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Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince Book Review

harry potter book review half blood prince

The threat of Voldemort is fully realized. The world has descended into chaos. Wizards are living their lives in fear. Students are being kept from going to school for fear of what might happen to the school now that the Dark Lord has returned. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince is the last step in the journey before the ultimate conclusion. Darker tones along with answers to mysteries that have been bubbling up since the start of the series get answers. Is this book worth your time to read? Let’s find out.

Introduction to Half Blood Prince

J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince is the 6th installment to the 7 book series of Harry Potter. This book was published July 15th 2005 by Scholastic. The book contains 652 pages in the US version that are shared between 29 chapters.

The story takes on a darker feel that is also follow several mysteries has Harry Ron and Hermione try to discover who the Half Blood Prince is. At the same time, Harry and Dumbledore try to unlock the secrets to Dumbledore’s work over the last year involving Lord Voldemort, his rise to power and how we were able to continue causing issues in their world.

The story really takes the feel of growing urgency that was created in Order of the Phoenix and amplifies it. When comparing the style of this book back to the beginning of the series we get two different reading experiences. Let’s take a look at what contributes to this.

Story in The Half Blood Prince

The story in the Half Blood Prince was enjoyable and captivating from cover to cover. The book starts out with Harry being visited by Dumbledore as he asks Harry to help him with a task. The task is to recruit a brand new.. Potions teacher. At this point we are all expecting that the new teacher would once again be for Defence against the Dark Arts has it has been refilled for each installment to this series, but we are surprised to find out that the roles have changed.

The Professor Dumbledore is trying to pick up is Horace Slughorn, a previous potions master that had retired. This character is critical to Dumbledore's plans and desire to unlock secrets to Voldemort's past.

Throughout the school year Harry and Dumbledore continue to work to unlock secrets to the past of the Dark Lord to try and uncover how they can defeat him for good.

As usual the events that transpire through this book are all loosely connected to an end goal. Malfoy in particular finally gets his time in the spotlight as Harry is convinced that he has turned to join his family with Lord Voldemort and no one believes him.

Harry’s concern over Malfoy starts very early on after visiting Weasley Wizard Wheezes. The joke shot that has opened up in Diagon Alley by Fred and George. Now that those characters have left school, they have taken harry’s winnings from the TriWizard Tournament and started the business that they worked on for years.

This book also builds on the teen romance between many of the characters we have grown up with. Ginny Weasley is dating Dean Thomas but Harry has developed feelings for her. Ron and Hermione get into several spats as Hermione lets her feelings about Ron become known to Harry. Ron dates Lavender Brown who gets in everyone's face with their mushy interactions.

It makes sense that these interactions would start to become increasingly common in this book as all these kids have been around each other for over 5 years and are now in their 6th year of hogwarts putting them around 16 and 17 years old.

But it’s all these things combined that make for a really compelling and emotional story. We have become aware that death is a real consequence in this series with the past two books.

The climax for this book is legendary in my mind. There were so many unexpected twists as well as a really dark and creepy scene in this book as Harry and Dumbledore continue their adventure together.

The twist at the end of the book caught me by surprise when I first read the book like anyone else that read it which easily cements this book toward the top of the series when trying to list my favorites. I will not go into more on this as I am trying to keep these as spoiler free reviews.

The end of this book sends shockwaves through the reader with no idea what happens next. It was a perfect setup for the final installment to the series.

The Characters In Half Blood Prince

There do not appear to be very many new characters in the Half Blood Prince which gives the existing characters a chance to continue development.

The one new character that stands out the most that was introduced though was Horace Slughorn. His character likes to collect successful relationships which is why he is drawn to Harry. We get to learn how he came to know many different wizard families such as Serious Black’s family and Harry’s parents. His character is played out to be quite the snob though in that he only likes to surround himself with the best and in doing so puts others aside.

Ginny’s character grows slightly. I know many people have issues with the movie version of her character but I feel that the book version of her character grows more realistically and has previous history that can better explain how her character has grown into who she is by the end of Half Blood Prince.

I feel like in this book Ron starts to really develop his own identity that was somewhat lacking in the previous books. He turns 17 in this book and tries to learn to apparat. (Which is the art of teleporting from one place to another). He does not succeed in this even through he takes extra lessons to try and get it down.

His confidence coming out as he is on the Quidditch team this year. Speaking of which, the previous two books were able to omit school quidditch season due to make room for more plot with TriWizard Tournament and the rules applied to break up quidditch groups by Professor Umbridge. It comes back in this book which makes it refreshing without it overstaying its welcome.

