Warning: I May Insult Draco Malfoy. Badly.

Imagine an blond adolescent boy in robes, strutting about with an arrogant expression, sneering at half his classmates, flanked by two slow-thinking sidekicks.

Draco and his sidekicks
from harrypotter.wikia.com

Meet Draco Malfoy. One of the (many) heartthrobs of the Harry Potter world. Pansy Parkinson fawns over him. Many fangirls go misty-eyed at the mention of his name. Sentimental fans pair him up with various female characters, one of the most popular "pairings" being Dramione- Draco and Hermione. (Then again, fans can come up with really impossible pairings)

But why? What is Malfoy's appeal?

He's arrogant. He discriminates people based on their so-called "blood status". He's so much of a daddy's boy that that term is rather weak: he idolises his father to the point that he blindly would follow anything Lucius says. Most of his arrogance comes from his supposed "status" which, really, is derived from Lucius' position in the Ministry and reputation as a rich man from an old pureblood family. He's used to being important, and prefers to be in power as far as possible (look at how he joins the Inquisitorial Squad under Umbridge, and that condescending line in the train in the fifth book: "You see, I, unlike you, have been made a prefect, which means that I, unlike you, have the power to hand out punishments.")

He's undoubtedly the typical snooty kid, only with a vindictive spirit thrown in for good measure (take, for example, the lyrics of the Slytherin version of "Weasley is our King" and the badges flashing "Potter Stinks" during the Triwizard Tournament). Merlin's beard, he even has two personal slow-thinking bodyguard-ish kids.

Really? And people like this guy? He's a creep. You've heard of inferiority complex? This kid's got superiority complex. He's a bully. End of story.
Or is it?

It's in the second half of the series that you start seeing another side to Draco. He's shown as desperate, afraid, and very insecure ("You don't know what I'm capable of, you don't know what I've done!")
If he's so afraid, why is he a Death Eater?


Lucius, Draco's hero, is a Death Eater and so is Narcissa. Bellatrix, his aunt, is the Dark Lord's "most loyal follower". He was a baby when Voldemort attacked the Potters, but he grew up among purebloods, many of them ex-Death Eaters who had managed to avoid Azkaban. He was brought up to believe whole-heartedly in blood status and the power of the Dark Arts (at the end of the fourth book, on the train, Draco tells Harry: "You've picked the losing side, Potter! I warned you! I told you you ought to choose your company more carefully, remember? When we met on the train, the first day at Hogwarts? I told you not to hang out with riff-raff like this! Too late now, Potter! They'll be the first to go, now the Dark Lord's back! Mudbloods and Muggle-lovers first!")

So why is he a Death Eater? Simple. He's practically forced into it. His family, and close friends of the Malfoys, more or less bully him into taking the Dark Mark. And as Sirius says, "Well, you don't just hand in your resignation to Voldemort. It's a lifetime of service or death." Look at what happened to Regulus Black (who became a Death Eater at age sixteen, like Draco, and happens to be Narcissa's first cousin). Or even Igor Karkaroff (who managed to survive for a whole year before being killed by the Death Eaters for his treachery). Draco doesn't want that to happen to him.

He can't back out- but by the sixth book, he wants to. Draco tells Dumbledore that the Dark Lord will kill him if he doesn't do what he has been asked - to kill Dumbledore. ("Don't you understand? I have to do this! I have to kill you! Or he's going to kill me!") 

No, Draco! Don't listen to Voldemort!
from harrypotter.wikia.com

At the beginning of his sixth year, Draco seems ready to fulfil the task Voldemort has set him- he has a plan to get Death Eaters into Hogwarts, and works on it all year (it works). He put Madam Rosmerta under the Imperius Curse for almost the whole year. He tried twice to kill Dumbledore, but both attempts failed (one attempt ended in Katie Bell being cursed and the other in Ron Weasley being poisoned). He is now feeling the pressure to carry out Voldemort's orders and is probably less sure about his capability to kill Dumbledore. The Death Eater status is probably losing its glamour. He's terrified of what he's being asked- no, ordered- to do. It's almost exactly what happened to Regulus.

After the Battle of the Astronomy Tower, he does what he is called on to do as a Death Eater. However, he is reluctant to do so (he hesitates when Bellatrix asks him to identify Harry, Ron and Hermione at Malfoy Manor), which clearly shows that he no longer wants to be a Death Eater.

It's in the sixth year that Draco changes. The movie, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, showcases this really well. Which brings me to another reason why people- such as the fangirls I mentioned earlier- like Draco Malfoy.

This reason can be summed up in two words.
Tom. Felton.
Do I hear the sighs of fangirls?

