In Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, the summer after Harry’s first year at Hogwarts has been his worst summer ever… the Dursleys more distant and horrible than ever before. But just as he’s packing his bags to return to school, a creature named Dobby the house-elf announces that if Harry goes back to Hogwarts, disaster will strike. And it turns out, Dobby is right. Harry and Ron miss the Hogwarts Express, so they fly to school in a blue Ford Anglia, crash landing in the notorious Whomping Willow. Soon other worries accumulate: the outrageously stuck-up new professor Gilderoy Lockhart; a ghost named Moaning Myrtle, who haunts the girls’ bathroom; the strange behavior of Ron’s little sister, Ginny Weasley; rumors about the “Chamber of Secrets,” a cavern buried deep below Hogwarts; and a magical diary owned by Tom Riddle, a Hogwarts student of long ago. Harry is also shocked to discover that he can speak Parseltongue, the language of snakes - a rare ability that Lord Voldemort also possessed - and that anti-Muggle prejudice exists in the Wizarding world, even affecting Harry’s friend Hermione. But all of these seem like minor concerns when someone starts turning Hogwarts students to stone: an evildoer said to be the fearsome Heir of Salazar Slytherin, on of the founders of the school. Could it be Draco Malfoy, Harry’s most poisonous rival? Could it be Hagrid whose mysterious past is finally told? Or could it be the one person everyone at Hogwarts most suspects: Harry Potter himself?

What Kind of Book is Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Reviews

Lauren Hancock

7.00

The adventure continues! This second book in the Harry Potter series begins to introduce slightly more depth and themes of self-introspection. It's just as much fun as the first, and readers can enjoy this book knowing they still have five more to go!

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The Creatives Behind the Book

Author

J. K. Rowling

J.K. Rowling is the author of the record-breaking, multi-award-winning Harry Potter novels. Loved by fans around the world, the series has sold over 500 million copies, been translated into 80 languages, and made into 8 blockbuster films. She has written three companion volumes in aid of charity: Quidditch Through the Ages and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (in aid of Comic Relief and Lumos), and The Tales of Beedle the Bard (in aid of Lumos), as well as a film script inspired by Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, which marked the start of a five-film series to be written by the author. She has also collaborated on a stage play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Parts One and Two, which opened in London’s West End in the summer of 2016 and on Broadway in early 2018. In 2012, J.K. Rowling’s digital company Pottermore was launched, where fans can enjoy news, features and articles, as well as original content from J.K. Rowling. She has also written The Casual Vacancy, a novel for adult readers, and the Strike crime series, written under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. As well as receiving an OBE for services to children’s literature, she has received many awards and honours, including an OBE and Companion of Honour, France’s Légion d’honneur, and the Hans Christian Andersen Award.

Illustrator

Mary GrandPré