My 48th book finished in 2023.

I've never read this book, and only seen the film, so I can't help but compare them.

I have to say, there was a slow start to the book, but I really like the world building. Finally we were seeing some of the magical world outside of the school.

I had various questions about plot contrivances in the film, but these were answered in this book. A much bulkier book is able to explain things more thoroughly, but at the same time, I thought some scenes and conversations went on a bit too long. It wasn't a strain, but maybe the book could have been slightly more streamlined.

The last quarter of the book is better than the film. The film missed out a lot of necessary exposition, which in turn now lets the fifth film make so much more sense to me.

Now for some criticisms:
The S.P.E.W. / house elf aspect of this was so unnecessary. Hermione says slavery is bad, the others don't believe her. Really JK? We know slavery is bad, I don't see this b-plot being needed in this book.

Rowling uses the word "foreign" a lot. It just made me feel a bit icky.

The Rita Skeeter storyline quickly became a bit overdone. We get it, journalists are bad.

But these aside, this is probably my favourite Harry Potter book so far. I definitely like the darker tone.