[Book Review] Harry Potter & The Philosopher’s Stone

Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone – J. K. Rowling 

Rating: 4/5

“Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts,
Teach us something please,
Whether we be old and bald,
Or young with scabby knees,
Our heads could do with filling
With some interesting stuff,
For now they’re bare and full of air,
Dead flies and bits of fluff,
So teach us something worth knowing,
Bring us back what we’ve forgot,
Just do your best, we’ll do the rest,
And learn until our brains all rot…”

I find that because I’ve read this soo many times its actually quite hard to write a coherent and formulated review. I re read all of the books last year but never reviewed them and with the eighth book coming out I figured I would re-read them again.
This is the first book in the series and is one of my least favourites in the series – that’s not to say that it is in any way bad!

I loved that my mind jumped from the movie and text for some of the dialogue because quite a lot of the text was in the movie! I don’t know if it’s like this for everyone but I love being able to say the character’s lines with them during the movie (you should hear me during the howler scene in The Chamber of Secrets!).

I have a lot of trouble, these days understanding why Rowling thought it would be a good idea to make Ron and Hermione canon. As I re-read the series my opinion may change but honestly, all Ron does is make fun of her and tease her. I did like that throughout the book once Ron sort of got over himself a bit and started being nicer to her they made a great team, along with Harry of course! (but they did still fight a lot).

I really think that J.K. Rowling is amazing at foreshadowing. She mentioned Sirius Black (in the first chapter!), talks about Mrs Figg and Hagrid says that anyone would be mad to try and break into Gringotts! This book is comedy gold once you’ve already read the books.
I can’t deal with the characters in these books sometimes!

Fred & George

“You haven’t got a letter on yours,” George observed. “I suppose she thinks you don’t forget your name. But we’re not stupid-we know we’re called Gred and Forge.”

These two are great comedy relief but are also great at supporting their family and no matter what they say, they do love Percy.

Wood

This guy is an absolute beauty. Wood is an amazing character and I can’t help but admire his devotion to quidditch. Oliver Wood is by far one of my favourite characters in the entire series, one of the few things that disappoints me about this series is that we don’t see much of Wood. He’s only at Hogwarts until The Prisoner of Azkaban so we still get to read all of the hilarious schemes he comes up with to beat Slytherin at Quidditch until then. And he was in The Goblet of Fire at the start because of the Quidditch World Cup but, I’ll be honest I would read a grocery list if he wrote one.

Hermione

“So light a fire!” Harry choked. “Yes…of course…but there’s no wood!” …
“HAVE YOU GONE MAD!” Ron bellowed. “ARE YOU A WITCH OR NOT!”
I think it’s really interesting how Hermione has been living at a wizarding school for a good part of a year, is the top pf her grade and somehow forgot that she could use magic when she needed it most!

I really love Hermione’s character and appreciated that even though she does have a good relationship with her parents, she stayed at Hogwarts during the holidays to help Harry and Ron solve the mystery.

The Houses

This is probably the last thing I’ll talk about but what’s with everyone hating on the Hufflepuffs? I know that Justin Finch-Fletchley is a bit of a douche but we haven’t even met him yet! I just don’t understand why people think being a Hufflepuff is a bad thing. Being a Hufflepuff doesn’t mean you’re weak or stupid, it means you’re a good person and you’re loyal – this is by no means a bad thing.

Recommendation: Read the book and then watch the movie. It’s a great experience – being able to spot the difference between the movie and book is really fun and because the text is still fresh in your mind you can say some of the dialogue along with the characters!

Recommendation 2.0: The audiobooks are a a great way to experience the story again!