Aha, I hit the nail on the head! I agree, he did justice to Draco Malfoy in the movie. I personally thought the way he portrayed Draco's reactions to everything was very characteristic. Just look at the photo above. That is one of the best, most characteristic expressions I have ever seen in a movie adaptation of a book.

So, two reasons for people liking Draco Malfoy- one, that you can feel sorry for him, and two, Tom Felton's portrayal of the character.

Tomorrow brings joy to fans of Draco Malfoy everywhere and will probably convert more sceptics to Dracoism, because JK Rowling will be nice to all of us eager fans of the series and post interesting things on Pottermore. This will start tomorrow, and one of these posts will be about none other than....
(drum roll, please)
DRACO MALFOY!!!

All fans of Harry Potter (and Draco Malfoy), celebrate! We're going to find out lots more about the people in the series and other fascinating tidbits!

So see you all the next time I post something (which may actually happen soon, given that it is likely the new Pottermore info will provoke me into writing), and until then...
DRACO MALFOY'S A JERK!

Just kidding!

The Puzzle Ring

The Puzzle Ring, by Kate Forsyth, is a book I discovered about a year ago. This is a slightly edited version of a review I posted on Goodreads.

Title: The Puzzle Ring
Author: Kate Forsyth

Hannah Rose is a twelve-almost-thirteen-year-old girl who lives in Australia with her mother, Roz. Years ago, just the day after her birth, Hannah's father Robert disappeared, somewhere in Loch Lomond, Scotland.
She comes home early one day, having been punished at school, to find a letter that turns her life upside-down.
Her great-grandmother is a countess.
In the letter, the Countess of Wintersloe, Hannah's great-grandmother, asks her and Roz to come to Scotland to see her.

In Wintersloe Castle, they meet the old, frail countess and her cook, Linnet. Hannah makes friends in the town- Donovan, the motherless boy who loves animals; Max, the science-crazy son of the Wintersloe gardener, Genie; and Scarlett, the dramatic daughter of the general store's owner. All four of them were born within four miles of each other, on four consecutive days of the same year- first Hannah, then Donovan, then Max and finally Scarlett.

And Hannah finds out about the magic the town talks of, and the curse on the Roses- how Eglantyne, the fairy wife of one of the Roses, was burnt to death and how she laid a curse on her husband's family:

By fever, fire, storm and sword
your blood shall suffer this bane.
No joy or peace for Wintersloe's lord,
till the puzzle ring is whole again.
The thorn tree shall not bud,
the green throne shall not sing,
until the child of true blood
is crowned the rightful king.

All the legends Hannah has read and loved are real!
On certain days of the year, gates to the Otherworld open- and one such gate is in Fairknowe, the hill near Wintersloe. But it is dangerous to go through, as after Eglantyne's death, the Unseelie Court, the 'bad' fairies, rule the Otherworld.
On one of the 'thin' days, Robert found one of the four parts of the puzzle ring, and hid it away. And on another of those days, he disappeared, trying to break the curse.

Two months after her thirteenth birthday, on one of the 'thin' days, Hannah, Donovan, Scarlett and Max go through the fairy gate, back in time to the reign of Mary, Queen of Scots- soon after Englantyne was killed.

Now the four friends, along with a younger Linnet (a fairy) and a new acquaintance, Angus, must look for the remaining three parts of the puzzle ring and try to break the Rose's family curse, without being caught by the black witch, now queen of the fairies, Irata.
And when they do they need to find a 'child of true blood' who will take the throne.

What happened that night, the night that Robert disappeared? Did Eglantyne actually die? Is Robert alive? Who is the child of true blood? Will the friends finish what Robert started and break the curse of the Roses?

To find out, read the book. Or you can read the spoiler below.
It's a really good book, and an excellent choice for fantasy lovers.

Happy Birthday!

Harry Potter fans, today is the day. The thirty-fourth birthday of the Chosen One...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, HARRY JAMES POTTER!

Dear Harry,
You've had so many adventures. The quest for the Philosopher's Stone, which was almost like a live version of a video game. The search for Slytherin's monster, and the fight in the Chamber of Secrets. The search for Sirius Black, who turned out to be your godfather. The Triwizard Tournament, as the youngest participant ever and the only non-Death Eater to see Voldemort's return. You ran Dumbledore's Army under Umbridge's nose and fought Voldemort and the Death Eaters in the Department of Mysteries. You lost Sirius and heard the prophecy in one day. You searched for the Half-blood Prince, who you found was your hated teacher, Severus Snape. You learnt about Horcruxes, and you saw your headmaster killed. You searched for Voldemort's Horcruxes as the Second Wizarding War hung overhead, a storm about to break. You saw many you loved die and found that you were Voldemort's last Horcrux. You sacrificed yourself to defeat Voldemort once and for all. You survived and killed Voldemort. You became the master of all three Deathly Hallows.

