Again, not a review, which would be redundant, but some observations:

1. The comfort of familiarity. Re-reading Chamber of Secrets I was struck by how similar the story is to Philosopher’s Stone. I am not going to list all the points of comparison here, but (to mention a few) both stories involve:

• a search for something hidden “miles” beneath the castle
• a dangerous trip into the Forbidden Forest
• Hagrid providing clues to the ‘secret’
• the climax of both novels featuring Harry travelling under the school with his friends, only to be separated from them and having to face You-Know-Who on his own.

The stories are not just similar in terms of their plots. Rowling developed a structure for these novels that was to serve her well and provide a comforting familiarity to her readers. (To be honest it came as a shock when she abandoned that formula in Deathly Hallows). Apart from that one outlier, all the novels start in Privet Drive, feature the journey to Hogwarts, the welcome feast, the three school terms, and culminate conveniently at the end of the summer. Harry’s birthday, lessons, feasts, Quidditch, Halloween, Christmas, Easter and exams are all fixed points of reference in each novel. (It is rare for Rowling to introduce new milestones – so far as I can remember, for example, neither Ron nor Hermione’s birthdays are mentioned or celebrated). This is not an objection, (and I suppose it’s not much of an observation either), but it does mean that each novel was constructed within tightly prescribed parameters, with only limited variations at each outing.

2. Still not sure. Rowling was careful not to assume that readers of Chamber had read Philosopher’s, so provides a detailed if rapid explanation in the opening chapter – Harry is a wizard, he goes to a magic school, he is an orphan, etc. Even the rules of Quidditch get a recap. In later novels Rowling is confident enough to assume that her readers are not joining the series mid-way and dispenses with these summaries, which I suspect were something her editors suggested.

3. Believability. When I first read Chamber I was mildly irritated by some of the plot inconsistencies and absurdities. Would Hagrid really have been carted off to Azkaban just on suspicion of involvement in the opening of the Chamber? Could a massive basilisk have moved freely around the pipes of the school’s medieval plumbing? And why didn’t it eat any of its victims, given how hungry it insists it feels? I could probably explain away these and the many other problematic issues that readers have identified over the years, but I am fairly sure that would be missing the point. This is not a realistic adventure story, and it is wrong to treat it as one. There are ghosts, trolls, centaurs and unicorns for goodness sake, not to mention the giant squid living in the lake! It is a children’s story where suspension of disbelief is required. As the series turns darker a more careful analytical reading can be justified, but for now this is still a bit of a lark.

4. A detective story? One of the pleasures of a re-read of any mystery is spotting the clues one missed the first time round, the misdirection and red herrings. Should I have been able to work out the ending and the plot twists? Most readers assume that the heir of Slytherin is unlikely to be either Malfoy or Harry, following the convention that it is never the more obvious characters ‘whodunnit’. But should I have been able to guess that Ginny was the one opening the Chamber and controlling the basilisk? On a reread the clues are there in plain sight, but the added complication of the diary being haunted by the spirit of Tom Riddle (who mysteriously still has his award for services to the school on display in the trophy room, despite the later difficulty with ahem trying to take over the world) clearly wasn’t guessable, in the same way that Quirrell being the host for You-Know-Who’s disembodied spirit wasn’t work-out-able either. The technique works surprisingly well – Rowling makes us think we should have been able to see the solution while at the same time making it obscurely improbable.

5. Easter Eggs. The other main pleasure of Chamber is seeing some of the skeleton of Half Blood Prince in the bones of the plot. References and objects pop up in passing – the Hand of Glory and the opal necklace from Borgin and Burke’s in Knockturn Alley (one of the many things I still really enjoy from the series are silly little jokes like that), the vanishing cabinet and of course Riddle’s diary.

Chamber isn’t the strongest novel in the series, but there’s still so much to enjoy. The story is told with the wonderful economy that was such a feature of the early novels. The central characters are beginning to come alive and be fully rounded, with the supporting cast also assuming much more depth. New characters such as Dobby are introduced, and the portrait of Lockhart is a wonderfully spiteful sketch. Despite the ghosts and the magic there is a grounded believability about Harry and his friends. They struggle with schoolwork, bullies, unpopularity and peer-pressure – the only thing that no-one seems to suffer from is acne. It’s been a real pleasure to return to Hogwarts, and while I doubt I am going to work my way through the whole series again, I might!