Publisher: Bloomsbury
Format: Paperback
Series: Harry Potter #5
Pages: 766
Date Finished: 09.06.15
Rating: 5/5
Summary: Harry Potter is due to start his fifth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. His best friends Ron and Hermione have been very secretive all summer and he is desperate to get back to school and find out what has been going on. However, what Harry discovers is far more devastating than he could ever have expected...
Suspense, secrets and thrilling action from the pen of J.K. Rowling ensure an electrifying adventure that is impossible to put down.
I wanted to reread The Order of the Phoenix partly because I haven't in a while, and also because I'm roughly the same age as Harry is in this book, give or take a few months. I've grown up with this series, and I don't even remember the first time I picked up a Harry Potter book. I do remember being eight years old, dragging my parents to the book shop on the release day of the final book. It took me months to read that behemoth, but it was so worth it.
It's safe to say that I don't remember a time without Harry Potter.
“The mind is not a book, to be opened at will and examined at leisure. Thoughts are not etched on the inside of skulls, to be perused by an invader. The mind is a complex and many-layered thing.”Rereading favourite books often makes me scared. I'm worried that I won't like it as much, or that the book will be ruined as I know what's coming. Yet, picking up this monster of a book, I wasn't worried at all. I knew straight away that I was going to love it, and I was right.
This book is fucking massive. I'm pretty sure you could bludgeon someone to death with it, or whatever. It's 257154 words long (according to Google, anyway), and to put that in perspective it's the size of a Mistborn novel. Two manuscripts of Wuthering Heights could fit inside it with room to spare. I felt as if I was flying through it.
“You're a prefect? Oh Ronnie! That's everyone in the family!"
"What are Fred and I? Next door neighbors?”I read the first hundred pages over a few days, but I picked this up the day before my Chemistry exam expecting to read a few chapters and ended up reading 666 pages. Revision? Haha, no. I couldn't put it down, and I was thoroughly enthralled even though I knew what was happening. It didn't bother me that I knew the twists and turns--this story is just so damn magical.
I forgot how funny this book is. JK Rowling is a genius, and her humour is both strong and subtle. I'm a much better reader than I was when I read this last, and I picked up on the things that a much younger me wouldn't have. I have a newfound love for Professor McGonagall. Seriously, that woman is brilliant.
"Have a biscuit, Potter.”This book is much darker than its predecessors and for the first time, I think it gives an insight into where the series is truly going to end up. There's a lot more angst (well, it's mostly Harry behaving like a drama queen), and there are so many interwoven plot thread that make it a surprisingly complex book.
One of my favourite things was the way that JK Rowling handled Harry's relationship with Cho. It's awkward at the best of times, and more realistic than a lot of high school relationships in YA. I found it refreshing to read about a cringey first kist, followed by an even cringier first date. The levels of second hand embarrassment were ridiculously high.
“Just because you have the emotional range of a teaspoon doesn't mean we all have.”Even though I'm certain that everyone and their dog has read this, I'll try to stay spoiler free. But, the saddest part of this book for me was none other than the life of Remus Lupin. Just imagine how it must feel to have two of your best friends die at twenty one, believe another dead, and have one convicted for murder. At twenty one. It breaks my heart that Harry looked up to Sirius like a father figure and that Remus was pushed to the side a bit. And, whatever was left of my heart was stomped on at the end. You know what I mean. I feel for him more than anyone, if I'm honest.
If I have to have one criticism, it would be that Neville and Luna didn't ask questions at the end when Harry was talking about Sirius. He's a wanted murderer, yet they didn't seem to batter an eyelid. I suppose I'm being too finicky, because aside from a few minor issues this book is pretty much flawless.
I don't really know what to say that can sum up my feels for this book. I'm pretty sure that everyone has read it, and I'm positive that most people have reread it as well. But, if you haven't, I'd really recommend you do. It's just fabulous, and I get more out of this series every time I reread. The Order of the Phoenix introduces some amazing characters and sets up for one of the most well thought out and ambitious plots in middle grade/YA fiction.
Basically, Harry Potter is 'effin awesome.
“Wit beyond measure is a man's greatest treasure.”
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