"Consider Cho Chang, Fred and George, Dudley Dursley, and hell, Ginny freaking Weasley. Each of them got a handful of scenes throughout the books. Rowling kept a pretty tight focus on the Trio. Secondary characters only got significant page space when a subplot directly involved them, and then they were lucky to have more than a few lines of dialog."

And it came back to bite her in the ass, once she needed Ginny to be more than she was before. But I agree with the analysis.

For what it's worth, I liked the size and the subplots in the prior books; even if that may have had to do with the fact that I read the books in one go -- and when you do that, you always want the book to be longer ;)

- Sesc