Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by J. K. Rowling

"Harry Potter is an orphan and lives with his abominable unbearable uncles and cousin Dudley.

Harry feels very sad and lonely, until one day he receives a letter that will change your life forever. Here we report that has been accepted as a student at Hogwarts boarding school of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

 Summary 

Before the start of the novel, Voldemort, considered the most powerful dark wizard in history, killed Harry's parents, but mysteriously vanished after trying to kill Harry. While the wizarding world was celebrating Voldemort's downfall, Professor Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall and Rubeus Hagrid placed the one year-old orphan in the care of his Muggle (non-wizard) uncle and aunt: Vernon and Petunia Dursley.

For ten years, they and their son Dudley neglected and bullied Harry. Shortly before Harry's eleventh birthday, a series of letters addressed to Harry arrived, but Vernon destroyed them before Harry can read them. To get away from the letters, Vernon takes the family to a small island. As they are settling in, Hagrid bursts through the door to tell Harry what the Dursleys have kept him from finding out: Harry is a wizard and has been accepted at Hogwarts.

Hagrid takes Harry to Diagon Alley, a magically-concealed shopping precinct in London, where Harry is bewildered to discover how famous he is among wizards as "the boy who lived". He also finds that he is quite wealthy, since a bequest from his parents has remained on deposit at Gringotts Wizarding Bank. Guided by Hagrid, he buys the books and equipment he needs for Hogwarts. At the wand shop, he finds that the wand that suits him best is the twin of Voldemort's; both wands contain feathers from the same phoenix.

 Development 

In 1990 Jo Rowling, as she preferred to be known, wanted to move with her boyfriend to a flat in Manchester and in her words, "One weekend after flat hunting, I took the train back to London on my own and the idea for Harry Potter fell into my head... A scrawny, little, black-haired, bespectacled boy became more and more of a wizard to me... I began to write Philosopher's Stone that very evening. Although, the first couple of pages look nothing like the finished product." Then Rowling's mother died and, to cope with her pain, Rowling transferred her own anguish to the orphan Harry. Rowling spent six years working on Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, and in 1996 obtained a grant of £4,000 from the Scottish Arts Council, which enabled her to finish the book and plan the sequels. She sent the book to an agent and a publisher, and then the second agent she approached spent a year trying to sell the book to publishers, most of whom thought it was too long at about 90,000 words. Barry Cunningham, who was building a portfolio of distinctive fantasies by new authors for Bloomsbury Children's Books, recommended accepting the book, and the eight-year-old daughter of Bloomsbury's chief executive said it was "so much better than anything else".

 Curiosities 

This book was brought to the big screen, and video games.

 J.K. Rowling 

Joanne "Jo" Rowling (born 31 July 1965), known as J. K. Rowling, is a British novelist, best known as the author of the Harry Potter fantasy series. The Potter books have gained worldwide attention, won multiple awards, sold more than 400 million copies to become the best-selling book series in history and been the basis for a popular series of films, in which Rowling had overall approval on the scripts as well as maintaining creative control by serving as a producer on the final instalment. Rowling conceived the idea for the series on a train trip from Manchester to London in 1990.

Rowling has led a "rags to riches" life story, in which she progressed from living on social security to multi-millionaire status within five years. As of March 2011, when its latest world billionaires list was published, Forbes estimated Rowling's net worth to be US$1 billion. The 2008 Sunday Times Rich List estimated Rowling's fortune at £560 million ($798 million), ranking her as the twelfth richest woman in the United Kingdom. Forbes ranked Rowling as the forty-eighth most powerful celebrity of 2007,and Time magazine named her as a runner-up for its 2007 Person of the Year, noting the social, moral, and political inspiration she has given her fans. In October 2010, J. K. Rowling was named 'Most Influential Woman in Britain' by leading magazine editors. She has become a notable philanthropist, supporting such charities as Comic Relief, One Parent Families, Multiple Sclerosis Society of Great Britain, and Lumos (formerly the Children's High Level Group).

