Month: October 2005

I’ve been paying closer attention to The Constitution lately. It’s an amazing document that sits at the core of our Democracy and the rights that distinguish us as Americans. Yet at the same time it is a political football, under constant threat of revision to score political points (Help, my marriage is being threatened by gays, please alter the Constitution to defend it!), and subject to interpretation by a changing and fallible judiciary. But through it all, the essentials endure. Or so I thought until last year, when I discovered that my home-buying decision had required me to sign away a Constitutionally protected right.

Floyd Abrams‘ career has taken place in the legal trenches where the grand ideas of Constitutional protections come face to face with the more complicated circumstances of real life. In his book, Speaking Freely, Abrams describes in fascinating detail a variety of 1st Amendment related cases he has argued in court; from The Pentagon Papers case early in his career, a number of media-related libel cases, then-Mayor Guiliani’s attempt to shut down a Brooklyn Museum of Art over an exhibit, to the fight against Campaign Finance Reform.

Somewhere inside me there’s a frustrated lawyer wanting to get out. I am fascinated by the law, its use, abuse, and those who practice it. Even I was a little surprised how much I enjoyed reading these tales of sometimes arcane details of various lawsuits related to free speech. Let’s face it, this doesn’t have the sensationalism of an O.J. Simpson trial. But the the consequences to all Americans on how these fights are settled can be profound. I expect most Americans would say that the Freedom of Speech is a good thing, and rightly so. But things can get sticky when some test that right by actually using it.

I’ve decided it’s not enough to maintain a ‘What I’m Reading’ block as I do on my blog, and not make some better effort to offer some thoughts about the books after I have read them. And so, I’m going to try and do that now.

And the first of the newly regular book reviews will be Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. I didn’t start reading Harry Potter books until well after the third one. Only after they had become the phenomenon that they are did I decide I needed to get caught up and find out what the fuss was all about. Having finished the latest, I’m all caught up again. My problem is my lack of any memory. Unlike my daughter, the Potter Encyclopedia, I can’t recount the details of the previous books as if I just read them, and so I struggle like a muggle to recollect what for Harry happened just the previous year, but that I read five years ago.

But even with that handicap, Harry remains an easy and fun read. Harry’s growing up, and has become a BWOC (Big Wizard on Campus – duh), and so is struggling with increased work and responsibility at school; tougher classes and being captain of his Quiddich team, the burden of having been labeled ‘The Chosen One’ who prophecy and previous experience says is destined for some epic battles to come, the attention and training that Hogwarts Headmaster Dumbledore gives him, and the fact that he’s matured enough to start noticing girls, not just any girl… Harry fancies his best friend’s sister. (I will resist the obvious temptation to insert any joke related to a wand in Harry’s pants here… better I don’t read such thoughts into children’s books).

All in all, I was a bit let-down by this book. To me it felt like it was all build-up, with little payoff. Obviously, with two books promised still in the series, it’s really just a chapter along the way in a bigger story. But the big news of this one… a major character dying, didn’t provide a satisfying ending. For any reader who’s gotten this far in the Potter books, you really can’t NOT read it, right? Just be prepared for this book to be a set-up with a big fat “To Be Continued…” at the end of it and hope for better in volume six.