[Tobytwo]

Apologies to D&D players, against whom I bear no grudge! By D&D-style magic I meant magic of the more standard sort - fireballs, lightning etc. I think you have to be careful writing about this "up close" without the reader saying "seen it all before". Ultimately this requires either an original take on magic itself or good writing. I certainly wouldn't say that magic in general or principle is a cliche, any more than putting cars in a story is a cliche.

On the Harry Potter point, this is going to raise some hackles, but I think there is a fair amount of cliche in Harry Potter in the sense that a lot of the basic concepts are familiar to readers. However, Rowling's skill is in what she does with them and how they are developed. One of the things that marks a book out as good, I think, is how it deals with its ideas, not just what those ideas are. I remain convinced that if the writing is good enough, cliche can be overcome.