Harry is about to begin his third year at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. But before he starts school, he is faced with the prospect of expulsion as he inflates Aunt Marge in a fit of rage. Certain that he is now an outcast from the wizarding community and having no intention of remaining stuck with the Dursleys, he decides to make a run for it.
As he waits by the road planning his next move he glimpses a large, shaggy dog staring at him. This dog, the Grim, is an evil omen in the wizarding world that seems to haunt him everywhere; in his tea leaves reading during Professor Trelawney’s Divination lesson, during the Quidditch match and even in the hints people around him seem to be dropping.
But if Harry thought this was bad, worse was just lurking around the corner. A convicted supporter of Lord Voldemort, Sirius Black, has escaped from Azkaban, the wizard prison. He is on the run and is suspected to be chasing Harry, to seek revenge for Lord Voldemort’s downfall. When people tell Harry he is not to go after Black, Harry doesn’t understand. After all, why would he go after someone who wants to kill him? But when Harry discovers the truth about Black all he can think about is how to capture Black and kill him.
The third installment of the Harry Potter series is finally taking its readers into Harry’s and his parent’s past. This book is the beginning of Lord Voldemort’s rise back to power. This one was a fast read and is also a favorite among many of my friends. Definitely recommended! ( )

My favorite so far. Harry is learning more about his past and looking towards a better future. Definitely some unexpected plot twists ( )

I’m not really the biggest fan of modern fantasy books but this is one of my favorites. I watched the movie and it wad very similar to the book but the book goes more into detail. This book is about Harry Potters third year at the school and they are trying to protect the school from a mysterious teacher after they found a murder. The characters are pretty odd and scary, these kids have magic powers. ( )

My all-time favorite fantasy book written by one of the greatest authors. Harry potter prisoner of azkaban is a classic! ( )

I must say that this used to be my least favorite book in the series. I know how ridiculous that sounds. I just found the book to be... boring, for the most part. The overwhelming focus on Hogsmeade, Buckbeak, and Quidditch in this entry made it a lot less entertaining to me than the other ones. However, upon rereading it, I've changed my opinion slightly. While I do still find certain portions of this book to be quite uninteresting, there's just so much good stuff here that it's hard to ignore it.

This book introduces my favorite character in the entire Harry Potter series: Sirius Black. I must emphasize, however, that he is my favorite character in the books and not in the movies. In the movies, Severs Snape is my favorite character, and I'll explain why in an upcoming review. Anyway, I love Sirius's character. This man's story is absolutely incredible. The fact that he used to be a beloved student at Hogwarts and then made the entire school lock down in fear of him a few decades later is so interesting. Thinking about it gives me the shivers. He was a regular guy who got falsely accused of murdering a dozen people and spent over a decade in the worst prison humanity has ever known. Then, he miraculously escaped this dementor-infested hellhole, travelled thousands of miles as a dog, sent the whole of Britain into mass panic, and he hunted down the true murder: Peter Pettigrew. The first time I read the major twist in the Shrieking Shack, I lost my mind. The fact that it is only my 2nd or 3rd favorite plot twist in this franchise speaks volumes about how great of a writer Rowling is.

Another thing I love about Sirius is that he is the first morally gray character in this series. As I mentioned in an earlier review, I don't like how childish the character work is in the first two books. Every single character is either completely good or completely bad. Yeah, some characters like Ron aren't always the kindest, but there aren't any characters who are truly in that grey area. In this book, however, we see that, while Sirius is generally a good guy, some of his actions are very questionable. The fact that he almost killed Snape on purpose when he was 16 is pretty dark, and the fact that he still despises Snape and lets his head bump against the roof of the tunnel as he leaves the Shrieking Shack shows that he is not an entirely good person. It's a sign that the series is now going in a more mature direction, and I love that.

As I said, there are some sections of this book that I find very mundane and that really reduce the quality of the reading experience, but, man, when it gets good, it gets REALLY GOOD. Those last 100 pages are easily some of my favorite in the entire saga. ( )