It began to seem like I’d been reading this book forever.

Don’t get me wrong; I like Harry Potter. It’s fun stuff. But when David
insisted that I read him the second Harry Potter book as his bedtime story I was
reluctant. I wasn’t in the mood for it, and anyway I’d read it to
myself late last spring in preparation for the publication of
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. It was simply too
soon. On top of that, Dave already knew the basic story very well, from
watching the movie.

When you’ve got an adult who’s reluctant and a kid who already knows
what’s going to happen, there’s no real tension, and thus no incentive to
read a book quickly. And so I read it to him a few pages a night, taking
three or four days per chapter instead of one. And let me tell you, read
that slowly this book is a real dog.

Reading a book aloud word by word casts a bright light upon it, and all of
its flaws and imperfections spring out. It’s a dangerous thing to do. I
had an entire series of books by a guy named Craig Shaw Gardener that
I summarily disposed of after a failed attempt to read the first one
aloud to Jane. So long as I could read them at speed I was able to
ignore the lack of substance, but let the harsh light of slow and
careful reading be once cast upon them and my enjoyment ceased.

This book, fortunately, is not that bad. The first Harry Potter
read aloud adequately (though not superlatively), and I’ve no doubt this
one would have read aloud adequately as well under better circumstances.
I do confess, by the end of the book I’d started editing Rowling’s prose,
omitting needless adjectives and adverbs here and there.