If someone had told me to read some Harry Potter fan fiction, I would have politely declined. It goes to show how much I like Rainbow Rowell that as soon as I learned ofCarry On (2015), I put it on my to-read list. I will give anything by Rainbow Rowell a chance.
I’ve never heard of Rowell specifically stating that Carry On is based on Harry Potter, but the similarities are undeniable. Simon Snow is an orphan who grew up in various group homes and foster homes throughout England. It also turns out that he is the most powerful wizard of his time. He discovers this at the age of eleven or twelve when he is invited to go to the exclusive wizarding school. At school he becomes best friends with Penelope, and they have many dangerous adventures together. Simon’s nemesis is Basilton or Baz (Draco). Unfortunately for both of them, they were chosen to be roommates and must suffer the other’s company their entire tenure at school.
The book begins as Simon travels to school for his last year. The wizarding world is not in a good place. Holes–places that are void of any magic–are appearing throughout England and slowly growing. The mage (the headmaster as well as the leader of the wizarding world) is fighting with the older wizarding families and war is about to break out. Finally, there is an insidious “bad guy” who people call the humdrum that constantly attacks Simon.
At first I had a hard time with this book. I’d only recently read Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, another Harry Potter book that didn’t quite feel like the originals. Now I was reading another book that felt like Harry Potter, but there were enough significant differences in the worlds, that you can’t merge the worlds. I kept catching myself giving Simon Harry’s backstory. I also really prefer original characters and stories, especially when written by a different author.
If you read Fangirl, then it shouldn’t be a surprise that there is a serious love/hate relationship going on between Simon and Baz. And once Baz got back into the picture and Baz, Simon, and Penelope started working together, the book picked up dramatically.
By the time I’d finished, I’d bought into Rowell’s new creation of Harry Potter and his world. In some ways, I almost prefer it. I really liked Rowell’s description of Simon’s magical powers, and how they affected him and others around him. In addition, J.K. Rowling likes to kill all my favorite characters and then tie everything up into a nice little bow. Rowell definitely went in a different direction. In the end, I don’t really understand Rowell’s decision to tread upon such familiar ground, but once I got into it, her book was easy to read and made me think.
“(Just when you think you’re having a scene without Simon, he drops in to remind you that everyone else is a supporting character in his catastrophe.)” (197)
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*gasp*
This doesn’t bode well for me. I’ve been putting off reading this because the Simon Snow bits were my least favorite part of Fangirl.
I mean, I’m still going to read it – because Rainbow Rowell – but your star rating confirms my worst fears. (I didn’t read your review, though).
The Simon Snow parts were my least favourite part of Fangirl as well, and yet this book is my favourite of all of hers. Seriously, it’s great, don’t psyche yourself out about it.
Chiming in to agree with what Malin said!
I found the Simon Snow parts in Fangirl just slowed the momentum of the story right down, so I was wary of Carry On, but I LOVED it. Like, tied with Attachments for my favourite Rowell.
My only advise would be to go into it aware that the similarities with HP are completely intentional, so instead of comparing the them, you can just enjoy!
Yikes, so many typos.
If it helps, I would have given it 3.5 stars if that had been an option. I was waffling between giving it three or four.
I don’t see this as Harry Potter fanfiction at all, but I guess taste is taste. For me, this is a very clever book that uses your expectation of stories like Harry Potter against you, and then overturns them. I also think this story is concerned thematically with very, very different things than Harry Potter.
Forgot to add, it just makes me sad when people don’t like this book :(
I may have been a little lazy in calling it fanfiction. I’ve never actually read any fanfiction, and I just called it that since that was what Kath was writing in Fangirl. I did think it was undeniably Harry Potter, though. You had the powerful wizard orphan child, the Hermione character, the Draco character, and the Dumbledore character in the same setting in the same world with the some of the same major problems (feuding families). I couldn’t get Harry Potter out of my head. Even writing this review, I kept writing Harry instead of Simon. Once Rowell’s story really started developing, though, it definitely became its own and that’s when I really liked it. So please don’t be sad! Because I did like it!
Fwiw, I totally agree with your viewpoint and review. I liked this book overall too, but it doesn’t resonate with me emotionally nearly as much as her other books do. The higher concept setting distracted a bit from her strength in exploring character interactions by necessitating that we follow along with these fantasy tropes on the chosen one journey.
I think Rowell herself said that while Carry On is clearly in part inspired by Harry Potter, what she really wanted to do was her own take on the Chosen One narrative that’s so prevalent in fantasy fiction and now YA. She’s playing with a lot of tropes popular in YA (and in various kinds of fan fic), but this is more Rowell doing fan fic of her OWN book (Fangirl), than Harry Potter, in my mind.
I’ve been letting this one sit on the shelf, waiting for me, since its the last new Rainbow work I have. I am also trying to give myself some mental head space between Fangirl and the other Chosen One books that are out there so that I don’t draw to many direct parallels when I do read it. I’m thinking I might bring it with me as a plane book this holiday season, even though I have it in physical form and its a bit of a behemoth for carry-on bags.