Using Harry Potter and J.K. Rowling’s birthday to mark the occassion, Pottermore released their brand new design and final Prisoner of Azkaban chapters on Wednesday.
You’ll see the new Pottermore design – which their blog has been teasing over the past few weeks – immediately upon loading the website.
After logging in (by the way, don’t expect your browser to remember your username and password because the area where you login has changed), you are given a tour of the new design and how to navigate it. As you go through the new chapters, you’ll be introduced to additional design changes and features.
One of the best new features? You no longer have to go through every moment. You can now skip to any area you choose, and you can easily see which sections have new writing from Rowling.
In these final Prisoner of Azkaban chapters, there is detailed new information on Secret Keepers, Werewolves, The Time Turner, and Patronus’.
In the werewolves section, Rowling details many aspects of the life of the creature including the mating process:
One curious feature of the condition is that if two werewolves meet and mate at the full moon (a highly unlikely contingency which is known to have occurred only twice) the result of the mating will be wolf cubs which resemble true wolves in everything except their abnormally high intelligence. They are not more aggressive than normal wolves and do not single out humans for attack. Such a litter was once set free, under conditions of extreme secrecy, in the Forbidden Forest at Hogwarts, with the kind permission of Albus Dumbledore. The cubs grew into beautiful and unusually intelligent wolves and some of them live there still, which has given rise to the stories about ‘werewolves’ in the Forest – stories none of the teachers, or the gamekeeper, has done much to dispel because keeping students out of the Forest is, in their view, highly desirable.
In the Patronus area within “Prongs,” we see how a witch or wizard comes to get a particular animal as their Patronus. We also learn that Tonks’ Patronus was a jack rabbit before meeting Lupin.
In the chapter “Owl Post Again,” we get an extremely detailed look at this history of Lupin – from his parents’ union, to Lupin’s birth, to his meeting of Tonks, and beyond.
Hit Pottermore to discover all of the new information for yourself!
We’re enjoying the site’s new design so far, but this writer is using an 11-inch screen and finds the design very cramp. It’d be nice to be able to minimize the story navigator at the bottom of the page so that users on smaller screens can browse the moments easier.