Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (5)

This seems a common choice for least favorite HP book. I quite like it. Lots of delightful details; Umbridge is the service's best villain; and the scenes where they plan the DA in insouciant defiance of her are wonderful, inspiring even. When it all goes to bell and you realize that the Order is just civilians playing at soldiers, it hurts. No one there to give Harry better advice. No one to realize that Snape and Dumbledore lack the judgement to lead the team. No one who thinks to teach the kids serious defensive magic.

This is the fifth book in the original series of seven novels in the Harry Potter world. Of course, more have been added over the years and the universe of Harry Potter has expanded beyond the original set of books. It is set in the fifth year of Ron, Harry, and Hermoine at Hogwarts. Harry and Dumbledore are being discredited by the Ministry Of Magic for saying the Voldemort has returned, and as a result, the Ministry tries to take over Hogwarts by installing one of the worst characters (meaning one of the best "bad guy" characters) from the series, Deloris Umbridge, at Hogwarts. She is first installed as the new defense against the dark arts teacher, then accumulates more power. This is again another very long book (840 pages) and because it was not (unlike Deathly Hallows) split into two movies, there is a lot in the book that the movie cut out or changed heavily to fit the time constraints. There is a lot more at the beginning of the book than there was in the movie, there was a lot more to the Order and what they were up to, and there was a lot more of the Harry-Voldemort mind connection. And, of course, there was a whole storyline with Hermoine and SPEW that had been removed from The Goblet of Fire movie adaptation, so the continuation in this novel was totally left out of the movie. The book is also darker (yet again) than the prior book and since the idea is that kids would be reading it when they were around 14-15 years old, they would be able to handle more violence and death than when they were 9 or 10 (about the ages that first novel was appropriate for). The style of the book is much like the others. It takes longer to read than the first three novels only because it is over twice as long as those books were. But in terms of readability and how easy it is to follow, it is on par with the shorter novels. And, as I have said about the other novels, even though they are technically kids' books, adults can easily enjoy them as well. That is true whether you read them as a kid and are now an adult, or read them for the first time as an adult. The stories hold up very well over time and are definitely worth coming back to.

This book is an magical master piece dramatic but peaceful. This wonderful book created by j.k Rowling is just one of her amazing work. With Harry going through a difficult time ,with Sirius,the only one Harry trusts and I think the newly every one can relate to that. With Harry just leaning how to use his powers and the help and support of his friends and the horrific event of Mr Weasly that shocked the hole family this is just a truly inspiring book and on of my favourite in the Harry potter series and I think that everyone should read. These books have taught be lessons that I never would have none of it if J.K Rowling it wasn't for brilliant mind I think this book teaches you to make sense of your friends and if someone you know or love die s and you won't them back you all ways have help. I hope you read this book and a big thanks to j.k Rowling my favourite author I hope she will keeps on giving more hope for the people that need it. Thank you J.K Rowling we all love you. By Saoirse Lyons Age 11

We as a family are reading these in order. We had read all the Jim McKay versions, however, this version will not be ready until 2021, so we switched to a text version. While the loss of pictures is disappointing; the rest has been amazing. It was delivered nearly next day and we started reading it immediately! We're trying to read a chapter a day and so far, we've been hooked. It's a little more adult-themed then the previous books (if you have kids), but overall, highly recommend across the board!

I started reading this series to my 9-year-old son to see if I could interest him in chapter books. He loved the books instantly, but I will admit that the first few books were a bit too young for me. This book and the last (Goblet of Fire) have been really engaging and I looked forward to our reading sessions, which are sometimes as long as 3-4 hours, if we have the time. That's a long time to read aloud and I was very surprised that my rather kinetic, athletic boy kept begging for "one more chapter!" What a wonderful experience to share.