Harry Potter and the Cursed Child – The Official Playscript of the Original West End Production – by J.K.Rowling, John Tiffany, and Jack Thorne.

Book Review by Cari Mayhew.

Until now I’d never read any of the Harry Potter books, but I’m glad I read this one!  There’s magic, mayhem, time travel, alternate realities, and some seriously dangerous close calls.  Don’t worry there are no big spoilers here!

The paperback version of this book has a large tome – but don’t be fooled, it’s a quick read.  As it’s a script alone, rather than a novel, the story is told entirely by the dialogue between the characters, with double spacing between each character’s lines, and there are no wieldy descriptions to tolerate.

The book is split into 4 Acts, with each Act packed with rapid scenes.  You could fit in about 3 scenes while you’re waiting for a bus, but once you’re into the story you may not want to put it down!

It stays true to the story put over in the films, and with JK Rowling as a contributing author; it’s the real thing – not to be confused with any of that fan fiction out there.

In the beginning, Harry is married to Ginny and they have 3 kids, including Albus Severus Potter.  Hermione is married to Ron Weasley and they have a daughter, Rose.  On his way to his first day at Hogwarts, Albus becomes friends with Scorpius, son of Draco Malfoy.

Albus Potter sets out to right his father’s wrongs, by using a stolen time-turner to travel back in time with Scorpius to the Tri-Wizard Tournament where Cedric previously died.  In doing so they thought they would save the day, but an alternative reality took hold, where Hermione and Weasley had never got married, and Albus is in a different house.

They decide to go back and correct their mistake, but this time they (or at least Scorpius) is confronted by possibly the worst imaginable alternate reality when returned to the future.

Miraculously Scorpius manages to fix things, but just as Scorpius and Albus are about to destroy the time-turner, it is snatched by a character by the name of Delphi, who they had trusted up until then.  The three are then sent back to a more significant point in time.  Of course, during this time the parents have got wise to what’s going on, and pool their efforts into the rescue.

Not having read the previous books, I wasn’t clued up on the names of a lot of the spells used, and I had to Google them as I was going along.  This is the only bad point I found to the book.

Having now read the script, I would love to see it acted out on stage – I’ve already signed up to be informed of the next batch of ticket sales!