As featured in the first year set texts reading list in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is an extensive introduction to the magical beasts that exist in the magical, non-Muggle world. Some of the animals featured in the A-Z you will have already met in the existing Harry Potter books: for example Hippogriff, Flobberworm, Kappa - others you certainly won't: read on to find out exactly what a Chizpurfle is, or why one should always beware of the sinister Lethifold ...As Albus Dumbledore says in his introduction, this set text book by Newt Scamander has given the perfect grounding to many a Hogwarts student. It will be helpful to all Muggles out there too ...On reading the book you will also find that Harry, Ron and (in one instance) Hermione - couldn't resist grafittiing the book, and adding their own personal hand-written opinions.
I had so been looking forward to a new Harry Potter book to tide myself over until Harry Potter and the Cursed Child and the adaptation of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Unfortunately, my expectations were not met in this small volume. Despite, Albus Dumbledore's introduction and Harry's notes scrawled in the margins it read like it was advertised -- a textbook. The descriptions of said creatures were small, only a few sentences each and were typically already the description provided in the Harry Potter series. I would have prefered a longer book with more in-depth summary of let's say a Crumple-Horned Snorkack or a hippogriff but instead only got mediocre mentions.
Harry Potter's additions were cute and a throwback to the seven books, mainly involving Hagrid, but they were few and far between and began to see why Harry was doodling in his book rather than paying attention. Personally, I would have found The Monster Book of Monsters much more interesting as unlike Fantastic Beasts, it would have had some bite to it.
Reading updates
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Started reading
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23 April, 2016:
Finished reading
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23 April, 2016:
Reviewed