Harry Potter Hullaballoo - The Rogue Bludger

The Rogue Bludger

In which a bludger chases Harry, he ends up in the hospital, and someone new is petrified.

Hermione's crush on Gilderoy Lockhart is utterly perplexing. Clearly he isn't smart and clearly he didn't do the things that he said he did in those books that he said he wrote. Everyone seems to realize this except for Hermione, who is still head over heels for him. It's kind of funny that she probably has the most common sense out of the three of them, yet she always seems to have crushes on famous guys. a.k.a. Lockhart, Krum, Ron.

They've started brewing a polyjuice potion in the hope of discovering whether or not it is Draco Malfoy who is petrifying the muggle borns. Hermione is pretty ridiculous at potions. This one will take a month.

Then it's the first Quidditch match of the season, and the game is addled only by the presence of the killer bludger that loves Harry. Obviously it was Draco Malfoy who tampered with it. If there's one thing you know from reading Harry Potter, it's that you can always blame Draco Malfoy. Finally the bludger does kill his arm, but not before Harry catches the Snitch and wins the game. If you want to see an accident, you should go to a Quidditch match. Quidditch itself is a fine sport, but things like dementors, jinxed broomsticks, and jinxed bludgers are always popping up at games and landing Harry in the hospital wing.

Actually, it wasn't the bludger that landed him in the hospital wing, it was Lockhart, duh. Lockhart, the big dummy, tries to mend Harry's arm but instead removes all of the bones in it. Gross. In the hospital wing, Madam Pomfrey gives him a little potion to regrow his bones (it's just that simple!). 

Dobby visits him and lets slip that it was he who blocked the platform and tampered with the bludger. Dobby means well, he really does. We still don't technically know that the Malfoys are Dobby's owners, but Holy Hippogriffs are they nasty to him. He briefly mentions that if his owners give him clothes then he'll be free. At least he never has to do the laundry. On a serious note, though, it's extraordinarily sad that owners of house elves think so little of them that they don't even provide them with the basic immediate needs of food, shelter, and clothing. House elves only get shelter, and maybe leftovers, I'm not sure.

The chapter ends with a few teachers bringing Colin Creevey into the wing, petrified. He's the first human to be. We learn that Dumbledore believes in the Chamber of Secrets and that it has been opened again.

Harry Potter Hullaballoo - The Writing on the Wall

The Writing on the Wall

In which everyone jumps to conclusions.

Everyone jumps to conclusions. Filch and Snape jump to the conclusion that Harry petrified Mrs. Norris. Moaning Myrtle jumps to the conclusion that Harry, Ron, and Hermione hate her. Percy jumps to the conclusion that Ron is a pervert, hanging out in the girls' bathrooms. Harry, Ron, and Hermione jump to the conclusion that Malfoy is the heir of Slytherin. And the whole student body jumps to the conclusion that Harry is the heir of Slytherin. That is the gist of the chapter. Restatement of my thesis: everyone jumps to conclusions.

I find that in a lot of stories, the "background story," why or how something came into being and why it is the way it is, is just stuck in somewhere randomly in the first few pages of the first book in a series. I think J.K. Rowling did an excellent job of saving story for when it's relevant, instead of just giving it all away to start with. She sneaks in some excellent background in this chapter, the entire story of how Hogwarts came into being. And adds to it by telling us the mystery of the chamber of secrets.

The castle is struck with chamber of secrets fever, trying to figure out who the heir of Slytherin is. And Harry starts questioning his placement in Gryffindor. I said it before a while ago: the houses are pretty general. No one is simply courageous, smart, ambitious, or loyal. They're a mixture of one or more. This would probably be the opportune time to sneak cleverly in that according to Pottermore, I'm a Ravenclaw. Yeah, totally just wrote this whole paragraph, so I could say that I was a Ravenclaw.

A little sprinkling of fun for anyone who was paying extra close attention to the text: maybe it's only the older copies of CoS, and I assure you my copy is ancient, but on page 157, when Percy finds Ron coming out of Myrtle's bathroom, it's accidentally typed "Perry."

Everyone accusing everyone of everything, clever background story, house confusion, and a typo sum up my thoughts on the chapter. It wasn't very long, and not a lot happened, but it sure was a fun time.

Harry Potter Hullaballoo - The Deathday Party

The Deathday Party

In which Harry, Ron, and Hermione attend Sir Nicholas's Deathday party, and Mrs. Norris ends up looking like the picture above.

Chamber of Secrets has never been my favorite book, but something I like more then the others is that it delves deeper into wizard culture. The first book paints a great picture of the wizarding world for you to start out with, and the second book kind of twists the lens and brings everything into focus. You get to read about things like Quidditch practice, ghosts, Dueling Clubs, squibs, and detentions and experience Hogwarts.

In this chapter, Harry is invited to Sir Nicholas's deathday party, the ghostly equivalent of a birthday party. Don't quote me on this, because I'm likely wrong, but I thought that all four of the Hogwarts house ghosts, Fat Friar, Bloody Baron, Grey Lady, and Nick, were all connected somehow through some sort of story. I realize it would take me ten minutes to look that up, but I'm being lazy. There's also a poem that was cut from CoS that is deliciously dreadful. You should check it out.

