jk rowling

Review: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling

by Stefani

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling

Narrated by: Jim Dale

Published: September 17, 2007 by Listening Library

Buy this book at: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Kobo

Synopsis:

Harry returns to Hogwarts with nightmares about Voldemort looming in his head. This year, there is an exciting event at Hogwarts, but will it be more dangerous than fun? Between the weird dreams Harry’s been having, his scar hurting, and rumors of the Dark Lord’s return, Harry’s godfather Sirius Black grows increasingly concerned as he tries to ensure Harry’s safety. Will Harry’s nightmares come true? Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is an exciting story you won’t want to put down with surprises you wouldn’t expect.

Rating:

Review:

I have always remembered this book as being the weakest one in the series. But I found new levels of depth when I re-listened to it. Jim Dale is still the absolute perfect narrator, no one else could have done what he did with these audiobooks. He brought them to life in such a cool way.

This book is not just a simple story about a boy and a tournament at school. In this book we dive to the depths of some of the hypocrisy in the wizarding world. I had forgotten how much focus we give to how house elves are treated in this book. Most decent wizards abhor how some wizards view themselves as superior to Muggles, but those same wizards who see the bigotry on that front, utterly fail to see it with house elves. At one point Ron, who managed to accidentally curse himself retaliating on Hermoine’s behalf, actually says that house elves enjoy being enslaved. Astounding blind spot. It was fascinating to see Rowling explore this interesting dynamic. Unfortunately, I seem to remember that this largely gets abandoned after this book and I think that’s a shame.

It’s funny when you spend a lot of time watching the movies for these books and then come back to the books, there’s a lot of things you’ve forgotten. I completely forgot all of the interesting little side stories we get adjacent to the tournament. This book is a really good mystery. And Rowling lays out so many clues about the identity of the dark wizard along the way. It was very well done. Honestly, at a certain point the tournament is a minor side plot, more of a vehicle to introduce all of these other stories. I think I may have to retract my statement about this being the weakest book in the series. There’s too many gigantically important things that happen.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban: A Compelling Bridge to Darkness

by Stefani

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling

Published: February 1, 2000 by Simon & Schuster Audio

Buy this book at: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Kobo

Synopsis:

Harry Potter, along with his best friends, Ron and Hermione, is about to start his third year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Harry can’t wait to get back to school after the summer holidays. (Who wouldn’t if they lived with the horrible Dursleys?) But when Harry gets to Hogwarts, the atmosphere is tense. There’s an escaped mass murderer on the loose, and the sinister prison guards of Azkaban have been called in to guard the school…

Rating:

Review:

This book is the bridge for the entire rest of the series. While we flirted with darkness and dark magic in Chamber of Secrets, this one plunges us right into the depths of darkness and sets up the tone for the rest of the series. It is often cited as people’s favorite book of the series, and I certainly understand why.

Harry has a real transformation in this book as well. He is forced to reckon with his parents and their death. But he also has to reckon with negative opinions about his parents. This is actually one of my pet peeves with this book series, the idolization of Lily and James Potter. It makes sense why Harry idolizes them. He never knew them, he only ever hears positive things about them, so it’s an easy thing to put them on a pedestal in his head. But everyone else does it too. They speak about them like they were saints. But, let’s face it, when they were in school they were jackasses. James was a bully and a psychopath. The “prank” that James and his friends pull on Snape is cruel, vindictive, and could have gotten him killed. Much more than just schoolyard pranks, they were awful. And Lily rejected Snape because he wasn’t useful to her anymore and to gain James’ favor. Even if they changed A LOT in their adult years, they are certainly not the saints that the series likes to portray them as.

Anyway, off of that rant. Going back to this book I also realized what a raw deal Professor Trelawney got in this series. No one takes her seriously. No one. McGonagall is downright disdainful to her, in front of students, which is unusual for her as a character. The students don’t take her seriously or respect her. Even Dumbledore gets impatient with her, even though he was the one who witnessed the prophecy about Voldemort. The prophecy that this started the entire series! In reality she’s actually a pretty good Seer. From telling Parvati to beware the red haired man, since she and Padma are twins, she merely got them confused but was correct about the prediction itself. When she says that “around Easter one of our number will leave us forever” and sure enough that’s when Hermoine stomps out of class and never returns. Even the warning “when 13 dine together the first to rise is the first to die.” What Trelawney didn’t realize is that there already WERE 13 people at the table, before she got there. Ron had Scabbers, who is not actually a rat. Dumbledore rises to greet her, he was the first to rise and was the first to die of those people. This happens in Order of the Phoenix too, 13 Order members have dinner, Sirius is the first to leave….he dies later on in the book. She deserves more respect, she’s a damn good Seer.

