Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets seven books had been published, Graeme Davis regarded "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" as the weakest of the series, and agreed that the plot structure is much the same as in "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone". He described Fawkes's appearance to arm Harry and then to heal him as a "deus ex machina": he said that the book does not explain how Fawkes knew where to find Harry; and Fawkes's timing had to be very precise, as arriving earlier would probably have prevented the battle with the basilisk, while arriving later would have been fatal to Harry
Religious debates over the Harry Potter series LaVaque-Manty of the liberal website Left2Right notes, "Religion plays no role in the books. There are no churches, no other religious institutions, nobody prays or meditates, and even funerals are non-religious affairs." When considering the role of religion within "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows", Christopher Hitchens observed the apparent secularism in the novel, stating that the characters of Harry and Hermione possess certain moral virtues while also expressing an ignorance of Christian ideas. In an article written for "Time" magazine before the publication of the seventh and final book in the series entitled "Who Dies in Harry Potter? God,"