Rating: 
Summary: Hero? yes or no?
Review: Unlike the previous four books by JK Rowling, the fifth book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenis, is much darker. From the moment readers open the book, there is no happy cheerful atmosphere of Harry Potter teasing his cousin Dudley. Instead, readers meet an adolescent who is introduced to "hormones" and has great tempers (lots of yelling in this book). Not the usual carefree Harry is he? In the fifth book, Harry has changed quite a lot. His anger of not knowing anything is shown also on Sirus Black who has to stay confined to his house. Harry's pride stops him from thinking correctly despite his friends' warnings to take Occulmency lessons from Snape. And in this book, readers realize that the people who are admired before are suddenly not that great and magnificent anymore. Yes, things are no longer that pure and innocent. Harry learns so much more about the truth. And the truth isn't always that wonderful. Also unlike the earlier chapters, Harry is no longer the bright hero who shines. You decide if he still is the great hero admired by all. I'm sounding so pessismistic. Some people I thought were awesome: Professor McGongall (She's awesome in this book. I loved her even more after reading this book), Fred and George (professional troublemakers! I love these two twins), Neville (don't laugh! He's great in this chapter.),and a new character who is a girl and joins Harry's group of friends (she may sound a little "looney" in the beginning, but she's really kind of cool towards the end). Anyhow. This book is definetly a must read. This is my favorite out of the five books because it's just so different.
Rating:
Summary: Turn your TV off
Review: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix will be your daily entertainment for the next couple of weeks.
Rating: 
Summary: The only one missing that magical spark...
Review: Order of the Phoenix was, like the others, a masterpiece. JK Rowling once again carefully mixed magic with real life experiences to make a world of fantasy so well crafted that we can just believe it without questioning. I enjoyed the story. There were many high points: the never-ending evil of Umbridge, the depth of Harry's character, and Hagrid's latest creature! But there was just something missing from this work that has been there the rest of the way. I think Rowling spent too much time setting everything up so that it will all fall together in the 6th and 7th installments of the book, too much to remember to enjoy the adventure. I got the feeling that the adventure was forced, along the lines of "I have to include the fun stuff." It didn't seem like a story all about the fun stuff. For Potter fans, it's worth a read. If for no other reason than to find out what happens. If it's your first Potter book (what planet have you been living on?), don't start with this one. Start from the beginning and get hooked first!
Rating:
Summary: And your point is. . .
Review: What was that all about? Okay, I admit, I have never felt that any of the Harry Potter books were works of great literature, but I was always willing to let the weak style slide because of the certain naive charm that these books had. They were fun and for the most part interesting, and Harry was a fairly appealing hero, struggling through his outrageously cruel upbringing with the Dursleys with a certain, stoic steadfastness and dignity: I just wanted to cheer him on for all his courage and maturity. So what happened to our Harry? The old argument that Harry's just growing up, and that he's a typical, moody teenager is absurd and really growing thin. Teenagers, even the moodiest ones, don't spend all their yelling at their best friends or their favorite headmasters! That seems more a sign of a disturbed young man! After all, Hogwarts is full of kids Harry's age who manage to keep their voices below a full blown roar for most of the story--even those who have undoubtedly suffered traumas in their lives as well, like Neville Longbottom. And besides, I like my heroes to be people I can look up to. I hate to think of all the kids who are reading this book and seeing this whiny, petty, annoying young man as someone to admire and emulate. And not only is Harry annoying, he's also a real jerk. His obsession with Cho, so charming in the last couple books, regresses into a wierd sort of hormone-driven conquest with Harry wanting Cho around him only when she behaves like a perfect, pretty, smiling mannequin with no real feelings. He becomes annoyed with her, and subsequestly loses all interest when she expresses grief over Cedric Diggory's death and cries over it--all the while he himself yells and whines louder and longer than anyone else in the story, and seems to feel he has every right. Hmmm. Later, Rowling seems to become bored with the Harry-Cho thing and suddenly turns cute, nice Cho, who always had a smile and pleasant word for Harry in the past, into another one-dimensional meanie, yet one more Pansy Parkinson, who shrieks with rage when her team loses and gets ugly and immature ala Draco Malfoy when she's "foiled again!" as she gets her come-uppance, like all the other predictable villains in the story. Okay, I know first romances seldom work in real life, but as a plot device in a novel, this odd diversion really needs to have a point. So what is it? SPOILER BELOW! BEWARE!! I can say all the same about the infamous "death" in the story: and the point was???? The only answer I can come up with is that Rowling got it in her head to try a Gandalf-resurrection-kind-of-thing with Sirius, and and maybe she's planning to bring him back as Sirius White or something. ??? Who knows? Still, Gandalf's death in