Hermione’s character continues to succeed with her abilities as a Witch. She also attempts to learn to apparate. When Ron gets his girlfriend, this makes her Jealous and as a result she hangs out with Ron less since she cannot stand the two together.

Luna Lovegood’s character grows as well as she gets into situations with Harry when he invites her to go to one of the “Slug Club” meetings.

If there are characters that grow the most in this book I would have to say that they are Malfoy and Dumbledore.

Dumbledore shares much more about himself and his failures and frustrations. His mysterious and very important life gets put on center stage for Harry to see in this book and it really begins to crack his character and what makes Dumbledore such a smart and successful wizard. By the end of this book we are very heavily invested in the continued research into Voldemort and the adventure that it takes him and Harry on.

Malfoy’s character has a very large amount of growth in this book. We see this mostly from the eyes of Harry as he follows him around throughout the year. Malfoy finally is more than just a bully character to Harry and the gang when they get into multiple serious fights throughout the book.

Pacing of Half Blood Prince

This book does a good job at stepping the reader in the mystery and has something new hiding around every corner. It’s very hard to put this book down from cover to cover. There is a solid mix of imminent danger even within the castle walls as there are several threats on Dumbledore's life. These threats to the growing intensity of the situation and very real threat of Voldemort’s growing control of the society around the wizarding world.

At the same time, these smaller encounters hark back to the person to person mystery solving that Harry Ron and Hermione would do in the books in the past. J.K Rowling was able to craft a mystery book that did not slog much at all.

Half Blood Prince was easily in the top 3 of the books in the Harry Potter series. The writing feels like it has taken a step up from the previous novels in the series as well it’s ability to captivate the reader. It pays off many plotlines and hinted ideas that have been cleverly placed throughout the entire series.

Even if this was not the original direction that J.K. Rowling had in mind for the series, it plays off really well. Everything that has lead to this book serves a purpose and leads to good payoffs over and over again.

Most importantly, this book really does well in setting up the final chapter for the series. It’s clear what needs to happen next and the lessons that the characters learned not only throughout the course of this book but the entire series will play a role in that final chapter.

If you want to find out where this book ranks in the series you can check out our ranking list for the Harry Potter book series here !

This book is easily worth the read. It cannot be skipped. If you would like to pick up a copy of this book for yourself you can use our affiliate link. Also, be sure to check out the reviews of the rest of the books in the series if you have not already below. Soon to come is the review of the final book in the series. Keep your eye out for that.

What are your thoughts on Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince? Be sure to comment below and let us know.

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Harry Potter and the Half Blood-Prince book review

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince book review

This book is the 6th in J. K. Rowlings’ famous saga about the boy wizard that became a teenager with a most challenging quest. Check it out!

The conflict facing Voldemort is not turning out right. Dumbledore is out from Hogwarts for long ranges of time, and the Order of the Phoenix has already sustained losses.

And still, as with all hostilities, life keeps going. Sixth-years start learning to Apparate. Adolescents flirt, argue, and lose their hearts.

Harry receives some extraordinary help in Potions from a mysterious book with notes. And with Dumbledore’s leadership, he investigates the life story of Voldemort and finds his own weakness.

cultural relevance
entertainment
readability
Our personal rating

The Author and Average Rating

J. K. Rowling is the famous author of the Harry Potter saga and other titles. If you want to know more about her, read this mini-bio about the writer .

User Review

Harry potter and the half blood-prince the review.

This story depicts very important plot points in the structure of the general saga, and, maybe, for this reason, some of its structure points may seem weak to the novel when you analyze it isolated from the series, even though, some of its plot points are not so difficult to find.

I believe this phenomenon is intentional since we are now getting to the end of the saga and the novels’ plots are being heavily merged with the saga’s plot.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood-Prince Dramatic Structure

In the beginning of this story, the world is in an uproar. Voldemort’s army is increasing its power, and tragedies are becoming standard.

The Muggle world is also a mess, and fear overflows. The Muggle Prime Minister meets with the Ministry of Magic. The news is not good. It seems that a war is going on, and not even Hogwarts is completely safe.

Dumbledore uses Harry’s fame and Professor Slughorn’s vanity to convince the former professor to return to Hogwarts. The headmaster wants Harry to get close to Slughorn to extract vital information about Voldemort’ past.

After seeing Draco Malfoy in suspicious action in Diagon Alley, Harry believes that his foe now is a Death Eater. Nevertheless, few believe his theory.

Teenagers are raging their hormones at Hogwarts, testing Harry, Ron, Hermione and their friends into facing adult feelings and conflicts.