You had millions of people, fictional and real, rooting for you, cheering you on. You took us out of our own lives for a while. We laughed and cried with you. You took the world by storm.

Thanks for being with us. You're on my bookshelf, and in the houses and hearts and minds of millions around the world. We're still cheering for you.
Happy birthday!
-Purple Dragonfly

Holes

Oh my goodness, look at that, I haven't posted for almost two months!
How horrifyingly embarassing.

Holes happens to be a book that I personally think is awesome. It won the Newbery medal, which is, as far as I know, an award given in the USA to what the judges think is the best children's book of the year.

Don't quit reading this in disgust after the term "children's book", because a lot of those books are targeted towards teenagers as well, and even adults enjoy them.
Okay, so if you're not convinced...well, here's the review I posted on Goodreads last year.


When I read this book, I decided that it totally deserved that Newbery Medal.
Holes is the story of Stanley Yelnats IV, a singularly unlucky guy from a singularly unlucky family. His family was supposedly cursed when Stanley's no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing-great-great-grandfather broke a promise to a fortune teller.
His dad is an inventor trying to invent a way for shoes not to smell. When a pair of shoes falls out of the sky and hits him on the head, he thinks it's fate. Maybe his luck is changing...
Apparently not. Those shoes once belonged to legendary baseball player, Clyde Livingstone, called Sweetfeet.
Stanley is given a choice- jail or Camp Green Lake. He chooses Camp Green Lake.
There's no lake at Camp Green Lake, a 'correctional facility' in the middle of the dry Texas desert.

Once, the desert used to be a lake, and there was a town. The schoolteacher there, Katherine Barlow, fell in love with an African American onion-seller named Sam. When the townspeople found out, they shot dead Sam.
The sheriff refused to help, and asked Katherine for a kiss instead.
Three days after Sam was killed, Miss Barlow shot the sheriff and left a lipstick mark on his forehead.
She became the feared bandit Kissin' Kate Barlow, and the lake dried up. Twenty years later, when confronted by two people she once knew, she refused to tell anyone where the money she's stolen was.
They could dig holes in the desert for a hundred years, and they wouldn't find the treasure anywhere. Soon after saying this, Kate died from the bite of a poisonous yellow-spotted lizard, laughing.

If you take a bad boy and make him dig a hole every day in the hot sun, he becomes a good boy. And that's what happens at Camp Green Lake. The strange Mr. Sir and the mysterious, intimidating Warden make the boys dig a hole every single day. There aren't any fences or walls- because the camp is the only place that has water for miles around. It's a prison.
The boys at Camp Green Lake all have nicknames, and soon Stanley's new name is Caveman. The boy he becomes the closest to is Zero, a quiet boy who everyone dismisses as stupid. When Zero runs away, Stanley wants to find out what happened, and follows him.
Although he doesn't know it, running after Zero will lead to the breaking of two curses- the Yelnats family curse and the curse on Green Lake.

This was a really well-written, captivating book. I stay with my statement- it totally deserved the Newbery Medal it got.


Yes, I'm serious, Stanley and his family refer to his great-great-grandfather as his *deep breath* 'no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing-great-great-grandfather'.
It's engrossing and funny and a really good book, so I recommend you read it at the first chance you get!

Quote of the Week

 Another quote from Agatha Christie! Meet Miss Jane Marple, elderly spinster and intelligent detective...

"You imagined what you would do if you were a cruel and cold-blooded murderer?" said Craddock looking thoughtfully at Miss Marple's pink and white elderly fragility. "Really, your mind-"
"Like a sink, my nephew Raymond used to say," Miss Marple agreed, nodding her head briskly. "But as I always told him, sinks are necessary domestic equipment and actually very hygienic."
                                                      -Agatha Christie, 4.50 from Paddington

Quote of the Week

This quote is by Agatha Christie, an author who I am so wary of that I can never tell whether a paragraph of seemingly innocent description is, in fact, description, or a clue to the whole mystery. I have not actually read the book this quote is from, but I strongly suspect that the key to the mystery is in an unexpected place...



“Poirot," I said. "I have been thinking."
"An admirable exercise my friend. Continue it.”

-Agatha Christie, Peril at End House

The picture is a photo of Agatha Christie, from pinterest.com

Pi Day

3.14159265358979

What's that number?

Pi. The 16th letter of the Greek alphabet. Used to refer to the ratio between the circumference and diameter of any circle. Also the nickname of the protagonist of the novel and movie Life of Pi.
Pi is an irrational number, so the decimals don't repeat, which is why the number I've shown above is pi to 14 decimal places.

Oh, here it is...for those of you who are trying to forget it in the aftermath of the exams, here is a reminder of what the symbol of pi looks like.

