Well, dang it I missed the biggest and most obvious foreshadowing from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. I finished the book (again) and noticed the very obvious foreshadowing of Dumbeldore informing Harry that now Peter Pettigrew is indebted to him and there may come a time in the future when it would be important to Harry.
Well, turns out of course that Dumbledore was right! No big surprise there since J.K. Rowling was doing such a phenomenal storytelling job. She set up the clue because she had the end in mind.
When I have talked to people about storytelling, I often point out the importance of this. A good storyteller knows what subtle points to emphasize because they know which points will show up later in the story. I doubt that Rowling wrote this in and then when she got to Book 7 suddenly thought: Oh, I forgot about Pettigrew. She knew when she planned Book 3 that he needed to escape and he needed to be in debt to Harry.
I am biased
7 years ago