On 12 April 2012, Rowling announced that her new adult novel The Casual Vacancy would be published in the UK by Little, Brown & Company on 27 September 2012.

Name

Although she writes under the pen name "J. K. Rowling", pronounced like rolling, her name when her first Harry Potter book was published was simply "Joanne Rowling". Anticipating that the target audience of young boys might not want to read a book written by a woman, her publishers demanded that she use two initials, rather than her full name. As she had no middle name, she chose K as the second initial of her pen name, from her paternal grandmother Kathleen Ada Bulgen Rowling. She calls herself "Jo" and has said, "No one ever called me 'Joanne' when I was young, unless they were angry." Following her marriage, she has sometimes used the name Joanne Murray when conducting personal business. During the Leveson Inquiry she gave evidence under the name of Joanne Kathleen Rowling.

Awards and honours

1997: Nestlé Smarties Book Prize, Gold Award for Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
1998: Nestlé Smarties Book Prize, Gold Award for Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
1998: British Children's Book of the Year, winner Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
1999: Nestlé Smarties Book Prize, Gold Award for Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
1999: National Book Awards Children's Book of the Year, winner Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
1999: Whitbread Children's Book of the Year, winner Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
2000: British Book Awards, Author of the Year
2000: Order of the British Empire, Officer
2000: Locus Award, winner Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
2001: Hugo Award for Best Novel, winner Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
2003: Premio Príncipe de Asturias, Concord
2003: Bram Stoker Award for Best Work for Young Readers, winner Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
2006: British Book of the Year, winner for Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
2007: Blue Peter Badge, Gold
2008: British Book Awards, Outstanding Achievement
2009: Légion d'honneur, Chevalier, presented by French President Nicolas Sarkozy
2010: Hans Christian Andersen Literature Award, inaugural award winner
2011: British Academy Film Awards, Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema for the Harry Potter film series, shared with David Heyman, cast and crew
2012: Freedom of the City of London
Honorary degrees: St Andrews University, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh Napier University, University of Exeter, Harvard University

 Review 

"I wouldn't be surprised if today was known as Harry Potter day in the future - there will be books written about Harry - every child in our world will know his name."

Professor McGonagall, in the first chapter titled "The Boy Who Lived"

By now there's not much that can be said about the Harry Potter phenomenon  that hasn't been said already. Worshipped by kids, enjoyed by adults, this modern myth has become an accepted classic worldwide. Pull any copy of the series off a shelf anywhere in the world and you're holding magic.

It's not hard to see why. Right from the first page of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone Rowling proves that she knows a thing or two about the kind of magic that brings stories to life.

The book starts with Harry as an infant, the child of a wizard and witch. He is suddenly left orphaned after an attack by the evil and powerful wizard Voldemort, a villain so dastardly that most wizards and witches refer to him as "You-Know-Who". Mysteriously, Harry survives and Voldemort, his power apparently broken in his attempt to kill the child, disappears leaving many to think he's gone for good. Codex Alera spreads fast and Harry is hailed as a hero. Even though he's just a baby his victory over Voldemort makes him an overnight celebrity among magic users the world over.

As a result, the Headmaster and Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry step in to decide Harry's future. They decide to take the child out of the spotlight and allow him to live a normal life with his only remaining relations, a Muggle family named Dursley, until he is of age to attend the Hogwarts school. They leave Harry on the doorstep of the Dursley's home, with no more than a letter of explanation.

The story truly begins nearly ten years later, after Harry has endured a childhood of constant scorn and hatred at the hands of his new family. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia are embarrassed by the fact that Harry's mother considered herself a witch and married a man who claimed to be a wizard. The Dursley's simply don't hold with such nonsense. They consider themselves respectable.