Today, March 14, is Pi Day. (3/14, you get it?)
There are two things you can do to commemorate Pi Day:
1) Draw the pi symbol on the back of your hand or the inside of your wrist
2) Do about twenty sums calculating the area and circumference of circles of varying lengths of radii


 It's your choice.

Quote of the Week

My New Year's resolution is utterly failing, isn't it?

“What's that?" he snarled, staring at the envelope Harry was still clutching in his hand. "If it's another form for me to sign, you've got another -"
"It's not," said Harry cheerfully. "It's a letter from my godfather."
"Godfather?" sputtered Uncle Vernon. "You haven't got a godfather!"
"Yes, I have," said Harry brightly. "He was my mum and dad's best friend. He's a convicted murderer, but he's broken out of wizard prison and he's on the run. He likes to keep in touch with me, though...keep up with my news...check if I'm happy....”

-J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

EXAM TIME!!!

Exams are just around the corner.
Obviously, you're either trying not to study or you're taking a break, because otherwise you wouldn't be reading this.Or else you're being deeply philosophical, musing over who invented exams.
To help my fellow thinkers and exam-writers, I am posting this.

I, like so many of my classmates, have by now become a veteran exam-taker. So I can now give you five tips for surviving exam time.

Yes, exactly. Exam alert. The exams are coming, so quickly read this and get back to studying before someone finds you...well, not studying.

RULE NUMBER 1:
Don't stay up late. Never stay up late before an exam. Ever. You might be studying, but that is not going to help, because in order to write the exam, you have to be awake. It's not really going to help if you start snoring in the middle of a description of an experiment demonstrating the necessity of carbon dioxide in starch production.

RULE NUMBER 2:
Eat. Yes, I'm serious. Eat before the exam or you will collapse in the middle. Once, in the middle of a math exam, I started having visions of butter-covered potatoes I'd seen on a cooking show. And I'd eaten breakfast! Thankfully, I had finished the paper, but...don't starve yourself.

RULE NUMBER 3:
Try not to freak out. How can you not freak out before an exam? If you can't stop your stomach from turning in anticipation, pretend. Pretend you're perfectly fine. Pretend that you're not on the verge of having a panic attack. Pretend you're calm. You might just fool yourself into calmness and that will become real. Which, of course, means that you focus more on the paper.

RULE NUMBER 4:
Don't daydream. That will take your mind off the test and will cause you to cringe when you see the marks on the corrected paper. The minute you catch yourself daydreaming, bring back your focus to the test. Daydream later, instead of biting your nails and wondering about how you wrote.

RULE NUMBER 5:
Don't think about the exam after you've written it. Because this will ruin your peace of mind for the next exams. If you're thinking, "I wrote that it was active voice but my classmate wrote that it was passive voice, will I lose a mark?" while trying to revise how to find the inverse of a function, it's definitely not going to help you.

Believe me, these tips actually work- for me, but cross your fingers and hope that they work for you, too. Good luck for the exams!
Oh, and as for these tips...you're welcome.

Quote of the Week

First quote of February...


"She can't afford to commit more troops,' Holly whispered. 'The gate is her priority, and she needs to have as many Berserkers watching her back as possible. We are secondary at this point.'
'That will be her undoing,' Artemis gasped, already suffering under the weight of the flak jacket. 'Artemis Fowl will never be secondary.'
'I thought you were Artemis Fowl the Second?' said Holly."

-Eoin Colfer, The Last Guardian

Quote of the Week

Sorry for skipping a week. To make up for the skipped week, I'm posting two quotes now.

"A certain critic -- for such men, I regret to say, do exist -- made the nasty remark about my last novel that it contained 'all the old Wodehouse characters under different names.' He has probably by now been eaten by bears, like the children who made mock of the prophet Elisha: but if he still survives he will not be able to make a similar charge against Summer Lightning. With my superior intelligence, I have out-generalled the man this time by putting in all the old Wodehouse characters under the same names. Pretty silly it will make him feel, I rather fancy."

- Summer Moonshine by P.G. Wodehouse

And...quote number two...

“Who are you?" he asked.

I am the future queen of this world, at the very least. You may refer to me as Mistress Koboi for the next five minutes. After that you may refer to me as Aaaaarrrrgh, hold your throat, die screaming, and so on.”

-Artemis Fowl: The Time Paradox by Eoin Colfer

Quote of the Week

Happy New Year!
This year, I'm going to start posting a quote a week. These will mostly be from books I like.
This week's quote:

"Why were you lurking under our window?"
"Yes - yes, good point, Petunia! What were you doing under our windows, boy?"

"Listening to the news," said Harry in a resigned voice.

His aunt and uncle exchanged looks of outrage.

"Listening to the news! Again?"

"Well, it changes every day, you see," said Harry.

- Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

by J.K. Rowling