I missed the boat, the airplane, and every other form of transportation.
I downloaded a huge torrent of ebooks, and was scanning through them last night. I noticed that all 7 Harry Potter books were in there, and never being a fan, myself, I started paging through the first one. Before I knew it, I had read the whole thing. I always thought that these books were a little too far under the age line for me to be interested in, but it was actually pretty good. I'll probably keep reading them.
I thought the same thing when I saw the first one back when Rowling had just released the 3rd. A family friend suggested it to me (we'd talk about books a lot) and I decided to give the book a go. It's a nice series, and the ending is pretty good too, as far as endings go.
I've never actually read any of them myself, but I felt like I had the same misconception about the age mark too. My dad, who mostly reads history, lawyer and horror books, is definitely not into Harry Potter but got hooked somehow on them a few months ago. He's already read them all by now, but I guess he got bored one day and picked up one of the books my mom finished reading. I myself are just not really into them in general. I've tried reading the first and it just wasn't for me, but I'm not saying that it wasn't good.
Edit:: Come to think of it, I think the misconception came from the movies, since the early Harry Potter movies were easily planned for a younger audience (though it's been in the news lately since the new movie is out(/is coming out?) that each movie is progressively moving towards an older and older audience.) It probably has a lot to do with the actors growing up and being old enough to not suck at acting.
One thing that I noticed that set it apart from other children's fantasy novels is the dialogue. Usually, books like these are filled with either cheesy jokes or very blunt, obvious dialogue, so as not to confuse children about what is going on. In this book, I noticed that the dialogue is very realistic, and has a very natural feel to it. That's something that I look for in any type of novel, and I was glad that it wasn't dumbed down at all.
I lost interest before the last book, just couldn't drag myself through it. I should probably rebuy the series and check them out again.
Quote from: Holk on July 23, 2009, 01:49:59 AM
One thing that I noticed that set it apart from other children's fantasy novels is the dialogue. Usually, books like these are filled with either cheesy jokes or very blunt, obvious dialogue, so as not to confuse children about what is going on. In this book, I noticed that the dialogue is very realistic, and has a very natural feel to it. That's something that I look for in any type of novel, and I was glad that it wasn't dumbed down at all.
just wait until they get into the real british english.
snogging.
I was much the same way too few years back. I even hated the rabid fans surrounding Harry Potter, because it was just plain annoying. But a friend lent me a copy one day and I didn't have anything else to read, so I gave it a go. I'm not a rabid fan, but I'm definitely hooked enough to own all of them and see the movies on the first day. Witches, wizards, werewolves, gay pedo head masters... what more can you ask for?
Quote from: Zylos on July 23, 2009, 03:08:37 AM
gay pedo head masters...
(https://rmrk.net/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fv259%2Fpsycho-mantis%2FMalbus_Dumbleson.png&hash=52686e1d00a74890f924b6ef8acfacc4ee0aeaca)
I love you.
The movies suck for the most part except for the one that just came out. Of course it doesn't do the books any justice, but it's better than the others (they just don't have enough time :()
And I'm so glad I didn't get into Harry Potter when it started becoming a craze and everyone wanted to have that mob mentality. (of course, that doesn't mean a lot of those people didn't actually enjoy the book or appreciate it) Of course, the silly ones that watch only the Harry Potter movies and say "HARRY POTTER IS SO COOL" is >_>
I liked the third book very much and the seventh.
I didn't like the sixth movie actually, I found it pretty boring.
[spoiler]
I also don't like the ending of the whole series
happy ending ftw
My endings would have been:
His scar had not pained for 19 years. All was well.
"Ow" Harry said, holding his forehead, "Ginny, I think I have a headache"
OR
"Avada Kedavara!"
"Expe...t?arm?-shit i forgot. OH SHIT"
dead
end.[/spoiler]
Quote from: Nightwolf on July 28, 2009, 11:21:15 AM
I also don't like the ending of the whole series
happy ending ftw.
I actually thought that, too. Although you ruined it for Holk, maybe, idk. But, if you were to be in Rowling's place, there ain't much you can do :\ Some people are going to want a happy ending whether they enjoy it or not.
Children's names are redicalous, though. Silly Harry.
oh lol sorry
although I'm sure everyone knows what happens at the end
I DONT
Harry and Ron get married.
Harry steps out of his wizard-school simulation pod, and resumes his life as a hovercraft mechanic.
Harry wakes up and realizes it was all just a dream, and goes back to his dead end office job in Cleveland.
Harry wakes up next to pooky on the floor, and mutters to himself about hating Mondays.
Harry is Kaiser Soze.
Soylent Green was muggles.
Harry was actually dead, and Voldemort's weakness is water! Swing away, Harry!
Quote from: Holk on July 28, 2009, 06:02:07 PM
Harry is Kaiser Soze.
How'd you know? D: You shouldn't have read ahead to the ending of the 7th book.
Where is the torrent, by the way? It would be a good idea to post it up in a trading section. If RMRK had one ;o
I believe our good friend Tezuka just took care of that.
I never had any age line problems with Harry Potter. For obvious reasons.
Slight spoilers below, even if you've already heard it?
[spoiler]
I liked the series as a whole, the last one was pretty cool because of it's out-of-hogwarts-ish-ness, although I'm not sure I liked all of that "TWO OF YOUR FAVORITE CHARACTERS ARE GUNNA DIE" advertising.
If I had a favorite, I'd pick the last one with the same reasoning. However, overall they're all pretty solid books, even if death looks like it's becoming a gimmick near the end.[/spoiler]
[spoiler]It ends with Dumbledore's marriage to Harry. Dumbledore's gay pedo thing was my favorite sideplot, right next to the Dumbledore/Dobby stuff :)[/spoiler]
I meant the torrent Holk downloaded. I already have all the harry potter books.