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Jonathan Terrington

http://www.jonathanterrington.com

https://www.goodreads.com/thewritestuff

Jonathan ’s personal-favourites shelf

The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkien

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

The Hobbit, or There and Back Again by J.R.R. Tolkien

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Jonathan is Currently Reading

Jonathan Terrington is currently reading

The Butcher's Masquerade (Dungeon Crawler Carl, #5)

by Matt Dinniman (Goodreads Author)

bookshelves: currently-reading

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May 18, 2026 03:40AM

Jonathan Terrington rated a book it was amazing

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Harry Potter, #5)

by J.K. Rowling

bookshelves: fantasy, children-s-literature, favourites, worldbuilding, currently-reading

Reading for the 3rd time

read in February 2015

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Jonathan Terrington said: " This is probably the best entry in the Harry Potter series to this point. In my personal opinion, the novels begin as average stories at best - with Rowling trying to gain a proper control over her writing voice and style. They do show delightful pro This is probably the best entry in the Harry Potter series to this point. In my personal opinion, the novels begin as average stories at best - with Rowling trying to gain a proper control over her writing voice and style. They do show delightful promise with the worldbuilding and some sense of nice-enough characters, but all in all it's clear that marketing played a huge hand in selling the books early on. I'm not cynical enough to say marketing was all that did it, Rowling has a distinctly British charm and humour that shines even through her early books (and the world of Hogwarts provides a fantastic fantasy setting). However, something is missing from the first three books that is more present in this novel.

Perhaps it is the nuanced political commentary - through displaying the failing inner workings of the Ministry of Magic Rowling appears to provide a critique on normal human political systems. The ideas that she displays include that in trying to do 'good' often laws are designed for those in power to keep power and secondly that those in power often fight among each other for power when they should be fighting bigger problems facing the world. This rings true for politics in Australia at the moment in particular where it seems as if the government and opposition government are busier fighting internal party battles than actually passing legislation.

Perhaps it is the increased (and improved) characterisation present in this novel that causes this to be a more improved novel. You have Harry, Hermione and Ron showing more depth to different aspects of their personalities with their various fears and desires as teenagers and heroes being exposed. The fact that Harry houses more raw anger in this novel to go alongside his perfect heroic goodness leads him to become a more three dimensional figure. The same applies to his friends, however I think the most development of side characters is shown through Dumbledore and Snape. Firstly, because Dumbledore has more of an active role in this novel's plot and secondly because we see some of Snape's tragic, misunderstood, childhood.

All I can admit is that this series is growing on me and I can see the unique brilliance and appeal now in how the audience for Harry Potter grew up alongside the characters. It's a nice series, if not particularly groundbreaking, with some charming moments and a clever magical world. I look forward to seeing how the last two books now play out. ...more "

Apr 26, 2026 04:44PM · see review