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Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Book 5 Audio CD)

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Book 5 Audio CD)

List Price: $75.00
Your Price: $47.25
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Review: This was a pretty good book. It kept me interested. However, the plot, when compared to the earlier books, such as Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, is not that good. Most of the book was about the classes, and sometimes began to get a little boring. Some events were repeated over and over again, such as Harry's dreams. He had the same dream almost every night in the book. Overall it was worth reading.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Rowling Delivers!
Review: Harry's back, another year older but saddled with the typical teenager's conceit of believing that he is a decade wiser. He can be excused some of that, after all during his fourth year at Hogwarts School of Wizardry and Witchcraft, Harry managed to win the Tri-Wizards Cup competition along with defeating the Dark Lord Voldemort in a face to face duel. But achievements like that will only carry you so far in the wizard world.

A new year at Hogwarts is about to begin and Harry is miserable. He's been subjected to another two months of tyranny from the Dursleys; the Daily Prophet seems to be waging a campaign to discredit him as a delusional seeker of publicity; and there is the specter of his Ordinary Wizarding Levels (O.W.L.s) hanging over this next term. Of course, in order to even sit for the O.W.L.s he must return to Hogwarts, and that is not necessarily a foregone conclusion.

The wait for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix may have been longer than many of J.K. Rowling's fans were willing to bear, but it was clearly worth it! Unlike many literary serials, each of the Potter books has grown more vivid and compelling than it's predecessors. That's good news and not so good news as this version checks in at a staggering 870 pages in length. But it's 870 of very, very readable adventure and personality. Personality? Perhaps a better word would be "attitude". And Harry like any 15 year old male (wizard or muggle) has attitude to spare. It tests his relationships with friends and mentors alike. The story is rich, but dark and Harry must confront a personal loss of immense proportions along the way. So much has been written about the death of a significant character that to offer more might be giving away too much.

The entire cast of characters delivers on a number of different fronts. Graduation has opened the keeper slot on the Gryffindor Quidditch team for Ron, and he's also a new prefect along with Hermione who is still as insufferably bright and studious as ever. To Harry's dismay, Dumbledore is keeping his distance, distracted by matters of greater import, and Hagrid is tending to more secrets in the Dark Forest. Then there is Professor Snape, who's life's work seems to be centered around browbeating Harry into expulsion, only this year the new Defense against the Dark Arts instructor may accomplish that task for him! And did I mention that there are boy/girl issues to address? You only need to think back to age 15 to conjure your own disturbing emotions in that regard.

What sets Ms. Rowling's talent apart from other authors is not just her ability to craft an intricate and fascinating plot, but the depth of characterization that colors her writing. She manages to truly get inside the head of a 15 year old male in a way that is uncanny and more than entertaining. This latest installment will answer a number of questions for the reader, perhaps the most important being "why does Harry have to return to the Dursley's each year?", but there are sufficient new mysteries to unearth and carry the reader into the remainder of the series. It's a marvelous read for all!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix
Review: The fifth installment of the Harry Potter saga does NOT dissapoint at all. As the longest of Rawlings works to date the book does not waste time bringing the reader back up to date, but delves right in where the Goblet of Fire left off. (I would suggest to readers who would appreciate some kind of refresher on what's going on to re-read the last 3 or so chapetrs of the 4th book) There are two main points that makes this book great and the best so far...

1: Rawling keeps all the great aspects of the previous books that we've all grown to love. Harry's miserable Summer holidays with the Dursley's, to his (never dull) trek to Hogarts. The tight knit (and trouble-loving) friends, and so on. As well as the tremendous writing style that had me fly through this 900 pager in about 6 days (while working full time).

2: A few new things intergrated in to the working formulas really push this latest book to the for-front. Things like new characters: Umbridge - like to smack her with a frying pan. Looney Lovegood - nice addition. As well as (and this is the biggest plus in my estimation) the return of so many characters that it's just awesome. All the favorites (and some of the not so favorites) come back to this outstanding tale.

The final piece, which I have not thus far mentioned, is the strange behavior of Dumbledore and in the final chapters a mind numbing revalation.