Alright, I went off on another tangent. Although I still wonder how NO ONE put it together that Hermoine was involved in Buckbeak and Sirius escaping. The Ministry had to give permission for her to have the Time Turner, McGonagall knew. Some of the other teachers had to suspect, they aren’t idiots. If they were talking in the staff room and mentioned her being in their classes at the same time…someone must have suspected. But then, nobody really wanted to look into it too much I suppose. The teachers, except for Snape, would have protected Hermoine. The ministry had bigger problems on their hands, like the fallout from Sirius escaping in the first place. Which is the most likely answer, they had other things to worry about.

Last tangent, I promise. I’ll end this simply. I love this book. I find it one of the most compelling of the entire series. It sets up everything for the story to move forward.

Progress Updates Friday – August 9, 2024

by Stefani

Our Vengeful Souls by Kristi McManus

Progress: Page 230 of 290

Check this book out at: Goodreads

Synopsis:

When magical mermaid Sereia saves her little sister and overshadows brother and rightful heir, Triton, the position of next ruler of the sea is in question. Determined to keep his throne, Triton curses Sereia, transforming her into a human and stripping her of magic. Banishing her from their underwater kingdom, he gives her a final warning: if you should ever return, you will become a monster.

Left for dead, Sereia washes up on the shores of Atlantis, discovered by a kind merchant with a tragic past. Patient and charming, he helps her build a life on land, leaving her realizing that everything she was taught about humans may have been wrong. But legends are powerful forces, and mermaids are burned for their magic by humans who fear their power. Sereia is forced to keep her true identity a secret, even as her feelings for her savior deepen.

Channeling her skill with a blade, she finds a place within the ranks of the Atlantean army, finally giving her the chance to become the respected warrior she always desired. During her training, however, she discovers the legend of a trident of equal power to her father’s exists, and is within her grasp in Atlantis. With a way back to the sea in her grasp, she wavers between the pull of revenge and the possibility of love on land, all under the hateful eye of a vengeful enemy within her ranks. But when the fate of a friend is in the balance, she must make the hardest decision of all: be burned at the stake as a witch, or turn into a monster should she return to the sea.

How it’s going:

Holy crap! I just hit a big swerve in this plot. I thought I had discerned where the story was going, but I was wrong. I am not sure exactly how wrong I was…yet. But I suspect I was very very wrong. I imagine I will read the entire rest of this book in one sitting, I need to know what happens.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling

Narrated by: Jim Dale

Progress: 20%

Check this book out at: Goodreads

Synopsis:

Harry Potter, along with his best friends, Ron and Hermione, is about to start his third year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Harry can’t wait to get back to school after the summer holidays. (Who wouldn’t if they lived with the horrible Dursleys?) But when Harry gets to Hogwarts, the atmosphere is tense. There’s an escaped mass murderer on the loose, and the sinister prison guards of Azkaban have been called in to guard the school…

How it’s going:

This book sets a tone from the first page that is different from the previous two book. From the first word it’s clear that this is going to be a much darker book than the others. Also, Professor Trewlany got a raw deal. The woman is actually a pretty good Seer, but all she receives is ridicule. Even from other Professors.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets Audiobook Review: A Delightful and Compelling Journey

by Stefani

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling

Narrated by: Jim Dale

Published: December 1, 1999 by Listening Library

Buy this book at: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Kobo

Synopsis:

The Dursleys were so mean that hideous that summer that all Harry Potter wanted was to get back to the Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. But just as he’s packing his bags, Harry receives a warning from a strange, impish creature named Dobby who says that if Harry Potter returns to Hogwarts, disaster will strike.

And strike it does. For in Harry’s second year at Hogwarts, fresh torments and horrors arise, including an outrageously stuck-up new professor, Gilderoy Lockheart, a spirit named Moaning Myrtle who haunts the girls’ bathroom, and the unwanted attentions of Ron Weasley’s younger sister, Ginny.

But each of these seem minor annoyances when the real trouble begins, and someone–or something–starts turning Hogwarts students to stone. Could it be Draco Malfoy, a more poisonous rival than ever? Could it possibly be Hagrid, whose mysterious past is finally told? Or could it be the one everyone at Hogwarts most suspects…Harry Potter himself?

Rating:

Review:

After all my years of reading and listening (and re-reading/re-listening) to the Harry Potter books I have always remembered Chamber of Secrets to be one of my least favorite. Not for any particular reason, but I always remember finding it less compelling than the others. I wonder if my reading habits have changed or my perspective of the book has changed but this was delightful.

