# Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling

28 Hacker News commenters recommended Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling and 7 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 9 of 13 months; owners who said how long report a median of 1 years (4 owners). It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** Recommended for its world-building, storytelling and its power to get children reading; critics point to weak prose and the author's controversial views.

## Why people recommend it

- Gets kids reading and read aloud (4 comments): "if someone had forced me to read Plato instead of Harry Potter as a kid, I wouldn't have done nearly as much reading as I did" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49080425)) "Harry Potter and the likes at school is a great idea" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49653283)) "I've actually read them out loud to my children." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46606665))
- Strong storytelling and world-building (3 comments): "HP is wonderful storytelling and world building while providing exceptionally mediocre prose." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49408318)) "Rowling is actually really good, inventing very charming things, very fun sentences" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46264743)) "Harry Potter series is in fact one of the better ones among contemporary literature" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49778868))
- Beloved favorite series since childhood (4 comments): "Chronicles of Narnia and Harry Potter were my favorite children's series." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50037902)) "spending countless hours daydreaming that I was in that world" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46768018)) "the whole Rowling series, which I like a lot" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46263877))
- Audiobooks and French edition useful (3 comments): "If you're learning French, it's a great idea, the French gets progressively harder so you can keep up!" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46400136)) "the only item that wasn't absolutely repulsive was Jim dale reading Harry Potter" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49621952)) "It's read by Stephen Fry and he's great!" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46199972))

## What people warn about

- Weak, mediocre prose (3 comments): "HP is wonderful storytelling and world building while providing exceptionally mediocre prose." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49408318)) "the writing is atrocious, the plot is trite and the world-building is unoriginal and shallow" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48256083)) "the writing in the books is abysmally bad" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47079165))
- Author's controversial views and ethics (4 comments): "JKR's whole life and works involve strong themes surrounding eugenics" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46175407)) "it'd be a lot cooler without the terf book getting mentioned" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48817773)) "it's easy to not fund trans hate by not funding JK Rowling" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50307457))
- Political and disturbing themes (2 comments): "there are dozens of these disturbing tropes with real world parallels" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48869344)) "tried and mostly failed to push a bunch of weird political stuff" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48820934))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Discworld by Terry Pratchett](https://hackerapproved.com/p/discworld-series.md): 33 recommend
- [The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan](https://hackerapproved.com/p/wheel-of-time.md): 20 recommend
- [The Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson](https://hackerapproved.com/p/stormlight-archive.md): 12 recommend
- [Malazan Book of the Fallen by Steven Erikson](https://hackerapproved.com/p/malazan-book-of-the-fallen.md): 7 recommend
- [A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin](https://hackerapproved.com/p/a-song-of-ice-and-fire.md): 5 recommend

## Where to get it

- [See price on Amazon](https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Harry+Potter+series+by+J.K.+Rowling&tag=hackerapprove-20) (affiliate link)

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling", https://hackerapproved.com/p/harry-potter-series/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).