Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
The story begins at Number Four, Privet Drive, in Little Whinging, England, the home of Vernon and Petunia Dursley and their spoiled son, Dudley. Another young boy also lives with the Dursleys: Petunia's nephew, Harry Potter, an orphan with a lightning-bolt-shaped scar on his forehead. Just before Harry's 11th birthday, mysterious letters begin arriving for him. Then a near-giant, Hagrid, storms into his life, bearing a birthday cake, an invitation to enroll at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry (Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore), and the news that Harry is not only a wizard, he is the most famous orphan in the magical world.
Hagrid reveals that Harry became a legend and received his lighting-bolt scar by surviving an attack from the powerful Dark wizard, Lord Voldemort, who murdered Harry's parents ten years earlier. After he was unable to kill Harry, Lord Voldemort vanished, his powers lost. Hagrid takes Harry from the Dursleys and introduces him to the world of magic by way of Diagon Alley, a street filled with wizard shops and hidden from Muggle (non-magical) eyes. Harry finds his parents left him a fortune in wizard's gold deep in the vaults of Gringotts Wizarding Bank, from which Hagrid also extracts a secret package. After buying a uniform, books, and his very own magic wand, Harry is ready to board the Hogwarts Express, which leaves from platform nine and three quarters at King's Cross railway station and takes him directly to Hogwarts.
Shortly after Harry arrives, the Sorting Hat places him in Gryffindor House (which is overseen by Transfiguration Professor Minerva McGonagall), along with his new acquaintances Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. Harry's enemy Draco Malfoy is sorted into Slytherin, the former house of Voldemort, which is headed by the sinister-looking Potions teacher, Severus Snape.
Harry gets a flying start — literally — as classes begin and his natural talent for broomstick riding is discovered. He learns the rules of Quidditch, a soccer-like game played while flying high above the ground, and he becomes the youngest Seeker the Gryffindor team has had in a hundred years. Malfoy challenges Harry to a wizard's duel, but when Harry and his companions arrive, instead of finding Malfoy, they stumble upon a vicious three-headed dog standing guard over a trapdoor. But what it's guarding and why, they can only guess. Not long after, Harry and Ron save Hermione from an attack by a vicious mountain troll, and the three become firm friends.
Christmas finds Harry nearly alone at Hogwarts, which he much prefers to returning to the Dursleys. He stumbles upon the Mirror of Erised, which shows the deepest desire of the one who gazes upon it, and sees his parents and family. He also receives an Invisibility Cloak — a present that will serve him well in times to come — most immediately to smuggle out an illegal dragon that Hagrid won in a game of cards. Despite using the cloak, Harry and Hermione get caught in this venture, along with their friend Neville Longbottom. As a punishment they must walk deep into the Forbidden Forest with Hagrid to find an injured unicorn. Harry comes across a cloaked figure hungrily drinking a unicorn's blood. A centaur informs him the cloaked man was none other than Voldemort, trying to maintain his phantom existence.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione have already discovered that the three-headed dog is guarding the legendary Sorcerer's Stone, which Hagrid brought from Gringotts to Hogwarts and which can grant its owner eternal life. It then makes perfect sense that the person trying to steal the Stone is Lord Voldemort. Harry, Ron, and Hermione learn that Hagrid told a stranger how to get past the dog and know they must act at once to protect the Stone. After using all their skills, including Ron's chess mastery, Harry's talent for flying, and Hermione's magical smarts, Harry finds himself without his friends, face to face with . . . Professor Quirrell, the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher.
Quirrell explains that the key to finding the Stone lies in the Mirror of Erised. Harry looks in the mirror and thinks that what he wants most is to find the Stone before Quirrell does, and miraculously, it materializes in his pocket. Harry lies to Quirrell about what he sees in the mirror, but an evil voice hisses that he is lying. Quirrell unravels his turban to reveal Voldemort's face on the back of his head. Voldemort orders Quirrell to kill him, but Quirrell cannot do it, and Harry falls unconscious. Lord Voldemort disappears again. When Harry awakes, Headmaster Dumbledore explains that the same power that saved Harry as a baby — his mother's love — kept him from harm once again, as it hurt someone as evil as Voldemort to touch someone marked by something so good. Finally, at the end-of-year feast, Dumbledore awards Ron, Hermione, Harry, and Neville enough extra points that Gryffindor wins the House Cup, completing a triumphant and marvelous first year.
