Harry Potter and the... this certainly make a few years twitch at school and sometimes even at kindergarten. Is it about the fact that this 11 years old boy is a a wizard like numerous others, hidden from those not wizards, or is it that the boy lost his parents because of the brutal antics of one Lord Voldemort, or is it because there’s a healthy dose of action, drama and suspense, healthy enough for children, at leat, one can not really say, but this little boy tinkering around with spell-books and broomsticks does cast a spell on the reader.
Starting from a very beautiful and sweet introduction in ... and the Philosopher’s Stone, the book gains quantum with respect to the seriousness of events, the dangers Harry and his comrades Ron and Hermione face to reach a book (... and the Prisoner of Azkaban) which is surprisingly heart-warming, touchy and sad and not action-packed, JK Rowling brings the story to a stage in the Goblet of Fire that was least expected and the most unwanted, as far as Harry-fanatics are concerned. With the resurrection of the most evil sorcerer in Harry’s world, Lord Voldemort, the world of wizards is once again threatened by the horrible rein that they had to endure till Harry put an end to it.
The manner in which the whole plot has been constructed and put before the reader is such that the reader can have no idea till the very end of the book of what it is to end with. The book leaves the reader with a real feeling of tension and gloom, just as that which descended on Harry, his friends, the Hogwarts Castle and, for that matter, the entire wizard-world. When I first read this book, I could hardly believe what I was reading.
To be frank, rating the Goblet of Fire to be purely a children’s book is being unfair. The book has everything an adult looks for in his books- a puzzle, a mystery, a good-guy, a bad-guy, suspense, a hidden plot, a betrayal by somebody you’d never expect...- except for one thing that this one is based on the world of wizards. That shouldn’t matter, though, to the organized mind. Yes, being a story on wizards does, to some extent, dilute the tension a normal thriller gives, which is all the better, because such books are read to relax, not to increase an unwarrantable sense of foreboding.
I should say that this book is one of the better ones that have reached the market as far as children are concerned, of course, falling second to (an eggheaded choice of) textbooks and reference books.
If I were a parent, I would have certainly bought this book for Junior and allowed him to rad it (after I’d read it, you know!).