"If you think Scripture is telling you what you want to hear, take a long, hard second look."
- The Ancient Mariner
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Just finished book 3. If you've forgotten it, here's a fun way to review: The Sirius Black Rap.
This is IT. This is where Harry Potter books become brilliant. The first two books are good. But with this book we move into the level of excellence.
Finally, the plot is a little different. It doesn't involve Harry confronting Voldemore under the Hogwarts castle. (Well, OK, instead of the threat coming from within the castle, now the threat is from without.) Sirius Black has escaped from Azkaban and is coming for Harry... so Dementors are set up as guards around the castle...
Another Defense Against the Dark Arts Teacher...this position seems to be about as lucky as being a drummer for Spinal Tap. So when we meet Lupin on the train I had two thoughts immediately. 1. What's going to happen to this guy? No one stays in this job for more than one book. 2. Dude's a werewolf. The name is a dead giveaway. So he'll probably get found out and fired.
Rowling is a genius. I LOVED how minor details turn out to be important later, the motorcycle Hagrid rode, the picture of the Weasley's in Europe, and SCABBERS!!!!
Rowling is amazing. I'm trying to imagine what her notes must look like. What planning, and plotting she must have done to weave all those threads together.
On Dementors: Why employ evil creatures to guard other evil people? Seems kind of twisted to me.
The previous book,(Chamber of Secrets) was about solving a Hogwarts mystery from 50 years ago. (Voldemore and Hagrid's time.) This one is about solving a Hogwarts mystery from 12-20 years ago. (His father, Sirius' and Snape's time.)
Side note, why does Harry always look happy on the cover illustrations of these books. The poor kid is almost never happy.
The reason I said that this is the book that moves the series from "good" to "excellent" is the end. Giving Harry a father figure as its closing was just brilliant. You can almost feel Harry's warmth and joy at having someone committed to looking out for him. Even though Dumbledore and his friends cared for him, Harry's pretty much been on his own, an orphan. Now he's not an orphan anymore. I wonder how many readers cried when Harry got the letter from his godfather at the end? I didn't, but I was very happy for Harry.
Oh and the fact that they celebrate Christmas and that the position of "godfather" is significant, I think, is not insignificant... At the very least, Christian tradition underlies Harry Potter. (I guess some would argue that's just because it's England...)
Oh and then there's the ending...some stories have false endings. You know the movies, where you think it's over, but then there's a big surprise. This one doesn't pull the wool over your eyes, I didn't feel deceived. But each time you think it's over...it's not.
The last 1/4 of the book felt like a roller coaster ride to me. It was fantastic.
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Comments on "Let's Talk About Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban":
2. Evan
- 12/24/2009 3:33 pm CST
I don't have a favorite of the 7 books, but the movie of Prisoner of Azkaban is by far my favorite and the only one I think that is easily rewatchable.
Alfonso Cuarón should have been hired to direct all of the movies.
Unfortunately, the last three movies (based on books 4-6) have been particularly bad, and since David Yates is directing the Deathly Hallows movies, I'm anticipating they will be as bad as the Half Blood Prince which he also directed.
3. Jeff the Baptist
- 12/24/2009 6:23 pm CST
I used to like this book until I read the Sluggy Freelance parody and realized Pete Abrams is completely correct. The mere existence of the time turner ought to turn the universe on it's head. Even if you just used it to go back and observe the past, it would allow you to create an eye witness (or scry witness) to any crime so people like Sirius Black couldn't be falsely convicted.
Why employ evil creatures to guard other evil people? Seems kind of twisted to me.
Because you can't just get rid of the evil monsters. It's still genocide even if they're evil. Instead the magical world tries to put them to work. The goblins run the banks because they really like hoarding money. The dementors guard the maximum security prison because it keeps them isolated from polite society and restricts them to feeding on people who nominally deserve it.
4. Karl
- 12/26/2009 10:05 am CST
Love your comments on the book. Yeah, as much as I enjoyed the first two I thought the series hit a new level with Azkaban.
I was willing to suspend disbelief with the time-turner, and just not look at it too hard. She did a good job of maintaining a degree of believability with it, good enough that I could go with it, not needing to over-analyze all the reasons why it couldn't work.
The little touches - like the Knight Bus, blowing up of Aunt Marge, the Marauder's map, the backstory of Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs, the reason the Whomping Willow was planted, the shrieking shack, the concepts of dementors, boggarts, and the patronus spell . . . the details with which she furnishes the stories are so rich and multilayered, without ever feeling like mere extraneous clutter. They provide delight; they enhance and further the story, rather than bogging it down like so many authors' detailed descriptions of their imagined worlds.
I loved the visual of Neville forcing Boggart-Snape into his grandmother's clothes.
5. Quaid
- 12/26/2009 8:08 pm CST
If you liked POA, you'll love GOF.
BTW - details only get more and more important. If you're one of those people who like to figure things out before they end (as opposed to being a person who would rather be surprised), you're going to love Book six. After you're done with that one, you'll feel the urge to start over and read books 1-6 again before starting seven to see if you can put the puzzle together on your own. (I suggest giving into the urge - it's worth it). Believe it or not, the books are even more enjoyable the second time around.
6. Quaid
- 12/26/2009 8:10 pm CST
Oh - Evan,
I agree about the POA movie - Cuaron was awesome. Still, I've liked the other movies, too. (Although, the last one could have been better)
I'm hoping that because the last one(s) can give the necessary time to the books that they'll be noticeably better than HBP.
7. Karl
- 12/28/2009 7:05 am CST
I agree with Quaid's 2nd paragraph in #5. While I doubt many, if any, could actually put all the clues together, a re-read of books 1-6 after finishing 6 (or 7) yields a bunch of rich and significant detail that even an attentive reader probably missed the first time around.
My test of a really good book is how well - or whether - it stands up to a re-read. The HP books are definitely on that list.
8. Manders
- 12/28/2009 2:26 pm CST
Agreed re: the movie. I was completely unfamiliar with Harry Potter--never read the books, never seen the other two movies--when my suitemates at college dragged me to go see it at the dollar theater, and I still enjoyed it a lot.
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Ooh, brace yourself. This turns out to be very interesting later on.
I love the whole time-travel element of it--her notes must've been insane plotting this particular point.