Announcing Pottermore

J.K. Rowling has made her big announcement! Pottermore, coming in October, will be all manner of things Harry Potter. According to Rowling, the website will be a place where "the digital generation will be able to enjoy a safe unique online reading experience built around the Harry Potter books. " Also included will be numerous new details about the Harry Potter world. Plus, the website will also sell both Harry Potter e-books (which have never before been available) and digital audio books.

See the video below for Rowling's announcement. The animation in the pages of the book is nothing short of amazing.



What all this means, I'm not exactly sure. It combines many of the elements speculated about when Pottermore was launched, including a online interactive experience, the Potter encyclopedia and e-books. We'll have to wait and see what happens in October.

In the meantime, one thing is clear. Rowling is the master of suspense.

Update: There's a lot more information about the website in this article from Publisher's Weekly about J.K. Rowling's press conference this morning.

More Potter!

Just when you thought it was all over, J.K. Rowling has one more surprise. She has just launched a new website called Pottermore, with no real hints as to what it might be. There's even a countdown clock where you can watch the minutes tick by until she makes an announcement about her next project. You can also follow Pottermore on Twitter and Facebook. Here's an unofficial preview shot... you can find more here.

What could it be? J.K. Rowling's spokespeople have announced that it isn't related to more books... but I'm holding out hope that it could be the long-waited Harry Potter encyclopedia, or an online version thereof. Other rumors are going around that it's a social networking online game site. We'll see. In a few days, we'll find out from the master of suspense herself.

What are your guesses?

Update: The announcement has been made! See this post for more details.

Harry Potter Giveaway: Question 2

There's still time to enter my Harry Potter giveaway contest and win a prize pack of Books 5, 6, 7 in paperback! Full details are in this post.

Question 2: If you could bring one person in the Harry Potter series back to life, who would it be?

Here's the catch: You can only bring them back to life after the events of Book 7 are over.

Spoiler alert: don't keep reading if you haven't finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

Several people responded to Question 1 that they didn't like the fact that Sirius died. So, of course, you could bring back Sirius, who was a great father figure to Harry. Or, you could bring back James, Harry's actual father. Or, if you were feeling mischievous, you could bring back Voldemort. Or Fred. Or Dobby. Or Dumbledore. Or the tons of other people that perished during the series. Your choice, but it can only be one person.

To enter the contest, simply reply to this post. Please leave a valid e-mail address or your entry is disqualified. You may leave a comment on any of my giveaway posts until the contest ends on July 7, 2009. If you already commented to Question 1, you get an extra entry by commenting on Question 2. U.S. residents only, please.

Also, be sure to vote in the new poll on the sidebar.

Harry Potter Giveaway: Question 1

It's only been two short years since we were waiting breathlessly for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows to be released.

On July 7, 2009, Book #7 will come out in paperback, and the entire series will finally be available in both hardcover and paperback.

To celebrate, I'm announcing my first ever book giveaway! What am I giving away? Harry Potter books, naturally.

5 winners will receive a prize pack of 3 Harry Potter books in paperback.

The three books are:

#5. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

#6. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

#7. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

I will be posting a few Harry Potter questions over the next few weeks. To enter the contest, answer the question in the comments. You may enter one time each per question asked. See the bottom of this post for today's question.

Official lingo: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is a breathtaking finish to a remarkable series. The final chapter to Harry Potter’s adventures will be releases in paperback July 7th! It all comes down to this - a final face off between good and evil. You plan to pull out all the stops, but every time you solve one mystery, three more evolve. For more information and fun and games, check out Scholastic's Harry Potter website.
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Question:

If you could change any single event in Harry Potter books 2-7, what would it be?

(Sorry, you can't change an event from Book 1, because if you did, the series wouldn't exist.)

Contest rules :

Please leave an answer (and a valid e-mail address or link) in the comments to enter the contest.
You can leave a comment on any of my giveaway posts until the contest ends on July 7, 2009.
Winners will be chosen at random. If you don't leave me a way to contact you, your entry is invalid. U.S. Residents only, please.

Spoiler warning: If you haven't finished the series, don't read anything after this point. And definitely don't read the comments.

What would I change? It's mentioned several times that the prophecy could have applied to either Neville or Harry. There's a moment towards the end of the seventh book where Harry is preparing to meet his death and he tells Neville to kill the snake. When I read the book the first time, I believed that Harry was going to die. And I thought, what if this is what she intended all along? What if it's really going to be Neville who kills Voldemort in the end?

So, my change would be to have Neville finish off Voldemort. Harry would still live, but Neville would get all the glory.

What change would you make? I'd love to know.

How to write a book by your favorite author in ten steps or less

I love it when I read a great book and then find another book by the same author with a similar plot. Sometimes I get so familiar with an author that I can predict the plot of a book before I open it.