The Fellowship of the Ring was meaningful and served some sort of purpose (read this great book if you haven't--see what I mean). Sirius's death was just, well, pointless. I won't go too much into the problems with the repetitive, soporific style Rowling writes with--enough has been said in that area by others, but I do have to call attention to the terrible grammar in this work. I have never seen so many run-on sentences in a published novel! There were comma splices, slices, and dices enough to fill a lenghty infomercial, and run-ons and run-offs a-plenty. Suffice it to say, that as an English teacher, I could not in good conscience give Rowling a passing grade for this book! Is this important? I think it is, since we learn to write by what we read; these books cannot help but have an impact on the children and teens who read them, and their ability to discern a well-written line. Even worse, though I don't specialize in science, I noticed a couple of really glaring astronomical errors in the book as well. For one, the planet Venus cannot be seen after eleven o'clock at night as Rowling has written it. That's a scientific impossibility! Because Venus is fairly close to the sun, it sets soon after it--yet the Hogwarts students are apparently gazing at it long hours after darkness during their exams. Likewise, Orion is a winter constellation, and is not visible during summer evenings; nevertheless, it appears somewhere in the evening sky over Hogwarts during their June exams. What world is this that Harry inhabits? This seems to me like very sloppy writing. Rowling just needs to research a bit more in certain areas, especially those traditionally seen as inherently tied to wizardry (like Astronomy) before she goes about adding some really inaccurate details. Somehow I just can't quite accept that even Dumbledore would (or could) move the heavens around to make this scene plausible, even for the sake of his pupils' all-importnat wizarding exams! Well call me crazy, but despite all, I still admire Rowling for all she's done with getting so many kids into reading and what not, and I can't help but be a supporter of her work and goals. This is Harry Potter after all! I'm truly hoping that there's a method to Rowling's madness, and that she's got something up her sleeve that's going to make it all better next time around. (If not, let's hope the curiously absent editor returns for the next installment and is yet able to save the day.)
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Summary: A new start,. A new Harry.
Review: In his fifth book, fifth year, and now 15, Harry is now deep into adolescence. He is a lot angrier about the slightest things, and very twitchy. After another boring summer in Privet Lane, Harry looks forward to returning to Hogwarts to find out what happened to Voldermort, when he is attacked by Dementors. The book continues at a brisk pace to visit Sirius, the Ministry of Magic, and then the usual challenges of the school year. For some reason, during the summer months, gossip and the Daily Prophet have turned Harry into an attention seeking show off. The Ministry refuses to believe that Voldermort is back, and Dumbledore has been stripped of his titles. Back at School, Ron and Hermione have become prefects, and Harry is saddled with a new ("hem, hem") Ministry appointed Defense against the Dark Arts teacher---a nasty Dolores Umbridge, fresh out a Stephen King nightmare. Soon, she is running Hogwarts, and of course, Mr. Potter is in her gunsights. On top of which, this year Harry has to prepare for the Ordinary Wizard Level (OWL) exams; he develops an overwhelming crush for Cho Chang; and even Quidditch is less fun. Voldermort occupies his head frequently causing his scar to hurt, and Harry is haunted by dreams of long dead end corridors. In the end, someone close to Harry dies. In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry grows up. Grown ups become fallible, he becomes less lovable, and every issue now has two sides. The innocence of the earlier books is gone, which is to be expected after his experiences in the last book, but in its place is a rage that we could not have expected. JK Rowling does everything in the book to unsettle the reader by continuously feeding this rage. Her finest skill is in heaping problem after puzzle after trouble on top of Harry, and then having it all work out in the end. Other reviewers have criticized this book's moving away from the magical charm of the earlier works. I disagree. Harry is growing up, and this book is actually a new beginning. It will set the stage for the final conflict in the next two books. Like all things, life changes. Dumbledore's usual revelation at the end of the book is less satisfying than before, because life has become far more complicated. The new Harry is pernicious, impetuous, bashful, brash, sullen, and angry. But he is also brave, faithful, caring, and compassionate. In other words, Ms. Rawlings has done a good job putting together a troubled teenager with special responsibilities and talents. By the end of the book Harry has made more, and more powerful friends, and he will be burdened with his parent's legacy and the prophecy of his own doom. Dumbledore is exposed for his fallacies and miscalculations. These things set up the final two installments, building up the reader's anticipation. Don't buy this is you are perfectly happy with the previous four books, because this will be very different. But buy this if you care about the character, and enjoy watching him grow. For more mature readers, I would recommend starting from the first book, but this book can stand by itself as the first book in a new trilogy. I just hope that we don't have to wait another three years for the next episode. Also recommended: THE LOSERS' CLUB by Richard Perez
