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Harry Potter And the Half-Blood Prince...
Worth the Wait

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince has arrived with fanfare and parties. Millions of fans, old and young, are busy devouring the long awaited details and Pottermania seems to have taken hold of the world. If romantic novels appeal to you, this book is just what you've been waiting for. If swashbuckling adventure and suspense is what you're looking for, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince delivers.

If you are just getting to know Harry Potter, or if you only know the boy wizard through the movies, you are in for a treat with book six. If you are a true HP fan and have been watching the trio of Harry, Ron and Hermione since their first days at Hogwarts, the Half-Blood Prince will keep your blood and your mind racing as you tear through the action packed adventures in these pages.

JK Rowling draws recognizable characters with her words. The people and creatures that inhabit the world she creates, become real flesh and blood inhabitants of your imagination. The events in Harry Potter's world are fast paced and exciting.

A combination of sword and sorcery, science fiction, mediaeval mystery and romance, the Harry Potter books are a good read for anyone from 5 to 150. While the earliest books in the series may have been a bit slow for adult readers, the latest addition to the story will keep readers of any age spell bound as they wait for the tangled threads of the plotlines to weave into a tapestry of courage, love, adventure, loss and the triumph of good over evil.

In Harry Potter's world, many of the pure blood wizards and witches, who are descended from a long line of witches and wizards, look down on anyone whose ancestors did not have magical powers. Half-bloods, who have a normal human as a parent or grandparent, and mudbloods who somehow acquire magical abilities even though they are born to nonmagical parents, may be very skilled, but can never erase the prejudice against their heritage.

The dark wizard, Voldemort, has gathered a group of pure bloods and others who are attracted to his evil ideas, in an attempt become the ultimate power in the world. His army is known as the Death Eaters.

The battle is being waged in the world of wizardry, but the effects of the warfare are also getting through to the mundane world of unmagical humans, known as Muggles.

Dumbledore is the most brilliant and powerful wizard on the side of good. He is the headmaster of Hogwarts, a school that houses and trains young, magically gifted students.

Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, his two best friends and allies, have been students at the school for five years and are returning for their sixth year of study. They are almost ready to leave school and join the adult wizard world.

Like most high school students, they attend classes, play sports and try to find their way through the pitfalls of budding romance. Quite a bit of snogging, better known as kissing, turns up as the soon-to-be-seventeen sixth year students work on learning social skills along with magic.

Unlike most high schoolers, they also have an added dimension to their lives. Harry has been chosen by an accident of fate and a prophesy, to be the wizard that ends the threat of Voldemort... by killing him. The agents of Voldemort's Death Eaters are difficult to identify and are a constant threat to the safety of everyone at Hogwarts especially Harry and his mentor, Dumbledore.

One of the pure blood students, Draco Malfoy, has been a thorn in the side of the trio of friends from the first days at school. In the last book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Draco's was found to be one of the Death Eaters in league with the Dark Lord.

The elder Malfoy was imprisoned, in great part due to the efforts of Harry and company. With Draco's desire for revenge against Harry and Dumbledore added to his roots in the Death Eaters, admiration of Voldemort and hatred of mudbloods many readers expect a confrontation between the students this term. They will not be disappointed.

Harry Potter is no superman. He is a sensitive, intelligent teen-ager who wears glasses and worries about passing exams. Except for his growing magical powers, he is not a very formidable enemy for the Dark Lord.

The Half-Blood Prince is expected to be someone who helps Harry in the struggle, and in some ways that is true, but the twists along the road and the final outcome are not what you might expect.

In this episode of good vs. evil, the Death Eaters and Voldemort do not win the day, but they do inflict pain on the staff and students of Hogwarts. The forces of good may win in the end, but as in any good tragedy, the lessons and victories cost the heroes dearly.

Readers will learn more about Professor Snape and gain deeper insight into how Tom Riddle became the evil Voldemort. Anyone who has been a Harry Potter fan will be glad to finally get this installment of the series...and many new fans will discover the wonder of the magical world. There are dark days and happy times.

The world of Harry Potter fandom will be left deciphering the clues JK Rowling has planted here.

Will the innocent faith of Harry Potter be strong enough to destroy the evil Voldemort, who literally gave his soul to enhance his evil? Will Harry be able to confront the strength of the Dark Lord and his Death Eaters? Will the Half-Blood Prince turn out to be an ally or an enemy?

Clues to the final outcome are scattered throughout Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. This sixth book in the Harry Potter series raises as many questions as it answers.

Other reviews:

Net takes Potter fans on magical, frustrating ride - CNet

These books are about life: they possess a strong morality - Telegraph - UK

Harry Potter magic still there in new book - New Zealand Herald (By Catherine Kohler, age 15)