Homework load is intense and tensions arise with Snape on Harry’s take whenever possible.

Professor Horace Slughorn is the new Potions teacher, and he finds Harry to be a Potions superstar due to a mysterious notebook that Harry has found.

The sixth year is also the year in which Harry and his friends begin to learn how to Apparate.

Many tragedies and obscure circumstances strike members of the Hogwarts community. It seems that an outsider is conducting dark magic for the Dark Lord. Harry wants to figure out what is going on.

Dumbledore takes a greater role in Harry’s education with private lessons that involve traveling into the memories of those who once knew Voldemort in the past. They gather information on how Tom Riddle became Voldemort.

The most valuable memory, unfortunately, is disguised inside Slughorn’s mind, and it is now Harry’s task to convince the Potions professor to expose his memory.

That task proves to be tough since Slughorn tries very hard to avoid that.

IWhen Harry is all out of ideas, with the help of a luck potion, he eventually ends up convincing Slughorn to expose his hidden memories.

The memory shows the moment in which Voldemort first learned about Horcruxes, powerful, outlawed Dark Magic that provides the ability to gain immortality.

Dumbledore supposes) that Voldemort killed seven people to conceal parts of his soul inside seven different objects, the Horcruxes.

Using the memories that he has already collected pertaining to Voldemort, Dumbledore can make good guesses about where Voldemort’s Horcruxes might be. The only way to kill Voldemort is to destroy every single Horcrux, which, Harry realizes, will be his ultimate goal and mission in life.

After traveling to retrieve the first Horcrux, a task that proves to be incredibly difficult, dangerous, and scary, Harry and Dumbledore arrive back at Hogwarts only to find that the castle has been invaded by Death Eaters. The Dark Mark (the sign of Voldemort) floats like a cloud over the castle tower. As Dumbledore and Harry fly to the tower over which the Dark Mark lingers, they discover that the Dark Mark is a trap intended to lure Dumbledore to that very tower. Before he is cornered by Death Eaters, Dumbledore is able to use his magic to hide Harry and to make him temporarily immobile and mute, so that the Death Eaters will not discover him.

Draco Malfoy arrives first at the scene, his wand pointed at Dumbledore, intent on killing him. Draco is nervous and shaky – it doesn’t look like he’ll be able to go through with killing the great wizard. But he’s under orders from the Dark Lord, who has specifically stated that no one but Draco is allowed to kill Dumbledore that night. Soon Draco is flanked by his fellow Death Eaters who taunt Dumbledore and urge Draco to pull the trigger. But Draco can’t do it. Then Snape arrives. Knowing that powerful Aurors bent on protecting Dumbledore have arrived, Snape kills Dumbledore, sending him tumbling off the edge of the tower.

Harry is overwhelmed with grief. He watches Dumbledore die, and he can’t do a thing to save him or help him on account of the protective magic Dumbledore had cast upon him. Harry runs downstairs to get help and finds his friends, teachers, and Aurors fighting the Death Eaters in a violent battle. Blood is everyone, but no one is hurt too badly. The Death Eaters leave, and Harry is unable to stop Snape or to use his magic on him.

A crowd has gathered around Dumbledore’s body, and Fawkes, Dumbledore’s phoenix, sings a grief-stricken song. The faculty assembles to decide what should be done next and to consider closing Hogwarts for good.

Dumbledore wished to be buried on school grounds. On the day of his funeral, people from all over the world come to pay their respects. Everyone, from the Minister of Magic to Hagrid, from the mermaids in the lake to the centaurs in the forest show up to honor the greatest wizard in the world. Deep in his heart, Harry knows what he must do next. He must hunt Voldemort down and destroy each one of his Horcruxes. Ron and Hermione swear to follow and support Harry no matter what. Harry is left with a heavy heart, but with the knowledge that he has good friends.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood-Prince Archetype Distribution

Main Character = Harry Potter

Impact Character = Dumbledore

Protagonist = Harry Potter

It is important to note that Voldemort is still pursuing his goals in the saga as a protagonist.

Antagonist = Voldemort

It is important to note that Harry Potter is still reacting as a saga-antagonist in avoiding Voldemort.

Guardian = Dumbledore

Co-Antagonist = Slughorn, Malfoy, Death Eaters, including Snape.

Sidekick = Ron and the Weasleys, Luna, Neville, non-Slytherin students.

Skeptic = Skeptic a bit weak in this book and divided smoothly between many characters like Ron, Hermione, Lupin, etc.

Emotion = Lavander Ginny, Dobby, Slughorn

Reason = Hermione, Dumbledore

REad this article about the Harry Potter Story Structure of the Saga.