Seeing as I read it so fast, I look forward to a second read soon where I can relax and fully pay attention to more of the details.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: THE BEST BOOK IN HISTIORY
Review: i am almost positive that all of you have read this book. if you haven't i am very sorry for you. you have absoulutly no idear what you are missing. i read this book in 4 days. this book puts you into a magical kingdom that you never want to leave. however, if you haven't read the first four books in this seires then you should absoulutly read those first. there is no book in history as good as this book. i can not posibly put into words the magic this book gives you! read this book and the 4 that come before you in the order that they are. you will see what i mean when you read them. READ THESE BOOKS! even if you 100000000000 years old you will love and cherish them!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A great book for everyone- a comment from an 13 year old
Review: Out of all the Harry Potter books, this one is by far the greatest. Harry becomes more dark and shows his feelings like a true 15 year old. The new Professor for the Defense Against The Dark Arts, Umbridge, brings even more darness to Harry than thought possible. She is from the Ministry Of Magic and soon she becomes the new headmistress of Hogwarts. I personally think that Umbridge is by far the most cruelest character in this book. During the whole book, Harry gets dreams about a corrider and a door which he never gets to open until far in the book. Harry goes through a tragic death at the end of the book that causes great sadness to him and I cried because you won't believe that this person has died. A lot of people could have prevented the death from happening, but it's going to be great seeing what happens without this character in the remaining of this seris. Again, this is the best book I have ever read and it's the best book for people to read during the summer. I kept on reading and even at 1 in the morning, when my mom finally told me to go to sleep, i had to finish off this book and I'm very glad I did. This is surely the best work from Rowling I've ever seen.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Good read but not her best.
Review: When I picked up this book I was extremely excited thinking it would be very good. But I was shocked 2 find it actually more defining and explaining and even settings after the action packed 4th book. I noticed through out the book they repeatedly made references 2 the other books. The plot though extremely good towards the end, appeared 2 be more based on explaining all these things that have already happened. I'm now more anxious 4 the next book bcoz compared 2 the others this seemed well less mysterious and more of a recap of what has happened.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Great for Older Kids and Adults, not Younger Children
Review: First off, I read this book in its entirety the day I received it. I was very pleasantly surprised to see how often it refers to previous books, especially The Prisoner of Azkaban. It was like seeing old friends you haven't thought of for a while. That being said, if you have a young child (under 7) this book is just not for them. In addition to the death of a much-loved character, the Order of the Phoenix is far too long and draws thing out way too much to keep a young child's interest. Also, the references to previous books just confuses young kids, who have enough trouble remembering things that happened yesterday. In addition, Harry is gaining his voice in this latest installment. He's not afraid to talk back, be disrespectful or even rude, and he does not bottle up his frustration and anger and anxiety like he used to -- very healthy for preteens and teens who also need to learn not to internalize their emotions, but a bad example for young children who would mimic their hero, Harry. The level of anger and angst is also a bit much for sensitive young readers. However, for those who are old enough to handle the lengthy chapters, the references, etc., the book is very entertaining, especially the continued escapades of Fred and George Weasley. We never learn who gets the House Cup, though, and the book raises many questions that we'll undoubtedly have to wait another 3 years to have answered.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Disappointing
Review: I will start off by saying that I was extremely excited to have the new Harry Potter in my hands. I mean, I've been waiting 3 years for this! I got home shortly after 1am and promptly sat down to read. And I promptly fell asleep after only 20 pages or so, not out of sleepiness but out of sheer boredom. I greatly enjoyed the first 4 books in the series(Azkaban is still my favorite)but this one left me feeling cold. It is certainly too long in many parts and could have used a lot of trimming. A lot of the subplots, while interesting, are really unnecessary and don't really add anything to the overall story. I also didn't care as much about the characters, especially Harry. When did he become such an angry person? When we last left him he had gone through quite a trial with Lord Voldemort, but was still the same Harry. When did he do such a 180 in personality? Everything that I liked about Harry seemed to be gone and replaced with this newer, angrier, much more violent Harry. The only character that I could actually sympathize with was Professor Snape of all people! I didn't care when the big character at the end dies. I didn't care at all about Dumbledore, Hagrid, Moody, Tonks, Lupin, or even Draco Malfoy and this is very unfortunate. These are all characters that the first 4 books spent developing so that we may love(or hate)them and most of them were relegated to the background, and only mentioned from time to time. Lucius Malfoy even had a bigger role than his son this time around. The ending was very anticlimactic and didn't leave me dying with anticipation for Book 6. Overall a decent read, but not something that I will ever read again which is unfortunate because the first 4 books are such wonderful reads. Not reccomended.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: 800+ PAGES!
Review: Is it just me or is Rowling's books getting longer and longer? I couldn't help but wonder how much unneccessary information was added in this one to cause such a long book, but I admit, I finished the book in under three days, so it couldn't have possibly dragged all that much. Harry still has his eye on the little Ravenclaw girl (Cho), the Weasley twins (Fred and George) are still up to no good, Ron seems to be overly concerned about who Hermione sends owls to, and even Ron's little sister's (Ginny) found a boyfriend. It seems the Hogsworth gang is growing up. Nothing surprising there. What's new? Well, Malfoy gets what's coming to him (several times) and the reader, as well as Harry, learns several surprising things about Neville.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Not the best, but really good!
Review: This one starts out slowly and you need to hang in there and trust the author. It picks up slowly, and things start to fall into place. Finally, the ending comes and it's so worth it. Very good, and sets up the next two really well. I'd say the 3rd and 4th are the best, but this one is better than 1 and 2.


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