As far as this review goes I will acknowledge my bias straight away. Yes, I am a Harry Potter fan. Yes I did actually go to the midnight release of the Cursed Child. Some would call me a total fan-girl. I've read / listened to the original seven books so often that I could probably talk along with the narrator. With all that being said I will try and be as unbiased with my critical review as possible.

WARNING! THIS MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS

I picked up a copy of The Cursed Child without knowing anything whatsoever about the story. All I knew about it was that it's not a book but a script for the London Westend play. However, I was excited at the prospect of a new, legitimate Harry Potter continuation so I got a Starbucks, went to the beach and began reading.

My first impression is that you can't delve too much into the lore of the story. I understand that Harry Potter is probably THE biggest example of content creating itself but the fact of the matter is unless you're personally friends with J.K Rowling and can pick her brain for answers you'll need to suspend your disbelief.

The story starts with the 19 years later scene out of The Deathly Hallows with Harry's family and Ron's family about to board the Hogwarts express. The story for the most part follows Albus Potter (the son of Harry) and Scorpius Malfoy (son of Draco) who befriend each other aboard the Hogwarts express. The plot follows their misadventures around Hogwarts, retreading through old Harry Potter set pieces, locals and themes. The writers (for there are actually three) try to establish conflict between Albus and his father but to me it seems kind of forced. This is probably a bi-product of not being able to see the stage production but that entire storyline just seems sloppy to me. So what if Albus is sorted into Slytherin I thought the entire point of The Deathly Hallows ending was to break down the obvious stereotypes surrounding the Hogwarts Houses. But Albus's main reason for being misunderstood is because "he's a Slytherin and his father can't possibly understand what that's like because he's “Harry-Gryffindor-Potter." All in all as one of Albus's driving motivations for the story it seems weak and not believable.

Unless you are a series like Doctor Who, where the rules of time travel have been thoroughly established, meddling with time manipulation is a bit of a risky business. So far in popular media we've seen time-travel used as a "restart button" for a series (see X-Men, Startrek etc) in order to continue new storyline opportunities. Yet, in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child the time mechanic hinges only on our limited knowledge of "Time Turners" in the Harry Potter universe. For those of you who haven't read the previous books (how could you) we've only ever seen how a time turner is properly used in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Harry and Hermione use it to turn back time three hours in order to save both a magical creature and Harry's godfather Sirius Black (spoilers sorry.) Then, in The Cursed Child, multiple characters use Time Turners to go back years and sometimes decades which doesn't really follow the established canon "rules."

I think I'm getting too far into the analyzing which I warned you, the reader, not to do at the beginning of this post just let it be known that a rather large amount of disbelief needs to be suspended in order to get through this book. I'm by no means saying its bad or I didn't enjoy it but (and I think this has something to do with it being a stage production rather than a actual book) if you go into it trying to get the richness of the world that other Harry Potter books have then you will be disappointed. I think reading it is only half the experience. (Pardon the pun) I feel that some of the magic is lost, not being able to see it performed on stage.

This quote really resonated with me. Sort of reflects on where I am in my life right now.

But, in the end the question remains of is it good? My complex opinion aside yes, it is good. It is beautifully written and what details there are fill the imagination. However if you're looking for an in depth story world there just aren't enough pages in the script or minutes of stage time to hold everything that would need to be there to create one. Does that detract from the overall story or experience of The Cursed Child? No. I don't think it does.

All things said and done I would recommend picking up a copy just for the fact that J.K Rowling tells a good, enjoyable story.

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child - Book Review