Here's an example:

Basic Harry Potter Plot Summary

1. Harry is at the Dursleys for the summer and he’s miserable.
2. An event happens before Harry gets to school. After it’s over, Harry visits Diagon Alley (or Mrs. Weasley visits it for him) and takes the train to Hogwarts.
3. Harry arrives at Hogwarts and finds out who the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is (who is always someone Harry’s met before school started).
4. Harry gets a lot of homework and Quidditch practice and games happen.
5. Major events occur on Halloween and/or Christmas.
6. Harry, Ron and Hermione are trying to solve a mystery.
7. Harry and friends study for exams. In the afternoon after the last exam, the answer to the mystery is suddenly discovered.
8. The climax of the book occurs and something terrible or miraculous happens. Harry meets Voldemort and narrowly avoids death. The climax lasts all evening and takes up several chapters of the book. At the end of it, Harry ends up in the hospital wing.
9. Dumbledore explains it all.
10. Harry deep in thought about whatever happened during the climax, takes the train home and dreads another summer with the Dursleys.

Of course, there are deviations to this structure in various books. Harry doesn’t take the train to Hogwarts in Chamber of Secrets, he doesn’t meet Voldemort in Prisoner of Azkaban (although Voldemort is discussed during the climax), he doesn’t play Quidditch in Goblet of Fire, etc. But basically, if you think about it, the events listed above happen in Books One through Six.

**Begin spoiler alert. Don’t read the comment below unless you’ve read the Half Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows.**

One of the things I love in Book Seven is that Dumbledore STILL explains it all. He doesn’t let a minor thing like death stand in his way of summing up the entire plot and explaining every mystery that’s happened during the book.

**End spoiler alert**

Stock plot summaries can work for lots of books. Take a look at this one:

Basic Amelia Bedelia Plot Summary

It only takes five steps.

1. Mrs. Rogers gives Amelia Bedelia a list of things to do and then leaves the house.
2. Amelia Bedelia bakes a pie before she starts working on the list.
3. Amelia Bedelia does every item on the list and takes each task literally.
4. Mrs. Rogers comes home to find that the house is a big mess and that Amelia Bedelia hasn’t done anything correctly.
5. Amelia Bedelia’s pie makes everything better again.

This always makes me wonder. Hasn’t Mrs. Rogers figured out by now that Amelia Bedelia is an incompetent maid? Why doesn’t she hire someone else? Amelia Bedelia can open a bakery and contract on the side with Mrs. Rogers to bake pies.

And it's not always plot devices. Some authors seem to have lists of characters that often appear in their books. Here are several reoccurring characters from one of my favorite authors:

L.M. Montgomery's Stock Characters

For those of you who have just read Anne of Green Gables series, believe me, these characters surface in nearly every other L.M. Montgomery book.

Primary characters

• A female ingénue who is deeply in love with the house she lives in. She often has a teaching degree and sometimes a college degree (unusual for the time period). She has a creative imagination and writes stories and sells them to magazines for a small profit. She is usually (but not always) an orphan. The story is always told for her point of view.
• A handsome, perfect male who grew up with the female ingénue. He crosses signals with her multiple times and moves away (a letter is usually lost or destroyed.) But he always manages to come back three pages from the end of the book at the perfect moment and declare his undying love.
• An older female who takes care of the ingénue in a strict and no-nonsense way. She is usually not the ingénue's mother.
• An older man who falls in love with the ingénue. He proposes and is engaged to the ingénue, but she only sees him as a friend and she eventually breaks the engagement. (Not in the Anne books, but in many others).

Secondary characters (optional, but usually included)

• A wonderful housekeeper that the family couldn’t live without who has a mother that occasionally gets ill.
• A gossipy female neighbor who does beautiful needlework and feels there's a enormous difference between Presbyterians and Methodists. (Presbyterians are always favored.)
  
• A female friend who's had a rough life and only opens up to the ingénue.
• A female friend or sister that dithers for years over which of two identical men she should marry, and then falls in love with a third man and marries him immediately.
• A rich, crotchety elderly woman who dies and leaves her fortune to the ingénue.
• Small children who have big imaginations and provide amusing stories about adventures and local people. (The stories are typically the same from book to book.)
• A town doctor who makes house calls. (In the Anne books, he’s a primary character).
• A town minister.

Setting

• A farm on Prince Edward Island near a small town, where everybody’s primary occupation seems to be keeping track of the entire life histories of everyone else.

There are a few obvious exceptions. The Blue Castle is the only book that is not set on Prince Edward Island. And the male hero and the ingenue are together and happy for half the book and not just the last three pages. And Kilmeny of the Orchard is an exception because it's told from the man's point of view, not the woman's.

Conclusions

I love these kinds of books when they're written by a favorite author. Sometimes it's great to find many variations on the same theme. And just because stock characters or basic plot points are used, doesn't mean the books aren't original and delightful.

Also, it makes me intrigued about an author's life and when I see obvious patterns, I like to research them. A lot of it tends to be based in fact as authors frequently write what they know.

