Portable Magic
Reading, for me, is entertainment and an escape from the real world. But it can also inform and stretch the boundaries of the life I live.
Currently reading
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (illustrated edition) ★★★★★
I don’t have anything to add about this book – the story, the characters, the complex world that JK Rowling created – that I didn’t say on my last re-read. I love it as much now as I did when I first picked up the audiocassettes from a bargain bin, skeptical but figuring that I ought to see what the fuss was about.
Instead, I’m going to review this specific edition, an oversized “deluxe format” hardcover illustrated by Jim Kay. It added another dimension of pleasure to my eleventy-billionth re-read, for the heavy weight of it, the tactile sense of turning the thick, almost card stock quality pages, and the visual texture on every page. Even those pages with no illustrations have a sort of inkspotted parchment look.
But the illustrations! I love Jim Kay’s interpretation of the scenes and characters. Some pages are just decorated with little elements from the stories.
Every chapter has an illustrated header.
Some pages are text superimposed over an illustration.
But there are also several full page, standalone illustrations.
This edition was horrifically expensive. But so very worth it. I’ll be buying all seven books for my collection.
I read this for the 2018 Halloween Bingo square Baker Street Irregulars: mystery that involves children/teens in crime solving. In this book, 11 year old Harry and friends try to solve the mystery of what Fluffy is guarding and to prevent the theft of the Sorcerer’s Stone.
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