Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

How it reads

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is fantasy (young-adult fantasy, specifically), and its dominant mood is dark. It goes to difficult places and doesn't look away. It moves fast: plot-driven and hard to put down, the kind of book that carries you along even when you're tired.

It's set in an invented world, in no single period, told in the third person across several viewpoints. Its central concerns are friendship, power and politics and identity. In weight it sits in the middle: substantial without being heavy going.

It's a later book in a series — you'll usually want to start earlier. It ends on a cliffhanger, so have the next book ready. At 652 pages it's a real commitment. It's a mega-bestseller — the book everyone seems to have read.