Rating: 
Summary: Very Good, But Not Great
Review: J.K. Rowling has undoubetly proved that she can add mystery and suspense into the first four HP books. However, this factor slightly diminishes in 5. Loose Ties are presented throughout the whole book, and some never get answered. However, I must say Ms. Rowling really gives persona to characters like the vile Dolores Umbridge, and the distant Luna Lovegood. The author also is exceptional at sucking you into the book as if you were part of the D.A, or you were on a broom playing in a high-depth Quidditch Match. The only sections of 5 where it was dry, boring and I find myself skipping over were the Hagrid scenes, like chapters "Grawp" and "Hagrids Tale". It was simply put boring. They should've added more... zing to those parts. On a scale from 1 to 10- 9/10 On a letter scale- A- On a percentage scale- 92%
Rating:
Summary: This is what we waited three years for? Honestly
Review: When I finished the book, my first thought was this: Is this what I've been waiting for? For three years?! Is this why my library has 101 holds on the first book returned?! Don't get me wrong. I love the first four books. This was just disappointing. I was...well, draw your own conclusions. Character: Whats wrong with Harry? How come he has become a pessimistic, whiny, brat? Why does he turn on the ones he cares most about, and why does he feel no remorse or guilt? What about Ron and Hermione? Is Hermione still the annoying, know-it-all girl and is Ron still a punchbag for Harry? And Umbridge and Snape! Umbridge has no character whatsoever except for the fact that she is a sick, disgusting person. And the good part about Snape is the fact we finally find out why he seems so evil. These characters no longer feel compassion and no longer have depth. Plot: I had no idea what the plot even was until the final pages. There was no introduction, no climax. (Voldemort. Again. So unexpected!!) Malfoy is still the son of Death Eater Lucius, and still sounds as if he owns the planet, an actually good part of the story, considering the others. Nothing makes sense anymore. Why does Harry act this? How does this even tie into the plot? I'm a teenager, and I don't act like this! I felt extremely bored within 100 pages of the book. It was going nowhere, and the entire book could have been written within the last 200 pages. Everything is so predictable. The fight scenes were quick and narrative. (So and so did this, then this. Harry countered with this) The character died between two big fight scenes. The fights themselves made no sense. How is it that six kids defeat 12 fully grown death eaters with only 3 curses, Petrificus Totalus, Impedimenta and Stupefy? There were also scenes in the book that made the book WAY to lengthy. Do we really need a detailed description of Harry talking to his alter ego when he didn't get the Prefect's badge? (And this is just one of them) Dialouge: Pretty nice, actually. Although there were too many "Gits". Also, very nice vocabulary. Nice for the mature reader. Humor: This was the funniest book. However, the basic, elemental parts that make a good book were missing. Rowling seems to have lost her touch. Maybe its fame. Maybe its a new husband and child. Maybe it was pressure to write the 5th book (You can definitely tell that it was. There were too many loose ends, and everything seemed way too rushed). Or maybe the book isn't worth it anymore. I wouldn't be surprised if she killed Harry off in the end in a confrontation with Voldemort. I'm sure that there are Harry Potter fans bursting with anger that I even had the nerve to write this. I'm also equally sure if you had an open mind, you would see all the things I'm talking about. If you don't, that's your problem. Go ahead, click not helpful and talk to all your friends about how this anonymous coward even dared to badmouth HARRY POTTER! Go ahead. I really don't care.
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Summary: Harry Potter " The Order of the Phoenix"
Review: Ms. Rowling has done the impossible by topping her last work with this one. My children and I absolutely love this book! We set up a tradition that we have tea and cookies while we read Harry Potter to each other after our homework at night. I'm a single mother, college student, and have been working two jobs, so we are always looking for things we can do together. My kids enjoy my doing the voice for Prof. Umbridge my daughter says I could break glass with that one. So we love this book and can't wait for the next.
God Bless you JK for your wonderful works and your sharing Harry with us.
Christine, Ruth, and Andrew Morrison
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Summary: HARRY POTTER ROCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Review: Harry potter and The Order of The Pheonix is the best book i have read this summer it is pack full of unexpected happenings like the death of someone (i will not say who) a love interest and a love intrest gone bad. Even if you don't like to read books you will want to read this one. I cant wait to see the movie.
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Summary: Where's the mystery?
Review: All four of the previous Harry Potter series culminate in the solving of a mystery. They are like detective stories, keeping the reader on his toes, constantly guessing who the bad guys were. The newest installment, however, is utterly predictable. The book ends without any significant revelations. A true disappointment, especially considering the Goblet of Fire was such a tour de force.
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