“Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is the eighth story in the Harry Potter series and the first official Harry Potter story to be presented on stage.”
NO MAJOR SPOILERS
I need to start this review by saying what a huge Harry Potter fan I am, having read the books more times than I would care to admit. I have spent the last year counting down the days to the new story and as such I have imagined and wondered what it might bring. I couldn’t wait to go back to Hogwarts and watch a new generation enjoy the magical school, I couldn’t wait to meet Neville Longbottom, Professor of Herbology or see what Professor McGonagall would do as headmistress.
I got none of those things. Not one! If you’re sitting down to read The Cursed Child in the hope of reading the future of the wizarding world, then like me you might end up lost in your own preconceptions of what The Cursed Child is about.
I don’t want to give away any spoilers, and so I won’t, but I will say that I missed Rowling’s rich writing and descriptions very much. That was always going to be the case as this is a play, it’s stripped back and despite being 330 pages, I tore through it in about five hours. I also found myself surprised how much it leaned on the original stories, in ways that I had never imagined, if you’re expecting a story about the future, you may not get what you were looking for!
As such, I had very mixed feelings about The Cursed Child as I was reading, it really wasn’t meeting my expectations and I wasn’t sure I was enjoying it. That said I also couldn’t put it down, I had to stop and take a breath with 20 pages to go because the suspense was making my heart race! In the end as I turned to the final page, I felt like I had lost a friend (again), and so it would be impossible to give The Cursed Child anything but a good review.
If I had one criticism? IT WAS PROTECTED BY A BLOODY FIDELIUS CHARM!
Reviewed by:
Kath Cross
Added 3rd August 2016
