Pottermore gives users a sneak peek

A new video offers Harry Potter fans a glimpse of the books and activities – the chance to be "Sorted" into a house or to duel with other users – that will be enjoyed on official Harry Potter website "Pottemore."

Eager Harry Potter fans got another peek at the Pottermore website – scheduled to open early this month – through a video released by the site. 

Pottermore is the official website of Harry Potter and will be the only venue at which Potter e-books will be sold. The website will also have many interactive components, through which users can be "Sorted" into Hogwarts houses, fight duels with other users, create potions, and access never-before-seen backstories about the Harry Potter universe written by author J.K. Rowling.

The promotional video released by Pottermore shows the screen on which the Sorting into a Hogwarts house would take place, a screen depicting Platform 9 ¾, various challenges, including catching a Snitch and brewing a potion that will cure boils, and the “explore chapter feature,” which allows users to click on various features of a scene. 

In a section called “The Cupboard Under the Stairs” (the title of one of the chapters in the first Harry Potter book “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone”), new content appeared in the video titled “Vernon and Petunia Dursley” which gave new insight into the relationship between Harry Potter's profoundly Muggle aunt and uncle. “He had a perfectly correct car, and wanted to do completely ordinary things,” the excerpt reads. “And by the time he had taken her on a series of dull dates, during which he talked mainly about himself and his predictable ideas on the world, Petunia was dreaming of the moment when he would place a ring on her finger.”

Check out the new video below:

Molly Driscoll is a Monitor contributor.