Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban unveils the darkening direction that the series is set for. With well executed character growth and a strong and unique plotline, this book sets itself apart from the previous two books without staying too far from the path of what readers have come to love about the series.

This book being the 3rd installment to the Harry Potter series, written by J. K. Rowling contains 22 chapters sharing 435 pages. This book is significantly larger than the others of the series thus far but certainly does not read that way.

The story follows Harry as he deals with a murderer on the loose that has a desire to kill Harry. This leads to extra security around Harry and all the young wizards in general by releasing creatures called Dementors. These creatures guard the wizard prison normally, but after this murderer escapes, they have been tasked with hunting the murderer down and taking him back to prison.

These creatures play a pivotal role throughout the story and have an attraction to Harry and his dark past. This causes Harry a lot of grief as throughout the year they are patrolling the Hogwarts castle.

New Characters and Creatures

We are introduced to some new characters in this book such as Professor Lupin, who is the 3rd defence against the dark arts teacher since the start of the series. A job that has become notoriously high in retention rate. Perhaps Dumbledore really is awful at running a school and picking the right faculty.

Lupin is a sudo father figure to Harry as he progresses throughout the year. Harry is taught how to ward off Dementors by Lupin after watching the professor fight them off on the train heading to Hogwarts at the beginning of the school year. Lupin also knew Harry’s parents and fought with them in the last war. Lupin really cares for Harry and wants to make sure that his friend’s child (Harry’s father) is looked out for.

Another new character is Serious Black, the man who escaped the wizard prison of Azkaban. This character develops mostly to the tail end of the series but is a very interesting character. Without spoiling it here to readers I won’t say much more other than there is more to him then murder.

Character Development

When it comes to character development with the existing characters, it seems to have slowed somewhat. I didn’t get the feeling that the characters grew in this book as much as the Chamber of Secrets. Yes, they deal with more adult like issues and realities, but that is about it. In the previous book Harry and Hermione have to deal with wizard racism in a sense with the pureness of family magic blood. This was something that had an obvious overarching scope to the story. But in Prisoner of Azkaban, I just get the sense that they are dealing with an injustice of the adult world for the first time. Something that also existed in the previous book.

With all that being said though, this book is a very enjoyable read. There are still moments of new discovery with magic, we are also introduced to a mechanic of magic in this book that might what makes it stand out the most. Time travel.

Time travel in this book is handled decently. I would not say that it passes with flying colors, but for a children's book series I cannot expect something like this to be to overly complicated. Of course with the way this book was designed, that means that almost the entire last third of the book happens over the course of 48 hours. Even though it’s not fleshed out to a level that I would enjoy at a higher level of reading, I still enjoyed it.

Like all the Harry Potter books, the lessons throughout the year build to the Trio learning the important skills that they will need throughout the year to finish the book. Time Turners, learning the patronus charm. Learning to fly a Hippogriff, learning about animagus. Rowlings method of working these things into the school year keeps the story from getting dull while still letting the readers know that yes, the kids are there to learn.

Closing Thoughts

At the end of the day this book tells a cohesive story. It develops new characters that will have uses later on in the series in a clever way and explores new ideas to the series that have yet to be explored leading to a very fresh feel. This book ranks in the top half of my preferred books in the series. It has some weaknesses in the story with the existing character developments but does really set the stage for what is to come in the next books in the series.

Honestly if I had to describe the type of story this book is in the Harry Potter series, I would have to say it’s the filler book that is required to put may of the future pieces into place for the rest of the series. But it’s very well done and deserves to be read.

If you want to find out where this book ranks in the series you can check out our ranking list for the Harry Potter book series here!

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