Books by author: J. K. Rowling

Kevin is still intensely eager to listen to me read the Harry Potter series, and though the second volume doesn't have quite the same magic as the first, we both very much enjoyed it.

I had a lot of doubts going into the final installment in the Harry Potter series. The most recent books in the series wandered around a lot, leaving a lot of threads dangling and leaving me wondering whether or not Rowling could possibly come up with a satisfying ending.

Well, for the most part, she came through. Most of the plot lines I remembered were resolved adequately, and this book moves more fluidly and evenly than any since The Prisoner of Azkaban. I'm glad it's over, but I can definitely say that I enjoyed the ride.

As I've been re-reading the Harry Potter series aloud to Kevin, I have enjoyed revisiting the story, but this book didn't hold up very well to a re-read. The ham-handed bits about house-elf slavery are annoying and don't pay off until a later book, and the Tri-Wizard Tournament seems to go on forever.

Still, Kevin is loving every minute of it, and we're diving into The Order of the Phoenix next.

The Harry Potter series continues to get better; this fourth book is better yet than any of the first three. The characters continue to be developed, and Rowling proves that she has a knack for sustaining page-to-page suspense almost indefinitely. Reviews of this book have been done to death in the media, and I have no interest in giving any of the plot surprises away, so I'll just say that this series is very entertaining and enjoyable, and I'm looking forward to Book V. See also, books 1, 2, and 3

Don't follow this link if you don't want to read any spoilers, but I'm pleased that my predictions (made in 2003) for the events of book six were spot on. I predicted who would die and (kinda sorta) who would be the killer.

Okay, no more spoilers. What would be the point, really? Nothing I write here could possibly affect your decision whether or not to read this book. This novel is pretty much more of the same as the previous Harry Potter bricks, and you either like them or you don't. I enjoy them as very lightweight entertainment and don't expect very much of them. This one is about as good as the previous one, and I'm down-rating it only because it would have been nice to see some more evolution either in the characters or in the world. I'm a bit apprehensive about book seven, because the set-up at the end of this book could lead into a very dull finale (where Harry has many adventures on his way to joining the 4-H club — if you've read book six, hopefully that makes sense to you).

How much do you wanna bet that the deceased character comes back as a ghost to offer Harry bits of wisdom?

Kevin is still enthusiastic about having me reading the Harry Potter series aloud, but I'm getting burned out. The first couple of books in the series are written to be read aloud, but as the series goes along, awkward sentence constructions and word juxtapositions become more and more frequent. And, if you didn't know, the books also get to be very long. It took us almost four months to get through volume five. Phew!

We're taking a little break, but we'll get back to it.

This, the fifth installment in the Harry Potter septology, is one of the best so far, though it has its fair share of problems. My main complaint is that the plot unfolds too slowly for most of the novel's bulk (there's a lot going on but not much point to a lot of it), and then Rowling tries to make up for it by cramming a million things into the last 125 pages. It never feels like the students are at school; it seems like they attend class a couple of times, play one Quiddich match, and then it's time for Christmas break (Am I the only one who finds it funny that wizards celebrate Christmas? This sure isn't a Philip Pullman novel.).

I've noticed now that my reading of this series has suffered for having seen the first two movie adaptations. I can't help but hear some of the characters in the voices of the actors who played them (particularly Hermione, Hagrid, and Ron Weasley), and this is particularly problematic for Hermione and Ron, who should have matured in the book. I've managed to create my own internal versions of Snape and Harry (the Dumbledore and McGonagall in the movies matched my imagination), so they were less of a problem. And I can't help but picture Neville Longbottom as Ralph Wiggum from the Simpsons. Of course, I can't fault Rowling for the movies or my own bizarre associations.

As a final note, I'm becoming more and more intrigued by Professor Snape, and I sincerely hope that he gets to play a more prominent role in the last two novels. Dumbledore is still too much of a God figure, and it would be very exciting to see him be the next character killed off. But that's probably just me.

I remembered The Prisoner of Azkaban as being my favorite of the Harry Potter books, but upon reading it a second time (this time aloud to Kevin), it didn't stand up as well as The Sorcerer's Stone. Still, it was a fun read, and Kevin and I both enjoyed it.

I read this aloud to Kevin, and it captured his attention more than anything we've read together before. It's obvious we'll be reading the whole series over the next few months.

Having read it all before, I'm impressed by how well J.K. Rowling set things up from the beginning, and I'm quite enjoying rooting for Snape this time around. Although the later books aren't quite as magical as the first one, Harry Potter is great fun.

These novels hardly need separate reviews, since each is based on the same formula, though The Prisoner of Azkaban (#3) is the best of the three (it has the most plot twists, and it's got a few dark—though shortlived—moments). They are light, simple, enjoyable confections. It's been 20 years or so since I've read others in this genre, but these would probably sit happily alongside Lewis's Narnia Chronicles, Tolkein's Lord of the Rings, or Baum's Wizard of Oz books. However, unless the rest of the series is even better than these first, Rowling won't stand the test of time.

The Tales of Beedle the Bard is a collection of fairy tales from the Harry Potter universe. Rowling presents them as a volume edited by her character Hermione Granger, with notes from Albus Dumbledore, but you can also look at it as a surefire method to extract more money from Harry Potter fans.

I did not enjoy the stories in this book. They contain none of the wit and subversiveness of Grimm's fairy tales, and Dumbledore's literary analysis is pretty dull. I was expecting more, but my 8-year-old son liked them. Your mileage will probably fall somewhere in between.