A variety of things that probably only I care about

Every now and then, I find myself trying to explain to someone why I’m not a big fan of the Harry Potter series. I still haven’t gotten good at this explanation, probably because I usually change the subject before the other person decides I’m an elitist snob who is trying to over-think their simple pleasures. When I do go into details, I try to explain that it feels like Harry Potter just throws in world-building elements because they are amusing or useful at the time, with no thought for how they fit in to the greater series. It’s not that I’m intentionally nitpicking it, but if I really like a series, the world will keep living on in my head. And it breaks the spell when I repeatedly realize that a conflict from one book could have been resolved easily if the characters had just remembered to use a spell or character from a previous book.

Sometimes, instead of just walking away, the person asks me what alternative I’d recommend to Harry Potter. Usually, I tell them about Diane Duane’s Young Wizards series. Unlike Harry Potter, these books kept kept a foothold in my imagination for years after I read them.

When I discovered the series, there were only three books, and the final one seemed meant as the end of a trilogy. I was happy to discover recently that the series continued after all, and is now up to nine books. I got the first five for Christmas a year ago, and I began re-reading them. It was exciting, but also a little worrisome. Would these live up to the standards that had been set by almost two decades of nostalgia? Short answer: they did sometimes, but disappointed me at other times. They probably aren’t the Harry Potter killers I remembered, but I can definitely recommend them as good young adult fantasy books.

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