About a month ago, I finished the Harry Potter series (for the first time!). I really liked the HP characters that Rowling created, almost too much, because when there were deaths, I was sorely disappointed. I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to those characters, and some of the deaths seemed wholly unnecessary and excessive.
Overall, I enjoyed the first four books much more than the last three. Part of the reason is probably that the last three books were much darker than the first books of the series. Another reason, though, was that, at times, I felt conscious that I was reading a book, whereas with the first books I was too wrapped up in the story to notice. I wasn’t enamored with the last two books at all, probably due to the demise of too many characters. By that time, though, I was invested in the story and unable to resist finding out how the series ended.
I would love to know how others would rank the books in the series. I’ve heard some say that The Chamber of Secrets is the weakest book, but it happens to be my favorite (followed very closely by The Goblet of Fire). I guess I prefer the (relative) innocence of the first few books compared to the last in the series. If you’ve read the entire series, I’d love to know your ranking of the 7 books, even if it differs greatly with mine!
My ranking follows:
- Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
- Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
- Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
- Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
- Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
I actually liked Prisoner of Azkaban and Sorcerer’s Stone the best. I liked how light hearted they were, and yet very clever. I agree, they got much darker. And I also agree that the writing was more distracting by the end–as if J.K. Rowling’s deadlines were pressuring her and she didn’t polish the extraneous words out of them, as she had for the first few.
The Goblet of Fire is definitely my favourite book out of the series and I do agreee with you about not liking the last few books as much. I particularly dislike the “fairytale” ending of the series!
My favorite was the Prisoner of Azkaban followed by the Goblet of Fire. My least favorite was the Order of the Phoenix.
The Goblet of Fire seems to be popular–it was my favorite, too, followed by The Half-Blood Prince. My least favorite would have to be either Order of the Phoenix (for the writing) or The Prisoner of Azbakan (for the story).
Unlike others, I actually liked the darkness of the later stories–that’s my kind of fantasy! But I agree with Rebecca on the writing. The repetitiveness in Order of the Phoenix drove me nuts, even though the story itself was terrific.
I loved the whole series, but I think the final two books were less memorable. By that I mean that the details of the first several books really stuck with me, whereas I had to reread #6 before starting #7 b/c I couldn’t remember what happened.
The first few books were wonderful – they pulled me in to the story and got me hooked. I remember that The Goblet of Fire was my favorite book when it came out, but that I also really enjoyed the Order of the Phoenix. Those two are probably my favorites.
As a side note, I’ve been watching the movies with my son recently (he’s one of those kids who likes to watch things OVER and OVER and OVER) and I’m amazed at how much the characters have grown since the beginning. Of course, this is true in the books too, but it’s much more obvious in the movies.
I’d love to go back and read the series all the way through sometime … has anyone reading this done that? What did you think the 2nd time through?
My favorite is Azkaban, because I think I liked the combination of innocence and action that Rowling captured there. But I also liked Half-Blood Prince, 1) because I bawled when Dumbledore died and 2) I liked the romance as well as the twists and turns of that book. The rest are okay. I’ve not had any desire to re-read any of them, though.
I really should hurry up and read the last three books!
Goblet is definitely my favorite. I found that my key to enjoying the series was in the enjoyment of the fantastical experiences growing up at a school for wizards and all the strange (and fun!) things that went on there with the extraordinary cast of characters in the wizardry world. Once the setting moved away from focusing on life at Hogwarts it lost it sense of fun (maybe an allegory to a loss of innocence?). It wasn’t so much that the last books were dark per se, it’s just that they didn’t have that sense of the fun and the magical that the earlier books had. And I thought that the Order of the Phoenix movie, by streamlining and limiting itself very strictly to the Harry/Valdemort conflict at the expense of ignoring everything else really lost any sense of the fun and magic that the earlier movies had.
My favourite is, Goblet of Fire, followed by Deathly Hallows, least favourite is Order of the Phoenix, mainly because I think her editors should have been stronger and made her make some cuts.
Congrats on finishing! I don’t know if I could say which were my favorites. I read the first four together and was swept up in the last three and had to wait as each one was released. I finally had caught on to the Harry Potter fervor and I think that was half of the fun for me.
The series peaked for me with Prisoner of Azkaban and Goblet of Fire. I enjoyed the whole seven books very much, but the later books did get a little too heavy with evil. I liked when the books mirrored real teenage life than when Harry was the superhero fighting ultimate evil to save the world.
I would have to say Goblet was my all time favourite, with Half Blood Prince coming in as close second.
I also really enjoyed the plot twists of Chamber of Secrets … But I really did love each and every one.
My least fave would be Order of the Phoenix but mainly because of Harry’s moodiness. I think it was well written, with the teen angst and all that, it was captured very nicely. But it’s just not something I genuinely enjoyed reading about! Hahaha.
Deathly Hallows felt kind of rushed and trying-to-sum-it-all-up.
But I know I’ll read the entire series all over again for the third, fourth etc time.
I’m actually pretty “meh” about the whole series. I stopped reading them after, I think, the fourth one, and got that far only because a friend had lent them to me.
I liked Harry Potter too! Very much!
Bye!
I love your comments. I tried to read HP once and gave up somewhat disgruntled and not being able to understand the hype. But I’m giving it a second try this fall, but I was told by a close friend that I shouldn’t even bother with books one and two. Your take is definitely an interesting contrast!
Harry potter is awesome! I really like it.
Cool that you read them all. I would like to go back and read them again back to back at some point. My favourites were Prisoner of Azkaban and Half-Blood Prince. I liked the darker ones best. My least favourite was Order of the Phoenix which for some reason I found really hard to get into and really struggled trying to finish it.
I thought The Order of the Phoenix was the weakest, but I LOVED all the others!
Great review. I totally agree, the first books were the best, especially the first. It was so magical.
Goblet of Fire is my favorite. I love to be surprised, and did not expect the goblet to be a portkey. I also loved the part where he saw his parents.
Guess I’ll put in my two cents.:)
1.Goblet of Fire
2.Prisoner of Azkaban
3.the Sorcerer’s Stone
4.Chamber of Secrets
5.Half-Blood Prince
6.Deathly Hallows
7,Order of the Phoenix
Definitely not a fan of book bloat and I could have got without hormonal Harry.
I only ready the first three, and while the third was my favourite, it still didn’t make me want to read beyond that.