Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
After the sheer bulk of the Goblet of Fire and Order of the Phoenix this entry in the Harry Potter series is a bit of a physical relief. However this is the volume where things to start getting really dark and deaths start to occur ever more frequently.
I’ve read this book twice before – once when it came out and again just before the release of the final book.
Reading it again knowing the events of the final book improved it in ways I didn’t expect. Especially with regard to the cliffhanger near the end. Also it’s only with this read that I really started to get Harry and Ginny as a couple that makes sense.
One important thing to note is that this is infinitely better than the film version; which is an incoherent mess and by far the worst of the celluloid series.