A lot of the things that I struggled with in the first book were rectified here. There were less examples of Harry and his friends stepping into situations that they had no logical reason to believe they could solve. But in this book, because it affects Harry so personally it makes a lot more sense that he would see it as a mission to fix it himself. Harry changed a lot in this book. He went from a naive 11 year old who didn’t even know magic existed and was thrown into a situation where people believed that he was hurting people. He even had Hermoine taken away from him for a large portion of the story, who has always been his most sympathetic ear. He was nearly alone and it was a great test for him.

This book also shows us an entirely different kind of Voldemort. We see him as the boy he used to be. We learn that he and Harry shared a lot in common. We see him in the light he wishes to show Harry…the Head Boy, the school hero, the one who stopped the bad guy. It’s not the truth, as we know now, but it’s how he wanted Harry to perceive him. He used this to try and create a kinship with Harry so that he could manipulate him. And it’s just marvelous. Rowling has one of the best talents for adding complexity to her characters. I’ve never encountered an author that is as good at characterization as she is. Everyone is an intricately complex human being. Neither entirely good, nor entirely bad, just like all the rest of us humans. I find it remarkable.

This book also has a lot of little gems that I had forgotten about. This book is really funny. I had forgotten just how humorous it was. Dobby is so earnestly trying to be helpful, and failing so spectacularly, that it’s comical. Lockhart is absolutely hilarious. It is so fun to see some people absolutely hanging on his every word and others rolling their eyes before he even opens his mouth. He is perfectly pompous and it had me rolling out of my chair laughing. Since the rest of the book is so dark and serious it lightened the mood considerably in all the right places.

In the end, I enjoyed this book much more than I ever have before. It feels like sacrilege to say but I think I liked it more than the first book.

Note: You may or may not have noticed that I tried something different with the post title of this one. Let me know what you think. Whether you like it or hate it, I would love the feedback.

Audiobook review: Harry Potter and the Sorceror’s Stone by JK Rowling

by Stefani

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling

Narrated by: Jim Dale

Published: June 26, 1997 by Scholastic

Buy this book at: Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Kobo

Synopsis:

Harry Potter has no idea how famous he is. That’s because he’s being raised by his miserable aunt and uncle who are terrified Harry will learn that he’s really a wizard, just as his parents were. But everything changes when Harry is summoned to attend an infamous school for wizards, and he begins to discover some clues about his illustrious birthright. From the surprising way he is greeted by a lovable giant, to the unique curriculum and colorful faculty at his unusual school, Harry finds himself drawn deep inside a mystical world he never knew existed and closer to his own noble destiny.

Rating:

Review:

I have always loved the Harry Potter books. I was first introduced to them about six months after Prisoner of Azkaban was released. And I devoured them. I was the crazy person who signed up for all of the midnight releases of the new books. Got locked into the Barnes & Noble to await the book being delivered, got my book at midnight and went home to start reading. Once I was an adult I would take the following day off work to read the book in one sitting. I couldn’t get enough. I saw every film on release day. I bought every audiobook on release day. For a long time when I worked a data entry job I would listen to the audiobooks on repeat. I would get to the end and start again, over and over and over. So this was a comfort listen for me.

As far as the narration goes, what more do I need to say other than Jim Dale. Disclaimer, I also love the audiobooks by Stephen Fry because he is a legend and I adore his version. But there’s just something special about the Jim Dale audiobooks. He puts on such a performance! All of the voices and the inflection and the emotion. He is a legend. I could listen to these audiobooks every single day and never get bored of hearing his voice.

Enough of my fawning over Jim Dale, on to the book. It was just as book as I remembered it. One of the most memorable opening sentences in all of fiction, ““Mr. and Mrs. Dursley of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.” This single line puts you into this world immediately. You know exactly what kind of people the Dursley’s are. And then you have the wonder of all the “strange” and “unusual” thing that Vernon Dursley keeps noticing, but doesn’t say anything to Petunia because he wouldn’t want to worry her. The moment Harry Potter learns he is a wizard is a moment filled with so much emotion that it still makes me tear up.

Naturally the book isn’t perfect, but it’s close. You have to suspend reality a lot for this plot to be plausible. Why a group of 11 year old children, who had been learning magic for about 5 minutes, thought that they were more capable of protecting the stone than a group of wizards and witches that had more magical experience in their pinky finger? Realizing that if Harry had just left well enough alone that Voldemort wouldn’t have stood a chance at getting the stone in the first place, so he put his friends in danger entirely unnecessarily. And, of course, the royal screw job that Dumbledore gives Slytherin for the House Cup at the end of the book.

