The Tales of Beedle the Bard by J.K. Rowling

My eight-year old son Daniel is on a Harry Potter kick and got The Tales of Beedle the Bard from his book order.  I had never read it before.   I love the Harry Potter series but I never read any of the other side books J.K. Rowling wrote for charity.  

The Tales of Beedle the Bard is introduced as a collection of stories written for young wizards and witches, think the wizarding version of Grimm’s Fairy Tales.  This collection has a note on each story and its significance at the end by Professor Dumbledore.  One bad thing in the collection is that Daniel is on book five (and looks like he is stopping for now as he said the books are getting a little beyond him for reading, maybe next year he’ll finish up) and didn’t know what the future had in store for Professor Dumbledore, but the introduction of this book lets you know.  Beware!

There are five tales in this collection and I found them all to be delightful and Daniel enjoyed them too.  I love fairy tales and I loved that these stories seemed like an old tale that you had discovered that had been written for the magical community.  I just wish there were more in the collection!

Overall, this is a good addition to the world of Harry Potter and something that any lover of fairy tales would love.  Just beware that the introduction includes information that will spoiler the young reader if they haven’t read the entire Harry Potter series yet.

Book Source:  Purchased from the Scholastic Book Order

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

My husband Ben got me Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on DVD for Christmas. We watched Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire for a recap and then watched our new movie this past weekend.

Lord Voldemort had returned at the end of Goblet of Fire and in this movie there is a persistent fear of him. The Order of the Phoenix is a secret order of wizards that have banded together to fight the dark lord and include such luminaries as Lupin, Sirius, Snape, Mad-Eye Moody, the Weasleys, etc. At Hogwarts, Harry starts his own band of warriors after the Ministry of Magic decides to smear Harry and Dumbledore and ignore the return of Voldemort. To this end, the Ministry of Magic plans Dolores Umbridge on campus as the new Defense Against the Dark Arts Teacher who takes away student rights and does not teach any sort of defense. Harry and his friends secretly teach each other defense techniques to be ready for the return of the dark lord.

First of all, I love the Harry Potter books, but haven't always liked the movies. I think the movie was okay, but not as good as it could have been. I must admit that I didn't like the first Harry Potter movie that much and it has put me to sleep twice before. Chris Columbus took the book too literaly and really needed to chop some stuff out to make the movie more interesting. This movie went to the opposite end and really chopped out too much information. If like Ben, you haven't read the books (or like me its been a few years since you've read the book), you can get really confused on what is going on. A movie should be able to stand on its own without having read the book. The books get darker in tone as they progress through the series, but this movie seemed to take all of the darkness out of the book, and none of the lighter fun moments. I missed them! The movie was pretty good, but could have stood to be longer. Number 3 is still my favorite movie. Does anyone thing I'm being overly critical?

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

It was with much excitement that I received Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in the mail on Saturday. I started reading the series back in 1999 during my senior year at Michigan Tech. It was a busy and stressful year, but Harry Potter was so enthralling that I somehow always found time to take out a book and escape into a fantastical new world. I remember Corinna finding me in the windows in the DOW reading Harry when I should have been doing homework on numerous occasions. It was fun sharing the books with friends like Corinna and Phil so we could discuss the newest adventures of Harry.

It's hard to believe that was eight years ago and that the adventures are finally coming to an end. I finished reading the book at lunch today. It would have been sooner if I could have stayed home on the couch all day Saturday to read. Too bad work, chores, and social activities get in the way! There were many tears shed throughout the reading of this book, but I must admit, it was the most enthralling book of them all. The best part of the book is how J.K. Rowling shows that she had everything planned from the beginning with numerous story lines from all of the other novels finding their penultimate conclusion in this novel.

I'm not going to post a plot summary or how I felt about the end as I don't want to have spoilers for those who haven't read it yet. I know I didn't want to know how it ended until I read it myself! All I'm going to say is that it was for me, the best book out of a truly fantastic series of books. If you want to chat with me about the book if you've read it already, send me an email!