As Muggles go, the Dursley's may not be prime examples of the worst of their kind, but they rank pretty high. They force Harry to sleep in a cupboard under the stairs and to wear their spoiled son's damaged cast-offs. Harry is little more than a servant and a punching bag to his cousin Dudley. But worst of all, Mr. Dursley has not read Dumbledore's letter to Harry, leaving the boy unaware of such things as his heritage, the truth about his parents death and his emerging powers.

Then everything changes with the delivery of a letter in a very unusual fashion. From that point on, Harry's life is never the same again. The letter is actually an acceptance letter, a notification to Harry that he has a place at Hogwart's school. Literally rescued from the Dursley's and taken under the wing of Hagrid, the school's lovable giant of a groundskeeper, Harry embarks on the adventure of a lifetime in the hallowed halls of Hogwarts where in addition to his studies he makes close friends and a lifelong enemy, discovers a talent for a very unusual sport called Quidditch and solves a mystery that threatens the world, not to mention his very existence.

The magic potion Rowling herself concocts starts solidly with Harry, a remarkably unassuming kid who's got "hero of mythical proportions" written all over him. He's courageous, clever and resourceful. He's got a special talent in the form of magical powers, and a noble and mysterious birth. He's wounded - a big one in myths - not just physically as evidenced by the scar on his forehead, but emotionally as well due to the death of his parents, not to mention a tortured upbringing by uncaring relations that rivals Cinderella's. But most of all, as was hinted right from the start, he's got one heck of a destiny.  All this comes together to introduce a character the reader immediately bonds with. You *really* want to be this kid's friend and hang out with him to see what happens.

Next into the potion goes a heavy dose of down-to-earth realism - the kind of everyday stuff recognized by almost every kid in the world... but WAIT! You, gentle reader, are never allowed to get comfortable in the world of the often stupid, ever boring Muggles, because you're not one of them, are you? Of course not. You know better, because Rowling blends in the essence of magic fantasy with such skill that Harry's world literally shimmers with it. Because you're not a Muggle, you can see it all around you as you read.

The rest of the ingredients are just as high in quality, from the magical, mysterious yet somehow familiar Hogwarts School to the friends that help Harry get through it all, to the exciting conclusion. Rowling serves it all up with a deceptively simple and straight forward writing style that sparks

a response deep in the subconscious, drawing the reader in and holding on tight. The fact is, this story is not just read, it's experienced and that's the magic right there.

Of course, adults have to fight their Muggle tendencies and indulge in a little suspension of disbelief to get full enjoyment of the story. For example, those of you who read a lot of Nicholas Sparks might have trouble getting past the fact that such occurrences as motorcycles flying over London and entire groups of people who vanish into thin air at train stations, go virtually unnoticed. The exact purpose of the wizards trained at Hogwarts in relation to the world is never really explained, except in some vague reference to the further study and possible control of the other preternatural type creatures such as dragons, zombies and vampires who also go unnoticed by the Muggle world. Apparently, when it comes to Muggle mind control, it's everyone's game. Those readers with sci-fi leanings might start picturing Hogwarts as existing in an alternate dimension of sorts but that's not the point. The point is suspension of disbelief. It just all happens because it does and no one in the real world knows about it but those involved... and that's that.

Though I thoroughly loved this book, my only off moment came near the end, where I began to wonder exactly how suitable the images depicted were for the impressionable minds of Rowling's younger readers.

"Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" is a fantastic book, well plotted with strong characters that not only talk and act like real kids, but are also great role models as well. These kids do their homework, brush their teeth, study for exams and still have time to get into trouble in the name of a good cause. There is one excellent and well spelled out moral in the story that doesn't detract from the plot and if the reason why Harry survived Voldemort's attack doesn't leave you with a lump in your throat and a tear in your eye, I suggest you read it again.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who hasn't read it yet, kid or adult. Let it carry you away with the knowledge that you're reading a classic that will be read and loved by generations to come, just like the fairy-tales of old."