But, if you just suspend your imagination a little then these are merely things to giggle about in an otherwise legendary book. The only place where this book loses a star for me is that is it full of tropes. The nerdy, unattractive girl. The fat boy who resembles a pig. The shabby kid who comes from a large family and doesn’t dress well. A lot of tropes that make me crinkle my nose a bit as an adult. But it is just as magical reading it for the thousandth time as it was the first.

Progress Updates – July 19, 2024

by Stefani

The Delicate Beast by Roger Celestin

Progress: Page 149 of 414

Check this book out at: Goodreads

Synopsis:

In the 1950s Tropical Republic, a boy lives amid opulence and privilege, spending days at the beach or in the cool hills above the sweltering capital, enjoying leisurely Sunday lunches around the family compound’s swimming pool. That is, until the reign of The Mortician begins, unleashing unimaginable horrors that bring his childhood idyll to an end. Narrowly escaping the violent fate visited on so many of his fellow citizens, he and his brother follow their parents into exile in the United States where they must start a new life. But as he grows, he never feels at home, and leaves his family to travel across Europe and outrun the ghosts of the past.

A searing novel of a life lived in the shadow of history, The Delicate Beast portrays the persistent, pernicious legacy of political violence.

How it’s going:

So far this book has been 149 pages of….absolutely nothing. I put it down for a few weeks and hoped that would help spark my interest in it. But it hasn’t. All we’ve talked about so far is memories of the main character’s childhood. A few family history stories about how they came to be on the island. And the writing is difficult to read. The author meanders so much that I often forget what I’m reading. I’m not sure how much longer I will continue reading but something needs to happen soon. The synopsis says it’s about political violence, it is reminiscent of politics in one way so far. Tedium.

Our Vengeful Souls by Kristi McManus

Progress: Page 42 of 290

Check this book out at: Goodreads

Synopsis:

When magical mermaid Sereia saves her little sister and overshadows brother and rightful heir, Triton, the position of next ruler of the sea is in question. Determined to keep his throne, Triton curses Sereia, transforming her into a human and stripping her of magic. Banishing her from their underwater kingdom, he gives her a final warning: if you should ever return, you will become a monster.

Left for dead, Sereia washes up on the shores of Atlantis, discovered by a kind merchant with a tragic past. Patient and charming, he helps her build a life on land, leaving her realizing that everything she was taught about humans may have been wrong. But legends are powerful forces, and mermaids are burned for their magic by humans who fear their power. Sereia is forced to keep her true identity a secret, even as her feelings for her savior deepen.

Channeling her skill with a blade, she finds a place within the ranks of the Atlantean army, finally giving her the chance to become the respected warrior she always desired. During her training, however, she discovers the legend of a trident of equal power to her father’s exists, and is within her grasp in Atlantis. With a way back to the sea in her grasp, she wavers between the pull of revenge and the possibility of love on land, all under the hateful eye of a vengeful enemy within her ranks. But when the fate of a friend is in the balance, she must make the hardest decision of all: be burned at the stake as a witch, or turn into a monster should she return to the sea.

In line with the classic fairy tale The Little Mermaid (Hans Christian Anderson) and the mythological adventure Lore (Alexandra Bracken), Our Vengeful Souls takes you on a journey of loss, love and vengeance, into the life of one of fairy tales most famous villains.

How it’s going:

I am LOVING this one so far. Sereia is a formiddable character. And I love the idea of this book too, an origin story for Ursula. I can’t wait to see how it goes.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling

Progress: 40%

Check this book out at: Goodreads

Synopsis:

Harry Potter has no idea how famous he is. That’s because he’s being raised by his miserable aunt and uncle who are terrified Harry will learn that he’s really a wizard, just as his parents were. But everything changes when Harry is summoned to attend an infamous school for wizards, and he begins to discover some clues about his illustrious birthright. From the surprising way he is greeted by a lovable giant, to the unique curriculum and colorful faculty at his unusual school, Harry finds himself drawn deep inside a mystical world he never knew existed and closer to his own noble destiny.

How it’s going:

It’s been a long time since I read these books. And I realized that I’ve never actually done a formal review of the books. So I decided to listen to my favorite audiobook versions of Harry Potter, the one and only Jim Dale. Harry is much more whiny than I remember. Hermoine is about the same as I remember. Ron is much funnier than I remember. And so far, I’m having a blast.