Book Review

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
By now there's not much that can be said about the Harry Potter phenomenon that hasn't been said already. Worshipped by kids, and enjoyed by adults, this modern myth has become an accepted classic worldwide. Pull any copy of the series off a shelf anywhere in the world and you're holding magic.
It's not hard to see why. Right from the first page of "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" (or "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" for those reading in the UK) Rowling proves that she knows a thing or two about the kind of magic that brings stories to life.
The book starts with Harry as an infant, the child of a wizard and witch. He is suddenly left orphaned after an attack by the evil and powerful wizard Lord Voldemort, a villain so evil that most wizards and witches refer to him as "You-Know-Who". Mysteriously, Harry survive the Killing curse which is a solid way to kill people and Voldemort, his power apparently broken in his attempt to kill the child, disappears leaving many to think he's gone for good. The news spreads fast and Harry is hailed as a hero. Even though he's just a baby his victory over Voldemort makes him an overnight celebrity among magic users all over the world.
As a result, the Headmaster and Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry step in to decide Harry's future. They decide to take the child out of the spotlight and allow him to live a normal life with his only remaining relations, a Muggle (people with no magic) family named Dursley, until he is of age to attend the Hogwarts school. They leave Harry on the doorstep of the Dursley's home, with no more than a letter of explanation.
The story truly begins nearly ten years later, after Harry has endured a childhood of constant scorn and hatred at the hands of his new family. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia are embarrassed by the fact that Harry's mother considered herself a witch and married a man who claimed to be a wizard. The Dursley's simply don't hold with such nonsense. They consider themselves respectable.
As Muggles go, the Dursley's may not be prime examples of the worst of their kind, but they rank pretty high. They force Harry to sleep in a cupboard under the stairs and to wear their spoiled son's damaged cast-offs. Harry is little more than a servant and a punching bag to his cousin Dudley. But worst of all, Mr. Dursley has not read Dumbledore's letter to Harry, leaving the boy unaware of such things as his heritage, the truth about his parents death and his emerging powers.
Then everything changes with the delivery of a letter in a very unusual fashion. From that point on, Harry's life is never the same again. The letter is actually an acceptance letter, a notification to Harry that he has a place at Hogwart's school. Literally rescued from the Dursley's and taken under the wing of Hagrid, the school's lovable giant of a groundskeeper, Harry embarks on the adventure of a lifetime in the hallowed halls of Hogwarts where in addition to his studies he makes close friends and a lifelong enemy, discovers a talent for a very unusual sport called Quidditch and solves a mystery that threatens the world, not to mention his very existence.
J.K Rowling introduces readers to an assortment of characters, ranging from extremes of good and bad, enlightened to dumb, and capable to confused, with most being somewhere on between.
Like most of the greatest heroes in the world, Harry is both ordinary and extraordinary. He's an eleven-year-old skinny kid, with unruly black hair and a weird scar on his forehead. He's also an orphan who doesn't remember his parents. Harry’s character is appealing because of his an authentic human characteristics. Although he is often brave and bold, Harry also experiences self-doubt and is afraid, asking for help when he is terrified and feels powerless. He is often untidy and suffers queasiness and stomachaches when he experience emotional turmoil. Harry represents the contradictions of adolescents. He is primarily selfless, sharing his meagre scraps of food with Hedwig (his pet owl) when they are imprisoned at the Dursley’,but can be self-absorbed when focusing on solving a mystery related to his parents. Despite being surrounded by friends and classmates, he is often isolated. Harry is mostly wise but sometimes vulnerable and innocent. Respectful to authority figures, and he occasionally break rules.
Hermione Jean Granger. When we first meet Hermione, Harry and Ron think she's super annoying. She's loud and bossy and butts in all the time. She's your typical know-it-all, does-her-homework-perfectly-all-the-time, and always-follows-rules kind of girl. Hermione puts lots of people off by working so hard and being so smart. But she's not just a suck-up – we can tell that she's genuinely excited about learning magic and has an incredibly strong work ethic. To other students, though, it can seem like she's trying too hard.
Ronald Billius Weasley, Ron is Harry's first and best friend at Hogwarts (not counting Hagrid). They are BFFs from the get-go. Ron spends much of his time being overshadowed by his friends and family. Ron's closest friends are an international celebrity (Harry) and a brainiac (Hermione), and he feels intimidated by all his older brothers' reputations. Whether they're pranksters or high-achievers, they're all making names for themselves in the big bad world, and as the youngest of the Weasley brothers, Ron's worried he won't measure up.
