July 31, 2016 was a very special day in the lives of Harry Potter fans. It was a day that we had hoped, prayed, and waited (not so) patiently for for nearly a decade. Yes, this July 31 was in fact the day that the script of the new Harry Potter and the Cursed Child play was finally released as a book. Now for those of us fans who don't live in London, couldn't make it to London, and/or who probably couldn't afford a ticket to the play this summer anyway, this was and still is a very big deal. Other than what J.K. Rowling posts on Pottermore and what us fans create and theorize, there has been no new Harry Potter stories since The Deathly Hallows (book) came out in 2007. And like thousands (maybe millions) of other Harry Potter fans probably did on that special day, I rushed out to buy the book and read it as fast as I could.

I still don't know how I really feel about the story after reading it, though. There were definitely parts I liked, and I loved getting to read about Harry Potter again, but there were some things that just didn't live up to my usually high, sometimes unrealistic, standards. I'd like to use this article as an opportunity to maybe work out my feelings about the story and compare them to those of you who have read the story or who are still deciding whether or not they want to read it. To be fair to all, this will be a spoiler-free review/reflection.

We'll start with what I did like. First of all, like I mentioned before, I loved being able to read about a bunch of the characters I know and love from the first seven books again. I actually haven't read some of the first books in over ten years myself, so getting to be back in this world with those characters was really special. The new characters that were introduced in this story weren't bad either. If I had more time to spend with some of them, I'm sure I'd grow to love them too. It was also nice to see where these characters are in the future, even if some aren't what I remembered or expected.

What I really liked about this one, though, was that we were given a little more depth and insight to the original characters that we didn't learn about in the first seven books. Since it was in play format, there was no true narrator or perspective on the story. This meant that we got to experience what each of the characters were (somewhat) thinking as we read their dialogue and actions from the play. The story also explored some previously untouched territory in the pasts of the original characters. For example, I now know a lot more about what Harry and Malfoy (still can't call him Draco) were going through when they were younger.

Before I start blathering on about that, another positive aspect of the story was that it featured a good amount of plot twists that kept it interesting. I may not have liked them all, but they were certainly surprising. I can't really go into much more detail about this without spoiling anything, though, I'm afraid.

So now onto the unfortunate negatives. First, the script wasn't actually written by J.K. Rowling. Sure she helped create the story and all, but the script was written by Jack Thorne. And since the book was really just the script from the play, I had to get used to that format. It was quick to read and easy to follow who was speaking, but it still felt different from the other books in that way. You also don't get as many details as you would in a book -- in regards to character thoughts, that is -- and the transitions are much quicker and feel like things are left out. Speaking of things feeling left out, the story was kind of short to me and I felt that there could've been more to explore character-wise in this setting. Other original characters could've been in it more or even in it at all in my opinion as well.

Another part bothered me a little was that the beginning moved really fast to get to the inciting events of the plot. It starts out exactly as we left it in the end of the seventh book and movie, but then jumped ahead in time pretty quickly. I understand that it probably looked fine in the play, but it just didn't work for me on the page.

The last two aspects I'd like to talk about kind of go hand in hand. Some of the new developments and twists didn't always sit right with me. There were definitely some, for lack of a better descriptor, WTF moments in this story, especially if they involved us learning about events that we didn't know happened in the original storyline. I'll leave them for you to discover, though. Finally, some of the characters weren't exactly as I pictured they would be and/or remembered that they were. It may be because I haven't read the books in a while or because I just have too high of expectations, but what the characters said and did didn't always line up with the vision of them I have in my head. The relationship between Harry and his son, Albus, which is at the core of the story, is a perfect example of this. Yes, it makes sense that Albus feels the way he does about Harry, but it is a tad disheartening to see them having issues.

I've gone on way too long now. So long, in fact, that you probably could've read an act of the story in the same amount of time. I will leave you with these final comments:

Was Harry Potter and the Cursed Child everything I hoped it to be? Not exactly.

Would I recommend it to my fellow Harry Potter fans? Always.