Know your POTTER
This site is HARRY POTTER central. All the things you want to know about HARRY POTTER its all in this amazing website: http://www.kidsreads.com/HP07/content/spellbook.asp WOW! The site even spills out Harry's Spellbook!!! WARNING! Don't try this at home!
Accio: The Summoning Charm. When used in connection with an object, this charm will cause such object to fly to the spell caster. It comes in very handy for Harry during the Tri-Wizard Tournament.
Alohomora: A simple spell learned by first-year students that will open most locks --- so long as they haven’t been bewitched by a stronger charm.
Amortentia: The most powerful love potion in the world, recognizable by its mother-of-pearl sheen. Amortentia gives off the odors most favored by those who smell it to cast the illusion of passion and affection.
Avada Kedavra (Killing Curse): One of the three so-called “Unforgivable Curses.” Avada Kedavra kills any living being instantly. There is only one known survivor of the Killing Curse, Harry Potter.
Bat-Bogey Hex: A nifty little curse that causes flapping wings to appear on the recipient’s face. Ginny Weasley is very adept at casting Bat-Bogey Hexes, and is in fact rewarded with Professor Slughorn’s attentions for casting one on Zacharias Smith, a snobby fellow student.
Confundus Charm: The spell equivalent of an anvil to the head. A Confunded person is liable to crash into stationary objects and have a tendency to forget his own name. Hermione performs one on Cormac McLaggen, a cocky Gryffindor seventh-year, during Quidditch tryouts in Half-Blood Prince.
Crucio (Cruciatus Curse): The second Unforgivable Curse. The Cruciatus Curse causes its victim excruciating pain and suffering and is used as a torture device by Voldemort and his Death Eaters. Alice and Frank Longbottom, Neville Longbottom’s parents, were tortured by Bellatrix Lastrange into insanity with this curse. They have yet to recover.
Diffindo: Aslicing charm that appears to act like a wizard’s “pocket knife.” Harry used it to cut open Cedric’s bag in Goblet of Fire and also to slice the cover off of his new Spellbook in Half-Blood Prince.
Drought of Living Death Potion: The potion Harry successfully mixes with the help of the Half-Blood Prince to win a bottle of Felix Felicis.
Episkey: A handy spell for repairing minor physical injuries. Tonks uses it to repair Harry’s broken nose in his sixth year.
Evanesco: A vanishing spell. It isn’t exactly clear if the vanished objects disappear permanently --- or reappear in a more convenient location.
Expecto Patronum: An incantation to create a Patronus, which usually takes the form of an animal and protects the spell-caster from Dementors.
Expelliarmus: A basic defensive spell first taught by Snape at the Dueling Club meeting in Chamber of Secrets. Its premise is to block or refract an opponent’s spells; however, it can have interesting side-effects when mixed with other incantations.
Felix Felicis: “Liquid luck”. When taken moderately, it offers a “perfect day”: namely, the taker will have luck on his or her side for an entire 12-hour period. Things will just…happen to his or her benefit. However, taken in excess, Felix causes recklessness and silly behavior. It is illegal to use Felix Felicis in sporting events or games of chance.
Impedimentia: A simple stunning spell that often comes in handy for Harry and his friends in tight situations.
Imperius Curse: The last of the Unforgivable Curse. The Imperius Curse allows the caster to take complete control of another person’s mind and body. Think of a living puppet, unable to control his or her thoughts or actions --- that is the Imperius Curse.
Levicorpus: A non-verbal spell invented by the Half-Blood Prince, handwritten in Harry's Potions textbook; the person on whom the spell is cast will be hung upside down by the ankle.
Liberacorpus: The anti-spell to Levicorpus.
Lumos: A simple spell that creates a ball of light at the tip of the caster’s wand.
Mordsmorde: The incantation that causes the Dark Mark to appear in the sky.
Muffliato: A spell invented by the Half-Blood Prince, handwritten in Harry's Potions textbook; it fills the ears of anyone nearby with an unidentifiable buzzing, so that conversations can be held without being overheard.
Obliviate: The Memory Charm. The victim of this spell will lose some or all of his or her memory, depending on the intent of the caster. It is often used by wizards to help Muggles “forget” magic they have seen or been a party to. Usually, a wizard will replace the erased memory with a much more plausible one.
Polyjuice Potion: A complex potion that takes a month to create and will turn one person into another --- as long as the identity thief can get something personal from his or her target’s body, such as a strand of hair, a nail clipping, or a piece of skin. It is brewed and used several times in the Harry Potter books, both by the good guys and the bad.
Prior Incantato: A spell that will force the subject wand to emit a “ghost” of the last spell it cast.
Protean Charm: An advanced charm that, when cast on multiple magical objects, reveals the same information to all those who carry one of those objects. It is used for secret communication. Hermione impressed members of the D.A. in sixth year by casting this spell on gold Galleons so they all could plan meetings.