Please leave a comment with your opinion about Harry Potter and the Half Blood-Prince .

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Book Review

Harry potter and the half-blood prince — “harry potter” series.

J.K. Rowling
Adventure , Fantasy

Scholastic Press, an imprint of Scholastic, Inc.

Year Published

As Book VI (of seven) in the Harry Potter series opens, the chaos in the wizarding world has reached a degree such that Muggles are beginning to take notice. People are murdered, unexplainable weather patterns wreak havoc on England and a bridge suddenly collapses, killing dozens.

There’s no denying that evil Lord Voldemort is back with a vengeance. On his to-do list: regain power in the magical world, make certain of his immortality and—oh yes—kill Harry Potter. He has rallied his faithful to him, and he’s beginning to send them out on assignments, knocking off inconvenient opponents, careless of who gets hurt in the process.

Back at Hogwarts for their sixth year, Harry, Ron and Hermione continue to hone their magical skills. They’re no longer required to take a full schedule of classes, but instead get piled high with homework in their areas of specialization. Two interesting developments in Harry’s studies form the crux of the story: he finds a textbook helpfully annotated by a mysterious character called the Half-Blood Prince, and he meets privately with Dumbledore for a series of lessons that will help him understand the prophecy uncovered in Book V and prepare him for the ultimate battle with the Dark Lord that everyone knows awaits him in Book VII.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince showcases J.K. Rowling’s meticulous plot-planning, harkening back to the earliest books in the series and tying up loose ends that readers have wondered about for years. Equal to her cohesiveness in storytelling is Rowling’s consistency in her use of magic, which continues to disappoint. Christian families may find some consolation in the fact that there are no surprises in Rowling’s Half-Bloodmagic, but they still have every right to be concerned. For in our world—unlike Rowling’s—there is no such thing as a “good” witch or wizard.

Positive Elements

A constant throughout the series has been the idea that selfless love is a power stronger than evil—stronger, in fact, than “any magic.” In Half-Blood, Dumbledore reiterates and expounds upon this truth. Also, real love is contrasted with feelings of being “in love,” as created by a love potion: “[The potion] doesn’t really create love, of course. It is impossible to manufacture or imitate love.” (Unfortunately, though it places a high value on love, this book takes cues from humanism in that it makes it seem as if Harry’s ability to love comes from within himself, forgetting the fact that we humans can only love because God first loved us.)

Dumbledore makes a special effort not only to affirm Harry’s true friendship with Ron and Hermione, but tells him that he will need to rely on them and be honest with them through the course of this difficult year. He also bolsters Harry’s courage by telling him, “It is the unknown we fear when we look upon death and darkness, nothing more.” The influence teachers have upon their students is affirmed numerous times.

Perhaps the most important themes in Half-Blood are those dealing with the nature of good and evil. Dumbledore and those loyal to him represent the good side and are characterized by truly good things. For example, they value truth and respect for others, even those they don’t like. They trust people, not blindly, but with a willingness to give others second (and sometimes third and fourth) chances. They attempt to clear the names of innocent people—even those who are really unpleasant. They dislike poor sportsmanship.

Dumbledore empowers Harry by soliciting and respecting his opinion. He rewards Harry’s hard work and courage by giving him new and bigger responsibilities. Like a good leader should, he gives Harry reason to want to do what he asks. He also acts with courage, refusing to “allow Voldemort to dictate the terms of [a] meeting” between the two wizards (before Voldemort rose to power the first time).

The evil side of the Half-Blood conflict is likewise characterized by qualities and actions that are truly evil. By representing Voldemort and his followers (the Death Eaters) as such, Rowling speaks out against their evil and calls for it to be hated and destroyed. She speaks to the nature of evil people, calling Voldemort’s followers “the weak seeking protection, the ambitious seeking some shared glory and the thuggish gravitating toward a leader who could show them more refined forms of cruelty.” The Dark Lord is manipulative, blackmailing his followers into doing his will under threat of their lives and their families’ lives. He shuns others, believing he needs no one and can rise to ultimate power by depending solely on himself.

The most telling aspect of Voldemort’s character is revealed when Harry learns how his enemy arrived at his current depraved state. He learns that the young Voldemort was told, “The soul is supposed to remain intact and whole. Splitting it is an act of violation. It is against nature.” Also, killing people is “the supreme act of evil” and it “rips the soul apart.” Voldemort chose to violate this instruction and kill deliberately, thus destroying his own soul. As Dumbledore tells Harry, “The transformation [Lord Voldemort] has undergone seemed to me to be only explicable if his soul was mutilated beyond the realms of what we might call ‘usual evil.'”

