Just getting into the series at the age of 25, and it's hard.

Never read these books or watched these films growing up, for reasons I will not go into here. I just rented Philosopher's Stone/Sorcerer's Stone from my library. I have heard the later books are better, but my goodness, this book is bare bones. Very little depth and feels like a bad imitation of Roald Dahl with it's juvenile, grade-level writing style. I once heard a Catholic priest briefly review this book by saying it was "total garbage...not even worth reading on a literary level." He reiterated a few moments later, "It's a piece of junk literature. How that woman made over a billion dollars on that enterprise is beyond me." While I wouldn't be quite that harsh on the book, I still have to admit that it is not very engaging to me. For some reason, Hagrid taking Harry to Gringotts and Diagon Alley does not feel magical or wonder-inducing at all. The only redeeming quality is that its short and easy to read.