Everything You Need to Know About Cursed Child

What do you need to know about Harry Potter and the Cursed Child before you sit down and read it tomorrow? We give a spoiler free rundown.

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In only a few short hours, the boxes in the storerooms of bookstores around the world will be opened, the #KeepTheSecets hashtag will become obsolete, and Harry Potter and the Cursed Child will be unleashed upon the world. We’ve been waiting a long time for this–for some, it’s been nearly twenty years since they first picked up a slim volume about a boy wizard who took a train to Hogwarts.

So what do we need to know ahead of what could be the final installment of the life and times of Harry Potter? (We say could be, because, as Rowling says, “never say never!”) We run down the most important points you should keep in mind as you put on your best dress robes, stick your wand in your jeans back pocket ad head out tonight to the Potter Party of the decade.

• THE MOST IMPORTANT THING TO KNOW: It’s not a novel. It’s a script. Please adjust your reading expectations accordingly.

• It’s also a very *long* script. In script reading, the rule of thumb is it’s a page per minute. So a ninety minute movie is a 90 page script. Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is 320 pages. That’s a 320 minute run time. (And now you know why the show is in two parts.)
• J.K. Rowling did *NOT* write the script herself. She’s a novelist. This is not a novel. Two totally different types of writing. Rather than try writing in a manner she’s not accustomed and risk producing something that would not work, she hired Jack Thorne, a BAFTA winning playwright, to write up her idea for her, in a collaborative process that also included the director John Tiffany. Hence the three names on the cover.

• The story picks up 19 years later, on Platform 9 3/4, as Albus heads off to his first year at Hogwarts, along with Draco’s son Scorpius and Hermione and Ron’s daughter Rose, just as we read in the epilogue and saw at the end of Deathly Hallows Part 2.
• Though there is plenty of goings on at Hogwarts with the next generation, this is still Harry’s story. It’s not “Albus Potter and the Cursed Father.” It’s “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.” That framing is deliberate.
• As you might be able to guess from the title, the theme of the story is parenthood, and how the choices we make in life affect things in ways we don’t expect.

• Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is a sequel to the events of the original Harry Potter series, set in 2017. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is a prequel to the events of the original Harry Potter series, set in 1926.
• As far as we know they don’t actually have any connection with each other, other than both are being released this year.

• There are Potter Parties being held in bookstores around the world to celebrate the books release. Scholastic has a helpful website to find the one nearest you.
• But this being 2016, you can also have the book delivered to your house at midnight tonight, via Amazon Prime Now (if you live in one of their areas.)
• Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is the most pre-ordered book since…. Well look at that, since Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. J.K. Rowling is still singlehandedly supporting the industry.Even if she didn’t write this one herself.

Next: Cursed Child Tickets To Be Available Through December 2017

Happy reading to all my fellow Potterheads this weekend!