So Lash is so powerful she can hit Harry with illusions while simultaneously fixing LC (or causing Harry to unknowingly fix LC while fighting the illusions) and yet there are no other instances in the story where she comes close to displaying that kind of power? I'm not even convinced there is enough evidence that Lash could have fixed LC while Harry was unconscious. There certainly isn't enough to suggest she could fix it without his knowledge while actively fighting him for control of his perceptions.

It still comes down to her being the only being that knew about LC, could fix it and was present.

What evidence do you have that she could fix it, or even knew it needed to be fixed?

Mab has already answered the question about her replacement choice if Harry died.
She would recruit Thomas to be her Winter Knight instead...

Mab also went through a great deal of effort in GS to make sure she didn't have to pick Thomas as Winter Knight instead. Fixing LC would be significantly less effort.

Another thing to mention, is that even though LC was described as having a massive amount of power in it, that doesn't mean it would explode in a deafening blast, with concussive shock waves and such.  The "explosion" could have simply been a massive amount of concentrated fire, enough to flash fire the room and the whole building.   Or maybe the power would've come out in a magical method of destruction.   Remember Bob said the amount of power he had poured into it was roughly equivalent to the power in his fully charged Force Ring.   But it wasn't the same kind of magic.  The power he had pumped into it was one of seeking, investigation, discovery and revelation.  Not a kinetic asskicking spell.    Magic varies based on what type of power you are channeling and to what purpose, so just because the amount of power is equal to a ton of those force rings, doesn't mean it would manifest in the same way.   For all we know, the sympathetic link to Chicago made the power dissipate across the links, making all of Chicago slightly warmer for a fraction of a second.  Or maybe an odd flash of light, and a mild bang sound happened, something disregarded by the population.  Or maybe the fire simply dissipated it, fire is a cleansing force after all, magically speaking. 

Remember, just because a powerful spell is disrupted, doesn't mean it blows up.   Look at Harry when he destroyed the Great Circle trapping Ivy in Small Favor.   He made a point to explain just how much power was in that circle, and how even having just one thing out of place, could level a huge area.  Then what did he do?  He smashed it with his staff, destroying every aspect of that spell.   Did he blow up?  Did the spell site blow up?  Did Demonreach?  No, in fact, nothing negative happened until the very last vestige of the spell structure was destroyed, then the spell broke, and as I recall it was simply a bit of sound and light.  That's it.   Nothing negative or destructive happened, as evidenced by the fact that Ivy and the Heroes were all still alive, and standing at Ground Zero.   And I'd be willing to bet that the Great Circle to keep the Archive restrained, had more juice in it than LC.   So if that spell can be destroyed without leveling an island, I think LC can be burned out without leveling a city block.

Personally, when I talk about LC exploding, I don't really mean a physical explosion. The explosion is a backlash of magic that would fry Harry's brain, exactly like what happens when Cowl catches Harry tracking him with LC in a later book (except Harry had built an extra safeguard that saved him). LC itself might also be destroyed (I envision melting) but I see the destruction as being internalized to LC and the person trying to use it with very little, if any, external damage.