Blue Wolf Reviews

Tag: harry potter

  • Pocket Potters: Luna Lovegood

    Pocket Potters: Luna Lovegood

    For Harry Potter fans young and old, Pocket Potter’s is a wonderful way to become intimate with each of the characters in the Harry Potter series. Each character is described and given a back story. We learn about Luna Lovegood and her role in supporting Harry through his adventures. She is a unique and delightful young lady.

    Luna first meets Harry at the beginning of her fourth year at Hogwarts. He notices that she is a bit dreamy and unconventional, when they share a train carriage to school. She stores her wand behind her ear and reads upside down. However, when no-one else believes that the wizard has seen Voldemort, Luna supports him.

    We find out more about other Houses at Hogwarts, as Luna shows Harry the entrance to Ravensclaw. You have to answer a puzzle to enter the door, as Ravensclaw students’ values are wit, learning and wisdom.

    There are many more examples of Luna and Harry meeting. We examine details about Luna that have not been told before. These are lovely additions to the original series and certainly expand knowledge of the minor characters in the book.

  • Pocket Potters

    Pocket Potters

    Little Guides to the Harry Potter Books

    This series of hard back books for juniors from JK Rowlings Pocket Potters, gives younger children a chance to become familiar with the famous wizard. Rather than waiting to master the large and complex books that originally made up this series, Pocket Potters cover Harry, Hermione and Ron Weasley. They contain quite a large amount of information from the stories, but it is presented in comic type pictures with diagrams, and small blocks of print

    Harry Potter is illustrated by Natalie Smillie. She has included a great deal of information and set it out in a simple format. The first pages look at Harry when he lived in Privet Drive. Then Hagrid comes to visit, and Harry learns he is a wizard. The next pages show Harry at School and how he finds his way around. The following pages deal with Harry making friends, learning to play Quidditch, and how he manages to find trouble. This happens often when he is practicing magic.

    Hermione Granger is the next Pocket Potter book. It begins when Hermione gets a letter inviting her to Hogwarts School. No one in her family was magic so it was a surprise. She first meets Harry on the Hogwarts express. From the first, she loved every day at the school and would check Harry’s homework but never let him copy hers. This witch was always eager and studious reading up ahead of time on all her subjects. The illustrations are by Laura Proietti.

    The next book is Ron Weasley. His older brothers have all attended Hogwarts and Ron knows he has a lot to live up to. These illustrations by Olia Mula show red headed Ron as a fun-loving student who enjoys a game of Exploding snap, loves Quidditch, and plays Wizard Chess. Ron’s Guide to the wizarding world is quite interesting and shows him to be a thoughtful student. Each double set of pages presents facts, directly from the stories but in small segments for easy reading.

    These books would be a welcome addition to any child’s library.

  • Harry Potter: The Character Vault

    Harry Potter: The Character Vault

    The beloved characters of the Harry Potter series created by JK Rowling have become part and parcel of so many children’s and now adult’s lives, as they evolved from words on the pages of a book to the silver screen, bringing the written word too magnificently, believable life.

    How this amazing collection of stories evolved into the magical world of cinema is incredible as the creativity required over the eight movies that have been made, has set the bar so very high for further creations based in the magical world of faeries, magicians, wizards, make-believe and magic.

    Collated in a wonderful book to treasure, we are invited into the world of make-believe and how, by collection and combining resources and talent from many sectors, the screen magic of Harry Potter is born.

    Each of the characters is represented with beautiful full colour plates commencing with Harry Potter himself. A small synopsis accompanies each of the characters as well as detail on the creation of each of the costumes represented. One of the more fascinating details to accompany each of the characters wardrobes is the manner in which the costumes have been devised to set the scene, to create the ambience of time and place and awe.

    Wonderful snippets of information from the designers and actors adds an extra layer of information to this amazing world of costume and makeup, along with the props that are used and the amount of experimentation, time and trial required to discover the correct item to be used or worn is remarkable. Check out just what goes into the making, design and usage of the wands and the experimentation required to get them just right.

    Marvellous snippets from many of the actors involved help you understand how they transform into Professor Snape, Madam Hooch, The Grey Lady and Kingsley Shacklebolt to name just a few of the many.

    Divided into sections it is easy and fascinating to follow the journey from the creation of the Hogwarts Students to Families and all the bits and pieces that go into creating something so otherworldly that it comes to life, comes into reality and remains so!

    In many ways it is a book that is a great reference tool to be used by people who are considering and interested in costuming, make-up, props and behind the scenes in the world of theatre and make-believe.

    If you are simply a Harry Potter fan this is a definite addition to your book shelf.