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3.15 AVERAGE
3.15 AVERAGE
As a child, like most of my peers, I really loved the Harry Potter novels. As they were released in successive years, I was always about the same age as the main characters as they made their way through their school careers and beyond. This really made Harry Potter and his friends feel like more than fictional characters, but rather real people who were growing up alongside you.
This new story, set twenty years later, allows us to revisit our old friends (and enemies) and find out what they've been up to. What are they doing now? How they have grown? What's changed? What hasn't?
Harry and Hermione, predictably, are the real winners of this school reunion - Both having achieved high positions in The Ministry of Magic, and happily married to Ginny and Ron Weasly respectively. Ron, if anything, has become more of a class clown. But this is appropriate given his career running his brothers' old joke shop. Both couples also have a collection of children to introduce to us. Harry and Ginny's troubled middle child Albus is the one this story revolves around.
It seems being the son of the most famous hero in the wizarding world isn't necessarily as easy as you might think. Harry struggles to connect with him, and his difficulties at school lead him and his best friend Scorpius to a drastic course of action that has potentially very dark consequences.
The boys' series of mistakes and attempts to rectify them will lead them to some familiar locations and characters.
I wasn't sure about this story at first. I, like Harry, found it difficult to identify with Albus. I couldn't get behind the choices he was making, and this was pulling me out of the story. I wonder though if this is because we so used to experiencing the wizarding world from Harry's perspective, that rather than accepting Albus as the centre of this story, we adopt a parental attitude - still seeing him through his father's eyes, questioning his choices, and worrying about the consequences.
I got past this eventually though. Albus' motivations become more clear throughout the book, and I warmed to him as a character.
Another issue I had with the first half of the play: at some points the plot felt like an elaborate excuse to give the reader/audience a greatest hits of the Harry Potter novels, plus one or two 'what if' fantasy scenarios. But as the final acts come around, the story is resolved with a satisfying depth
It's important to remember that Harry Potter and The Cursed Child is a play, not a novel. Part of me worried that reading the book would spoil the experience of watching the play. Actually I think it has had the opposite effect - the ambitious sets, special effects and stage directions described in the script have just made me more curious to see the play performed. If the play can be realised on stage even remotely as it's written, then it promises to be a truly magical experience. - If you're lucky enough to score a ticket at least!
This new story, set twenty years later, allows us to revisit our old friends (and enemies) and find out what they've been up to. What are they doing now? How they have grown? What's changed? What hasn't?
Harry and Hermione, predictably, are the real winners of this school reunion - Both having achieved high positions in The Ministry of Magic, and happily married to Ginny and Ron Weasly respectively. Ron, if anything, has become more of a class clown. But this is appropriate given his career running his brothers' old joke shop. Both couples also have a collection of children to introduce to us. Harry and Ginny's troubled middle child Albus is the one this story revolves around.
It seems being the son of the most famous hero in the wizarding world isn't necessarily as easy as you might think. Harry struggles to connect with him, and his difficulties at school lead him and his best friend Scorpius to a drastic course of action that has potentially very dark consequences.
The boys' series of mistakes and attempts to rectify them will lead them to some familiar locations and characters.
I wasn't sure about this story at first. I, like Harry, found it difficult to identify with Albus. I couldn't get behind the choices he was making, and this was pulling me out of the story. I wonder though if this is because we so used to experiencing the wizarding world from Harry's perspective, that rather than accepting Albus as the centre of this story, we adopt a parental attitude - still seeing him through his father's eyes, questioning his choices, and worrying about the consequences.
I got past this eventually though. Albus' motivations become more clear throughout the book, and I warmed to him as a character.
Another issue I had with the first half of the play: at some points the plot felt like an elaborate excuse to give the reader/audience a greatest hits of the Harry Potter novels, plus one or two 'what if' fantasy scenarios. But as the final acts come around, the story is resolved with a satisfying depth
It's important to remember that Harry Potter and The Cursed Child is a play, not a novel. Part of me worried that reading the book would spoil the experience of watching the play. Actually I think it has had the opposite effect - the ambitious sets, special effects and stage directions described in the script have just made me more curious to see the play performed. If the play can be realised on stage even remotely as it's written, then it promises to be a truly magical experience. - If you're lucky enough to score a ticket at least!
Play, it's a play. JK Rowling is getting lazy.. Could spare some words and make it a real novel. Why publish a play used in rehearsals?
And this play is too much drama. I mean it's always been about love and friendship, and relationships, and feelings, and emotions that make us act and shape us as we grow, but it's too much father-son issues in this one and less adventures. Overdramatized apparently to do well on stage but not delivering as a book.
I cried when it came to professor Snape, I always do.. Feeling nostalgic about the lot. But didn't like them getting old. Feels weird. Feels like getting old and loosing friends, and missing them, and remembering times, when you were young and shared fun and sorrows, and not being able to do it again. Because, you know, it's family and kids and.. you know... It's their time now.
So this 8th part could do better if it were a totally new story, new adventures, new heroes. And if it were a novel too.
And this play is too much drama. I mean it's always been about love and friendship, and relationships, and feelings, and emotions that make us act and shape us as we grow, but it's too much father-son issues in this one and less adventures. Overdramatized apparently to do well on stage but not delivering as a book.
I cried when it came to professor Snape, I always do.. Feeling nostalgic about the lot. But didn't like them getting old. Feels weird. Feels like getting old and loosing friends, and missing them, and remembering times, when you were young and shared fun and sorrows, and not being able to do it again. Because, you know, it's family and kids and.. you know... It's their time now.
So this 8th part could do better if it were a totally new story, new adventures, new heroes. And if it were a novel too.
Ignoring the facts that I am obsessed with Harry Potter and hate Joanne Rowling as a human being… this would still get one star. This could be a bad fan fic written by a 14 year old and I would be none the wiser. The characters were one dimensional, there were really no good relationships that ended productively, and it felt overall lazy. Not what anyone was hoping for. The actors and choreography and sets in the play were absolutely fantastic, however reading it did not give me any of that imagery. I wish this had been a novel with more depth.
A sweet revisit to my favorite world. Because it's in play form, it's not very substantial and it's definitely not a JKR written story but it was nice to see our favorite characters fleshed out a bit as adults.
So lovely to read a new Harry Potter story! It's missing the detail of the original 7 novels because it's just the script for a play but it's still a heartfelt story with so much humor and emotion and a good dose of nostalgia. I'd love to see the play someday.
While I loved being back in the Wizarding World, and being introduced to the new characters, there were just some things that I didn't particularly enjoy that much.
Spoiler
An example is the fact that Neville didn't make a single apperance in this book. I guess it could be a problem fitting it in, when he doesn't play a big role here, but a small meeting would've been great. He works at Hogwarts, for gods sake.Spoiler
like Snape and DumbledoreUpdate: Lowering my rating from 4,5 to 3.
Ah, Harry Potter. I wish I could explain what the Harry Potter book series means to me, but I'm not that great of a writer. I just know that, any time I'm feeling bad, I can open up a Harry Potter book, any of them, and instantly be taken away to a different world. I was a bit skeptical about this new one. It's not written as a traditional novel, it's an actual script. I won't give any of the plot away, but all I can say as I started reading, I felt like I was home. You can tell that JK Rowling didn't do all of the writing, but overall, it's a satisfying book. And now I feel the need to read the whole series over again!