Road Trip Wednesday: Best Book of September
From YA Highway:
Road Trip Wednesday is a ‘Blog Carnival,’ where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing- or reading-related question that begs to be answered. In the comments, you can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic.
This week's question: What was the best book you read in September?
Even though we weren't just reading in September, easily the best book of the month was Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.
I was late to the Hogwarts Express. When the books came out, I was too busy with work and grad school and writing Very Important Literature to be bothered with a silly children's fantasy about a boy who learns he is a wizard. Foolish Muggle.
My son was born a week before graduation the year Order of the Phoenix was published, and my bookshelf heaved with the weight of books about breastfeeding and parenting and Dr. Seuss A to Z. My mother-in-law had purchased (although not read) the books and asked me when I thought I might start reading them to Toad.
We aimed for the summer after Kindergarten, but he wasn't interested. The following summer, Toad and I made it to Platform 9 3/4 and we haven't looked back. We plowed through the first three books and had just started the fourth when school started last year and the demands of second grade didn't leave much room for the wizarding world. So this summer we read the two longest books of Toad's life so far, The Goblet of Fire and The Order of the Phoenix.
What can I say about the Harry Potter books and J.K. Rowling that hasn't already been said, and by someone much more eloquent than me?
The Order of the Phoenix is my favorite of the books so far (although I have a special place in my heart for The Sorcerer's Stone), so filled with raw emotion and rage and love. I'd like to punch Dolores Umbridge in her toady little face. The chapter in which Dumbledore explains himself to Harry at the end nearly broke my heart.
The best part, of course, is that while I cultivate my love for all things Harry Potter, book by book, my little buddy is cultivating his own. This is something that we will always have -- that we read these books for the first time together.
I'm so glad I waited.
Road Trip Wednesday is a ‘Blog Carnival,’ where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing- or reading-related question that begs to be answered. In the comments, you can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic.
This week's question: What was the best book you read in September?
Even though we weren't just reading in September, easily the best book of the month was Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.
I was late to the Hogwarts Express. When the books came out, I was too busy with work and grad school and writing Very Important Literature to be bothered with a silly children's fantasy about a boy who learns he is a wizard. Foolish Muggle.
My son was born a week before graduation the year Order of the Phoenix was published, and my bookshelf heaved with the weight of books about breastfeeding and parenting and Dr. Seuss A to Z. My mother-in-law had purchased (although not read) the books and asked me when I thought I might start reading them to Toad.
We aimed for the summer after Kindergarten, but he wasn't interested. The following summer, Toad and I made it to Platform 9 3/4 and we haven't looked back. We plowed through the first three books and had just started the fourth when school started last year and the demands of second grade didn't leave much room for the wizarding world. So this summer we read the two longest books of Toad's life so far, The Goblet of Fire and The Order of the Phoenix.
What can I say about the Harry Potter books and J.K. Rowling that hasn't already been said, and by someone much more eloquent than me?
The Order of the Phoenix is my favorite of the books so far (although I have a special place in my heart for The Sorcerer's Stone), so filled with raw emotion and rage and love. I'd like to punch Dolores Umbridge in her toady little face. The chapter in which Dumbledore explains himself to Harry at the end nearly broke my heart.
The best part, of course, is that while I cultivate my love for all things Harry Potter, book by book, my little buddy is cultivating his own. This is something that we will always have -- that we read these books for the first time together.
I'm so glad I waited.
Aww, I love this! I can't wait to read the Harry Potter books with my daughter (she's only four now) because I've adored them for years. I know she'll love them as much as me. Glad you're enjoying the series!
ReplyDeleteThis is so sweet! I love that you're reading it together for the first time. And Umbridge really gets under my skin and makes my blood boil.
ReplyDeleteI have read the Potter books a number of times--first for myself, then to the family. Reading them aloud is a good exercise in itself, but it's so much more pleasurable when you have a responsive audience, and kids are the best for that. It's interesting you chose book 5 since that's probably my least favorite--I think it could have been edited down a lot more. But it's still a great story. My favorite is book 3.
ReplyDeleteI hope you and your family enjoy the last two books as much as you've enjoyed the first five!
I remember when my son read that one. It broke his heart (and mine!). Such a beautiful series.
ReplyDeleteThere's nothing like your first Potter experience and it's so sweet and great that you're reading them with your son.
ReplyDeleteMy mom finally read them this year, and I kept getting texts from here after spoilery things happened. It was really great to see her get so worked up about certain things and it really reminded me about how I felt when I read them for the first time. Like magic.
I'm so glad to see that you're reading Harry's life to your son. There are so many wonderful life lessons contained in those books...I can't even explain how much the entire series means to me.
ReplyDeleteSo cool to imagine that people are still discovering these. I'm just starting to read them with my oldest and it is so much fun.
ReplyDeleteSo glad that you eventually made it to Hogwarts! I really look forward to sharing those books with my children too, even though at this point they're just hypothetical future children. :-)
ReplyDeleteORDER OF THE PHOENIX is my favorite. So much story and TONKS...how I love her character. All the characters, really. Sarah xx
ReplyDelete