Bound To Stay Bound

School Library Journal - 07/01/1999 Gr 3-8-Fans of the phenomenally popular Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Scholastic, 1998) won't be disappointed when they rejoin Harry, now on break after finishing his first year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Reluctantly spending the summer with the Dursleys, his mean relatives who fear and detest magic, Harry is soon whisked away by his friends Ron, Fred, and George Weasley, who appear at his window in a flying Ford Anglia to take him away to enjoy the rest of the holidays with their very wizardly family. Things don't go as well, though, when the school term begins. Someone, or something, is (literally) petrifying Hogwarts' residents one by one and leaving threatening messages referring to a Chamber of Secrets and an heir of Slytherin. Somehow, Harry is often around when the attacks happen and he is soon suspected of being the perpetrator. The climax has Harry looking very much like Indiana Jones, battling a giant serpent in the depths of the awesome and terrible Chamber of Secrets. Along with most of the teachers and students introduced in the previous book, Draco Malfoy has returned for his second year and is more despicable than ever. The novel is marked throughout by the same sly and sophisticated humor found in the first book, along with inventive, new, matter-of-fact uses of magic that will once again have readers longing to emulate Harry and his wizard friends.-Susan L. Rogers, Chestnut Hill Academy, PA Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information. - Copyright 1999 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.

Bulletin for the Center... - 09/01/1999 To paraphrase an old movie trailer, Harry’s back and Scholastic’s got him. The comparison is fairly apt, as the Harry Potter series is somewhat reminiscent of old movie serials, full of secrets, revelations, death-defying deeds, and hair-raising escapes. In this, the second of Harry’s continuing saga, he returns to the Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry after a dreadful summer with the Dursleys, from which he is daringly rescued by his good friend Ron and Ron’s always-ready-for-mischief older brothers. All is not well at Hogwarts, thank goodness—Harry is being harassed by a bizarre little house-elf, something truly creepy is turning students to stone, and a diary belonging to a long-ago student is revealing things to Harry that he doesn’t really want to know. There are some minor inconsistencies in the plot and Hermione’s role in this sequel is disappointingly small, but Rowling has a flair for the dramatic, and her suspenseful pace is such that the pages just keep turning. Plot twists and pithy characterizations (the self-absorbed new professor, Gilderoy Lockheart, is screamingly funny) make this magical boarding school story roll to its breath-stealing climax. With only his true friends to stand by him, Harry the underdog comes from behind to overcome self-doubt and false accusations in order to win the day. Stay tuned for the next one. - Copyright 1999 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois.

Booklist - 05/15/1999 *Starred Review* Given the furor this book has already caused in the U.S., it seems almost redundant to review it; however. . . . Harry Potter's exploits during his second year at Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry completely live up to the bewitching measure of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone a Booklist Editors' Choice, 1998. Harry's summer with the spiteful Dursleys is as dismal as his life with them before Hogwarts, and not only that, a neurotic house-elf suddenly appears to warn him against returning to school. Harry, of course, goes back to school. Once there, he finds himself in danger, as predicted by the house-elf. Strange things are happening. Why can only Harry hear an eerie voice talking about escaping and killing? Who or what has put several students into a petrified state? Harry and his sidekicks, Ron and Hermione, work furiously to get to the bottom of it all. It doesn't help that the rumor spreads that Harry is the long-dreaded heir of Slytherin, one of the school's founders, who purportedly created a Chamber of Secrets that houses a grotesque monster that can only be released by the heir. The mystery, zany humor, sense of a traditional British school (albeit with its share of ghosts, including Moaning Myrtle who haunts the girls' bathroom), student rivalry, and eccentric faculty, all surrounded by the magical foundation so necessary in good fantasy, are as expertly crafted here as in the first book. Fans who have been thirsting for this sequel will definitely not feel any disappointment. In fact, once they have read it, they will be lusting for the next. (Reviewed May 15, 1999) - Copyright 1999 Booklist.