Book #88 of 2024: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone | DNF: Zombie Train
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling. [I know the issues with JKR; she got no money for this copy of the book.]
Quick synopsis: Harry Potter, the "Boy who lived", experiences his first year at Hogwarts.
Brief opinion: It's been 20 years or more since I last read this one, and wow it did not hold up at all. The story was so simplistic, some of the characters were the worst (Hagrid must be the most stupid man in both the wizarding and muggle world), and it was just so... superficial. No depth. Just fluffy light "of course the good guys win" story.
Plot: Is there a person on the planet who doesn't know the plot? Harry Potter, abused by his aunt and uncle, turns out to be a wizard and goes off to the best magical school. There he meets the well known characters Snape, Hagrid, and the rest. The conclusion of this one has him besting Voldemort (spoiler!) with help from Dumbledore.
Writing/editing: Editing was perfect, as I'd expect for an almost 30 year old, so-beloved book.
What I Liked/What I Didn’t Like: I was really surprised at how much I didn't enjoy this rereading. I've read Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (a fanfic the length of 4-5 books that takes HP and makes the story adult/reasonable/believable/realistic) so many times, the original book can't hold a candle to it.
I wouldn't say the characters are caricatures, but they were just so basic. So completely lacking in depth. Hermione was smart and annoying. Ron was a friend. Snape was mean. Hagrid was too stupid to live a friend. Forget about the characters growing, they never even got more of a description than those basic things.
Harry traipsed through the entire plot, it never felt like he was in real danger or that it was hard for him to win. (This might be because I knew the story so well though.)
I was happy that Harry didn't completely win in the end, Dumbledore swept in and saved him.
Rating: 1-Hated / 2-Disliked / 3-Okay / 4-Liked / 5-Loved: ⭐️⭐️⭐️ - Okay. It's probably closer to 2.5 stars. I skimmed through the trials near the end of the book (Fluffy the three headed dog, LARP wizarding chess, the flying keys, etc). I'm not going to be continuing with the series, I might just read Methods of Rationality again instead.
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DNF #84: Zombie Train by David Macinnis Gill. Take a bunch of unlikeable characters and put them into an unbelievable setting and you have this book.
Somehow a handful of 12 year olds were running a modern day train through the zombie apocalypse. The train never stopped moving, but somehow when kids hopped off the train to do something or to have long conversations they were never left behind.