Like many people born in the late eighties and early nineties, I am a self-professed Harry Potter nerd. Yes, I have read all the Harry Potter novels and all the spin-off works. I have seen all the movies. I was at Austin’s Bookstore at the front of the crowd that filled the place waiting to collect my pre-ordered copy of Deathly Hallows almost a decade ago. I am on J.K. Rowling’s Pottermore site where I took the Sorting Hat quiz and was placed in Ravenclaw house. So, it should not be surprising then that, like all Harry Potter fans, I was excited to hear that an eight book was being released, and that it would be in the form of a play – focusing on the main characters (Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Draco) and their children, twenty years after the Battle of Hogwarts that took place in the seventh book.

So after almost a decade, what is important to know is whether the new Harry Potter book lives up to all the hype and manages to be as wonderfully written as its predecessors. The short answer, shockingly, is no. There was a lot of potential for greatness, but it eventually falls short. Harry’s son, Albus, goes to Hogwarts and is sorted into Slytherin where he befriends Draco’s son, Scorpius. Both boys’ relationships with their respective fathers are tenuous and frayed and this fuels a chain of events that leads to time-travel, where a host of characters found in the previous books are met once more, and death, lessons on family and friendship, and a massive reveal about Lord Voldemort himself ensues. For these reasons, and because the play presents and uses the core characters we grew up caring so much about, the book ensures that it is not entirely disliked by fans. We do enjoy seeing the gang back together once more, we do enjoy seeing the characters we have lost, and we do enjoy being in that world of magic again. However, it is not possible to simply ignore the flaws of the play.

The play-form relies heavily on dialogue and while there are moments in the book that are well written and pull on the reader’s heartstrings, there are many other places where the dialogue is awkward and not as sharp as it should have been. Then there’s the convoluted plot, which eventually ties itself up so neatly in the end that the sheer almost-perfection with which everything is resolved gives us a contrived ending that is obviously, and not subtly, contrived. Sometimes the characters feel different from the way they were presented in the books as children. But isn’t this to be expected? Twenty years have passed, and people change. The characters have changed. Maybe that highlights one of the problems that people who read the books as children seem to be having with the play, when they claim dislike for it and disregard it “fan fiction.” We read the play as adults and, sometimes, we forget that J.K. Rowling wrote for children. Is the play written for children then? It is possible that the answer to this question is one which explains why adults all over the world are complaining about the book. However, as previously mentioned, it is not all bad and there are some really good moments in the text. It deserves a read by all true fans of the wizarding world.