Albus Dumbledore is the headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and pretty much the coolest wizard around. In this first book of the series, we see him as a friendly, but distant authority figure. While we readers first meet him as the wise, sorrowful figure who says Harry must be left with the Dursleys for his own good, Harry first learns about Dumbledore through his biography on a Chocolate Frog card (Chocolate Frogs are a delicious kind of wizard candy). According to the card, he's interested in music and bowling. He also figured out ways to employ the blood of dragons. Dumbledore really made a name for himself when he conquered a dark wizard named Grindelwald in the 1940s. The card also says that Dumbledore is "considered by many the greatest wizard of modern times". Dumbledore may be a celebrity in the wizarding world, but he also has a kind and humble heart. His speeches to the Hogwarts student body show that he's a good-humored guy. On top of that, he's pretty levelheaded. It's a great thing that Hogwarts has such an even-tempered guy running the show, since things get kind of crazy around there with all gossiping ghosts and ferocious plants. Dumbledore is really patient with the hormonal teenage shenanigans at the school, which are, of course, even crazier than at most schools, because the students have magical powers.
Lord Voldemort, at the beginning of the book, wizards all over the land are celebrating because Voldemort has been defeated. So, we learn from the start that he is one unpopular wizard. Voldemort's reign of terror that has oppressed so many wizards for eleven years has finally ended at the start of the book. Even though he's known for being incredibly powerful, a mere baby defeats him when he tries to kill it. As Hagrid explains to Harry when he comes to deliver his Hogwarts admission letter, Voldemort was a "wizard who went… bad. As bad as you could go. Worse. Worse than worse". Voldemort inspires such fear in his opponents that they refuse to call him by name, as though using his name will conjure him up or alert him to their presence. The only people who aren't afraid to speak Voldemort's name are Dumbledore and Harry.
Hagrid is the groundskeeper at Hogwarts, but, man, he's so much more than that. He's pretty much the friendliest, most trustworthy, and most loving authority figure at Hogwarts. He previously attended Hogwarts and was expelled during his third year. While he's not allowed to do magic anymore, he clearly knows how; Harry notices the special way Hagrid treats his umbrella. Hagrid means well and tries to keep secrets, but he's constantly letting things slip. He's kind of an open book in this way.
Minerva McGonagall welcomes students to Hogwarts both literally and figuratively – she writes the admission letters and also greets them when they enter to be Sorted. She is the Transfiguration instructor at Hogwarts and Head of the Gryffindor house. She's also Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts. This puts her as second-in-command to Dumbledore. We're first introduced to her as a tabby cat, though, waiting outside the Dursleys' home for the arrival of baby Harry Potter. She cares deeply about Harry and his parents and seems, at least at the beginning of the book, slightly more softhearted than Dumbledore.

Severus Snape. Snape. It rhymes with grape, tape, scrape, and drape. And it sounds a bit like "snake." Professor Snape teaches Potions at Hogwarts. He doesn't like Harry, and Harry doesn't like him. Snape is super mean to Harry and the other Gryffindors, and looooves the Slytherin students over all others. If we think Slytherin students as having a greater potential for evil than the others, then their Head of House may just have a nasty side as well. Snape is very different from the Gryffindor Head of House, Professor McGonagall; he's strict in a crueler way than she is. And, he's not very fair.
Draco Malfoy, like Dudley Dursley, Malfoy is a bully – except Malfoy is way more dangerous. He's your typical Slytherin – cunning and devious, with a tendency to use magic for cruel reasons. He sees Neville as an easy target, picking on him in order to get at Harry, but he's also mean to people like Ron and Hermione.
Quirinnius Quirrell is new to Hogwarts. He's the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. And he seems like kind of an oddball. He always wears a turban, he smells funny, and he stutters. He seems too weak and meek to be a threat to anyone, and many of the students consider his presence as Dark Arts instructor a kind of joke.Underneath that turban, though, is a deep dark secret: Voldemort himself. The Dark Lord is actually living in Quirrell, like a parasite .In opening himself up to Voldemort, Quirrell loses part of himself and becomes a hollowed-out shell. He acts all harmless around the folks at Hogwarts so he can assist his Master in his evil schemes.
Harry's Muggle uncle, Mr. Dursley, is described right out of the gate as "a big, beefy man with hardly any neck, although he did have a very large mustache" . He and his wife Petunia obsess over their only child, Dudley, and think "there is no finer boy anywhere" (1.2). That he thinks so highly of the obnoxious Dudley speaks volumes about what Mr. Dursley is really like.
Harry's Muggle aunt, Mrs. Dursley, is "thin and blonde and has nearly twice the usual amount of neck". Her first name is Petunia, which seems like a cruel joke by fate. According to ThinkBabyNames.com, "Petunia" is a "name for a humble-looking flower with white or pink blossoms." But acting humble is the last thing Mrs. Dursley could be accused of.
That was just a bit of characters from my favourite book. J.K. Rowling is just plain awesome when she wrote this book. And did I mention that she’s the only author who became a billionaire because of witing?? That is how awesome she is!