Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

This is a nice, unpretentious little novel about schoolchildren and magic. It's not really an amazingly good novel, but it's nice to read, and it somehow caught the public imagination, so that the series became a phenomenon, Rowling made a fortune, and the sequels became longer, less pleasant, and more pretentious.I still like this first book; the main thing wrong with it is Voldemort. Although I read sf and fantasy, which are stories not set in the real world, nevertheless I want to read stories about characters with normal good and bad sides to them. I don't encounter saints or devils in real life, and I don't find them convincing or engaging as fictional characters. Voldemort is bad through and through, and to me he's a blemish on the book, I don't want him there. Fortunately, he spends most of this book offstage.While I'm at it, I can't resist commenting on the stupid design of the sport of Quidditch, in which the result of each game is determined by the Seeker, and all the other players are basically an irrelevant distraction.I also note that the main requirements of a Seeker are good broomstick handling and good vision—and Harry Potter wears glasses. Yes, I accept that he could be a good Seeker wearing glasses, but it's surely a handicap, and he'd presumably be an even better Seeker if he had perfect vision without glasses.Although I first read this book before the films were made, in recent years I've become more familiar with the film than the book, so it was a rather odd experience to read the book in 2022 and notice all the places where the film omitted things, added things, or just somewhat changed things. Whenever a film is made from a book, I usually reckon that the book is better, but in this case I'm not sure. The book is fine as it is (apart from Voldemort), but the changes made in the film are in general not bad, and some of them might even be considered improvements.This is where the huge sales of the book series had a beneficial effect: because of those sales, Rowling was allowed considerable influence over the film versions, and was able to keep them relatively faithful to the books. I don't worship Rowling, and I think the huge sales were somewhat more than she really deserved; but nevertheless I think the films would have been worse without her influence—because films of books usually are.The screen version of [b:Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch 12067 Good Omens The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch Terry Pratchett https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1615552073l/12067.SY75.jpg 4110990] was also pretty good, because it was overseen by one of the authors. A novelist doesn't necessarily have the skills to make a good film; but it seems to me that few film directors or screenwriters have the skills to translate a novel to the screen. They can't resist messing around with it, and their changes rarely improve it.