That makes a change.....

[Barry Arrowsmith]

I expect that most of us have read reviews of HBP in the newspaper or  
magazine of our choice. Usually I find them a bit disappointing,  
there often seems to be an element of damning with faint praise or a  
touch condescension about  many of them. They sometimes get details  
wrong and often launch into side-issues like being a positive  
influence if it brings youngsters back to books.

But.
I've found one I like. It's in today's Sunday Telegraph Review and  
it's by Tibor Fischer. I'd like to be able to provide a weblink, but  
can't - I think you have to register to get  that deep into the ST's  
contents on-line. The guy is obviously a long-time reader of the  
books and enjoys it all enormously while not taking it too seriously  
or descending into sycophancy. He obviously approves of Jo's total  
independence from the literati mafia, too. And it's among the reviews  
for adult reading, not the kid's stuff.

He likes her satire, particularly the political skewerings in OoP and  
HBP (while admitting that it's probably above the heads of younger  
readers) and likes strong new additions to the character list -  the  
cowardly net-working Slughorn for instance. He likes Snape, and  
wonders how decisive his actions will be in delineating what he is -  
just how sneaky Jo will be in the last book? Not fond of Ron,  though  
- keeps hoping he'll die. Humour is noted, and he considers that  
she's not  so far from Pratchett or Robert Rankin in this respect.  
And he admits that reviews such as his mean absolutely nothing - Jo  
is above all  that - she is after all the Chosen One of contemporary  
writing.

This bloke should be posting on one of the boards, he's one of us.

All in all this brightened my Sunday breakfast-time. A book review I  
mostly  agreed with.

Kneasy