Riddikulus: Renders a boggart ineffective by making it silly. It requires the power of mind of the spell caster. For example, Neville sees the boggart in Prisoner of Azkaban as Professor Snape, whom he fears. After chanting this spell, “Snape” is rendered ridiculous by dressing him in Mrs. Longbottom’s clothes.
Sectumsempra: Another doozie from the Half-Blood Prince. This spell is not so nice --- it slices cuts into the victim wherever the caster’s wand is aimed.
The Unbreakable Vow: A spell that binds a wizard/witch to a promise; when it is made, flames from each person's wand link together like clasped hands, and a third flame from a Bonder twists around them to bind them together.
Unforgiveable Curses: Three cruel curses illegal in the wizarding world. They include the Imperius Curse, the Cruciatus Curse and the Killing Curse.
Veritaserum: A powerful Truth Potion.
Wingardium Leviosa: A simple levitation spell learned by first years. It is significant in that it plays a part in bonding the friendship between Harry, Ron and Hermione.
Here's the REVIEW from kidsreads.com:
Deeper secrets
Harry Potter is frustrated. Isolated from the wizarding world at his summer residence with his non-magical aunt, uncle and cousin, he hides in flowerbeds so he can listen to the evening news and steals newspapers from trash bins, hoping for some sign of activity from Lord Voldemort. He barely has had contact with his best friends, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger.
A dementor attack, a cryptic Howler, and a rescue brigade bring Harry back to the magical world, to a place where a group of wizards has assembled with the mission to stop Voldemort. To Harry's disgust, no one wants to tell him anything regarding the mission, not even when he begins to dream of a snake and a door at the end of a long, dark hallway that he recognizes as part of the Ministry of Magic. Things aren't much better at Hogwarts, where his dreams turn into visions of Voldemort's power, anger, and desire for domination.
Darker powers
It is a time of war in the magical world, but there are no clear lines of good and evil. The Ministry of Magic is so adamant in its beliefs that it refuses to acknowledge Harry's story of Voldemort's return. Harry is the butt of jokes in the Daily Prophet, and the only people who believe him are the ones the Ministry would discredit. According to the Ministry, Albus Dumbledore is a dangerous fool, and anyone who follows him is not to be trusted. Co-workers, friends, and even families begin to divide according to whom they support. Spies and secrets feed a new era in wizarding history and lead to changes at Hogwarts, not all of them good. The students are as divided as the adults, and discord haunts the corridors.
Stronger magic
Fifth year is the time for Ordinary Wizarding Level exams, or O.W.L.s, and Harry and the rest of the fifth-years find themselves working harder than ever to achieve top test results, which then dictate their careers. Spells are more complex, there's more homework, and the students have to work twice as hard as they did in previous years just to keep up. The only class that differs from this pattern is Defense Against the Dark Arts, taught by the deceptively sweet Dolores Umbridge, formerly Senior Undersecretary to Cornelius Fudge, the Minister of Magic. Umbridge's lesson plans leave Harry and his friends worried and wanting more from their education.
Harry is also asked by Professor Dumbledore to study privately with Professor Snape, the hook-nosed, greasy-haired Potions professor who has done nothing but make Harry's Potions classes miserable since the day Harry first came to Hogwarts. In order to succeed and even survive, Harry must put his trust in those who hide the truth from him.
Intricate plots, maturing characters, and fast-paced action paint a picture of a magical world with a new veil of darkness. As Harry and his friends grow, they must face more adult issues and deal not only with a changing world, but also with their changing selves. Characters who have only served in the background of previous books become more important, and some of Harry's favorite people, like Remus Lupin, return. Never content to sit back and watch things happen, Harry and his friends take dangerous matters into their own hands, confronting evil and working as a team to stop it.
From page one, where we see more complex sentences and an angrier, damaged Harry, this book's tone is completely different from the previous four: deeper and richer, with less humor and more detail. Rowling's tactics of inspiring fear are different in this installation, too. The horror is psychological rather than physical, and there is less Quidditch and more magic. Harry is achingly perfect and emotionally real as a typical teenage boy, confused and defiant about everything from girls to his friendships to his magical education. He has come to trust very few people, but those he takes into his confidence, like Ron and Hermione, complement him very well.
Patience is recommended while reading, because the pacing lags in some places while rushing in others, and the multiple plot lines take a while to mesh. Rather than take us through a mostly linear tale with a twist at the end, as seen in THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS and THE GOBLET OF FIRE, the plotline here is built of many small incidents that come together to form the whole of the story. This new approach shows a shift in the atmosphere and targeted audience of the Harry Potter series. As Harry matures, so does Rowling's writing style, coloring the events of the past and linking them to the present. HARRY POTTER AND THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX gives many answers and raises even more questions, setting up an excellent path for the final two books in the series.
-- Reviewed by Carlie Kraft