Harry’s Family

The Dursleys are at last called on the carpet for their prolonged mistreatment of Harry. Dumbledore reminds them, “I left him on your doorstep fifteen years ago, with a letter explaining about his parents’ murder and expressing the hope that you would care for him as if he were your own. … You did not do as I asked. You have never treated Harry as a son. He has known nothing but neglect and often cruelty at your hands. The best that can be said is that he has at least escaped the appalling damage you have inflicted upon [your son Dudley].” By making these statements, Dumbledore delivers a sharp one-two punch, obviously chastising the parents for abusing Harry, but also implying that they have harmed Dudley in an even more lasting manner by spoiling him.

This book gives a great deal of attention to Harry’s grief over the Book-V loss of his godfather, Sirius Black. That grief includes anger, sadness and a sense of loss. But Harry also at times expresses a mature perspective on his grief, recalling, “While I was at the Dursleys [after Sirius died], I realized I can’t shut myself away or—or crack up. Sirius wouldn’t have wanted that, would he? And anyway, life’s too short.”

The idea that a child’s upbringing affects his or her character is affirmed in several ways.

Crude or Profane Language

“Rude hand gestures” and uses of God’s name as a swear word are scattered throughout the story, as are the words “h ” and “d n.” They’re not constant, but get enough play to set a bad example for young readers, especially because the story’s heroes use them as often as anyone else.

Violence and Hatred

An evil wizard tries to throttle his own daughter. The story is told of how Voldemort killed his own parents. Harry uses a new spell and gravely—though unintentionally—injures an opponent, splitting his face and chest open as with a sword. (Harry immediately regrets his rash behavior and is glad when his foe is cured.) It is mentioned that werewolf attacks are increasing as Voldemort gains power. One character is mauled badly by a werewolf during the story’s action. (He survives.)

Harry’s response to Draco Malfoy viciously breaking his nose is hatred (“Harry had never hated Malfoy more than as he lay there, like an absurd turtle on his back, blood dripping sickeningly into his open mouth.”) Later, he feels a similar hatred for Professor Snape, who is looking more and more like a Death Eater all the time.

The book’s final battle is intense, and more than one participant dies.

Teenage Stuff

In the magical world, witches and wizards come of age at 17, so Half-Blood chronicles the year leading up to this event for Harry, Ron and Hermione. As such, Rowling makes numerous observations about the nature of teenagers and their rites of passage. Of note in this book is an increase in teenage romance, with all its petty jealousy. The physical aspect of romance is described in more detail, too. For example, “[They] were locked in a close embrace and kissing fiercely as though glued together.”

As Rowling’s characters age, they seem to move beyond the need for bathroom humor and sight gags. With the exception of Fred and George Weasley, of course. Those two jokers make light of the magical world’s obsession with “You Know Who” (Voldemort), by inventing a joke product they call “U-No-Poo: The Constipation Sensation that’s Sweeping the Nation.”

On a more serious note, a new foe Harry encounters is the Inferi, a corpse that has been magically animated by a Dark Wizard to do his will.

Situation Ethics and Worldly Values

As discussed, Rowling gives quite a lot of attention to the battle between good and evil, but she sometimes misses the boat on the nature of good, attributing to her “good” characters questionable values. For instance, Harry and his friends lie to protect Hagrid’s feelings. Hermione jinxes a haughty Quidditch player so that Ron will make the team instead of him. Dumbledore offers gin to an acquaintance so that she’ll get drunk and share extra information with him. Harry similarly extracts information from a drunken professor. Harry is at one point “forced” to lie in order to excuse himself from a nosy crowd of peers. A professor offers Ron a drink to make him feel better. Dumbledore deceives others into thinking he’s in one place when he’s really going elsewhere to investigate a mystery.

The stories are a tad darker and the characters are older, but Book VI is quite consistent with its predecessors, so few families will be changing their minds about what they think about Harry.

That said, I’ll leave it to an illustration from the book to aid the final pronouncement on Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince: In discussing with Dumbledore the magical world’s law against underage wizards using magic outside Hogwarts, Harry is surprised to learn that the Ministry of Magic can’t tell who performed magic, only where it was performed. Harry asks, “So, if you’re underage and you do magic inside an adult witch or wizards’ house, the ministry won’t know?” To which Dumbledore responds, “They will certainly be unable to tell who performed the magic. They rely on witch and wizard parents to enforce their offspring’s obedience while within their walls.”

It seems wise, then, for real-world, non-magical parents to prevent the misuse of magic by the young people in their homes too.

Plot Summary

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