It's exceedingly sad that Nearly Headless Nick died by being chopped forty-five times in the neck with a blunt axe and still can't is denied when he tries to join the Headless Hunt team. I'm not sure if J.K. Rowling's ghosts can or do move on, but I think that if Nick could run around with those headless hooligans for a year or two, then he would want to.

We also find out that Filch is a squib. I don't really have a lot to say about that, except that it makes sense, I guess.

And finally, we round out the chapter with a little murder . . . er, petrification. In the form of Filch's beloved cat, Mrs. Norris. There's writing in blood on the wall that reads "THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN OPENED. ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE" (138). If you've been reading along, you might remember Hagrid's roosters or chickens (something like that) that he'd been keeping. Well, let's just say, he might have fewer chickens after this whole debacle. And we finish the chapter with Malfoy shouting, "'Enemies of the heir beware! You'll be next Mudbloods!'" (139), which automatically makes him a suspect. Dun. Dun. Dun. And the plot thickens.

Also, Happy Harry Potter Day. I celebrated with frozen yogurt (very wizardly). I hope you did something nice to celebrate the momentous occasion.

Harry Potter Hullaballoo - Mudbloods and Murmurs

Mudbloods and Murmurs

In which the Quidditch practice season begins, a curse is uttered, and someone eats slugs.

Now that school is in full session, Oliver Wood is cracking down on Quidditch practices. Most of the people on the Gryffindor Quidditch team have other talents. Harry is a seeker and great at Defense Against the Dark Arts, Fred and George are beaters and great at joke-related magic, Charlie was a seeker and is now a dragon whisperer (whatever you call it). Alicia, Katie, and Angelina don't just chase all day (maybe). But Oliver Wood is one of those guys who eats, sleeps, and breathes his sport. He's really lucky that Puddlemore United wanted him. 

The Gryffindor Quidditch team is about to have their first practice of the season early one Saturday morning, when the Slytherin team arrives at the pitch. Apparently Draco Malfoy is on the team now, and thanks to his dad, the Slytherin team all have fancy new Nimbus 2001s. It's a little bit pathetic that when Draco is around his dad all he does is whine about Harry, and when he's around Harry all he does is flaunt the things his dad bought him and whine about how he's going to go whine to his dad about the things Harry's doing. "You wait till my father hears about this!"

Then Draco calls Hermione a mudblood. I had forgotten how big of a deal bloodlines and blood purity were in this book, and really the entire series. For the bad guys, death eaters, purebloods, family history and money are everything. For old wizarding families like the Dracos, the Blacks, and the Gaunts keeping their bloodlines free of nonmagical blood is essential. Mudblood is a terrible insult to Hermione. And the Weasleys, who are blood traitors and very poor, are just as bad as mudbloods, in a bad guy's opinion. Just as important as blood status is creature status (ahem, for example, if maybe you were a half-giant), but more on that in two books or so.

To defend Hermione—awwwww—Ron tries to curse Draco, but his broken wand backfires, and he ends up eating slugs himself. Harry, Ron, and Hermione run off to Hagrid's. At this point, we know that Hagrid's been expelled, but we don't know how.

To fulfill the detentions Harry and Ron received for flying the car to school, Ron has to polish the trophies, while still puking up slugs, and Harry has to help Lockhart answer his fanmail. I personally don't even know why McGonagall let Harry do that. Talk about your cruel and unusual punishments.

That's when Harry first hears the voice. The one that threatens to rip, tear, and kill him. You've heard it, right?

Review // The Basic Eight

The Basic Eight

by Daniel Handler

My current favorite author obsession: Daniel Handler. The past two months, I've read two of his adultier books and reread a couple of A Series of Unfortunate Events books. And it's almost summer; why wouldn't I be in the mood for a little murder?

The Basic Eight are a clique of high school seniors (there are eight of them; clever name, yes?) who are of the classy, intelligent variety. They have garden parties and cocktail parties and dinner parties, oh my. The thing is, you can be the classiest, smartest person in the whole school, but you'll still fall prey to high school drama. It's inevitable. And if things ever get too overwhelming, sometimes you just gotta kill someone to release some stress.

It's an epistolary book. What you see is Flannery Culp's edited diary, so it's a mix of what she actually wrote and what she's added later for pizzazz.

Let's talk about the narrator, the murderess, the ring leader of the Basic Eight, Miss Flannery Culp. She's unreliable and she works it. She'll have a conversation with one of her friends and then repeat it verbatim with another. She'll get a ride with a friend and tell you what they said while they were in the car, and then get out and tell you she walked to school. She tries to slyly worm her way out of things that she blatantly tells you she did earlier on. She's got panache, though. You just have to roll with it.

As for the actual plot, it's both dark and comical, and it's also very tense. It's kind of like when you conspire with your friends that your English teacher steals dogs from people's yards and eats them, and then you find out that he actually does. The foreshadowing was great. It left me on edge just waiting for the big day.

I have two criticisms, and those are that the twist ending, albeit shocking and surprising and all that jazz, fit strangely with the rest of the story. And the book was paced oddly. There were times when I just wanted to get to the climax already.

The Basic Eight is a great high schoolie satire. A great read especially for late April end-of-the-school-year days when you find yourself dreaming up elaborate ways to kill off your Chemistry teacher (not that you do that).