Compare the stock characters to L.M. Montgomery's actual life. Her mother died shortly after she was born and she was raised by farm on Prince Edward Island by her grandparents. She had both a teaching license and a college degree. She fell in love with the perfect boy- someone she had grown up with (her cousin) but didn't marry him and married an older man who was a Presbyterian minister instead.

Unfortunately, though, I'll never get to read a Harry Potter book again for the first time. And after a trip to Prince Edward Island and a careful search through tons of used bookstores there, I think I've exhausted all the new-to-me L.M. Montgomery books. But, by knowing the formula, I can also appreciate departures from it. I love Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and The Blue Castle, precisely because they break the mold.

And sometimes, only one book really rises to the top. I liked The DaVinci Code and read other books by Dan Brown. I was disappointed that not only were they all the same, but The Da Vinci Code (which still had flaws) was the best.

A Plea

If you found this post by googling "Anne of Green Gables characters" or "Harry Potter plot summary," please don't use what I've written above for any kind of informational purposes. They're just generalizations, and I hope that you read the books discussed above if you haven't before. Despite what I said, each one truly is unique and I've enjoyed every one. (Some more than others, of course).

Your Turn

How about you? Is there an author whose plot summary, typical setting and stock characters you know even before you start reading one of their books? Post it below. If you chose to write your own post about it, I'd love to see it and please include the link in the comments.

Happy Beedle the Bard Day!

You've flown your Firebolt to the nearest bookstore.

The Amazon.com owl has tapped on your window.

And now…

you have the Tales of Beedle the Bard in your hot little hands.

You open it, see how big the font size is, and dive right in.

You're finished in less than an hour.

WAIT! Don't do that.

Read slowly. One story at a time. Savor it.

When's the next time you're going to get a chance to read original J.K. Rowling stories set in the Harry Potter world?

Not anytime soon, I can tell you.

After you've enjoyed the book, come back and tell Wizards Wireless what you think.

I'd love to hear your opinions, even if you've only read part of the book.

And be sure to take the new poll on the sidebar.

Lawsuits and bookstores, oh my

I thought I'd share a pair of articles from the New York Times.

First, the big news: Harry Potter Author Wins Copyright Ruling

This was an incredibly complicated case, with lots of potential precedents hanging on the verdict. To me, the key sentence in the ruling by Judge Patterson (which isn't in the New York Times article, but which you can find at the Leaky Cauldron) is:

“While the Lexicon, in its current state, is not a fair use of the Harry Potter works, reference works that share the Lexicon’s purpose of aiding readers of literature generally should be encouraged rather than stifled.”

To read the full 68 page decision, see this PDF on the Wall Street Journal's website.

What do you think? Leave a comment or vote in the new poll.

And second: Children's Bookstores, Hanging On
I was surprised with this one. It only briefly mentions the two famous children's bookstores in Manhattan: Books of Wonder and the Bank Street Bookstore... and then focuses on the Scholastic Bookstore. Don't get me wrong, Scholastic's store is fantastic. But, it's owned by a publisher and doesn't feature the variety of publishers that other independent stores do. For some great children's bookstores (and to find one near you), check out the Association of Booksellers for Children.

Also, the article mentions the closing of a famed bookstore in Alexandria in 2007, (A Likely Story) but does not mention the fact that a new children's bookstore reopened in the same location in 2008 under new management as Hooray for Books!

Tales of Beedle the Bard to be published

There's big Harry Potter news today... which is very fitting, considering that today happens to be the birthday of both Harry Potter and J.K. Rowling.

Shortly after publication of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, J.K. Rowling wrote the fairytales of Beedle the Bard mentioned in the 7th book. However, the book was never published... six copies were given to friends and the seventh copy was auctioned off for charity. Interestingly enough, the winning bidder in the auction was Amazon.com.

(Warning: If you click on the announcements below, they contain spoilers for the sixth book.)

It was just announced that the Tales of Beedle the Bard will be published on December 4, 2008 and will include both the tales themselves (translated by Hermione) and commentary by Albus Dumbledore. Both a standard edition (for $12.99) and a collector's edition (for $100) will be available. The royalties for the book will go to J.K. Rowling's charity: the Children's High Level Group.

I'm thrilled about this development. I throughly enjoyed the other two books J.K. Rowling wrote for charity: Quidditch Through the Ages and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. I'm delighted to see Beedle the Bard in print, and happy to support a charity. This way, the fairytales will be accessible to everyone, and become part of the Harry Potter canon. I'm also wondering (although it's hard to tell without having read the stories themselves yet) if this book will be a way to introduce younger children to J.K. Rowling's writing.

Thank you, J.K. Rowling, and happy birthday!

What do you think about the publication of the Tales of Beedle the Bard? See the new polls in the sidebar.

New Harry Potter prequel story online

The Harry Potter prequel written by J.K. Rowling that has been in the news recently is now available online. Before you get too excited.... I should warn you that it's not an excerpt from an upcoming book. It's a stand-alone short story that was auctioned off for charity.

To read the story, go to the Waterstone's website, click on "read our authors' stories" and then select "J.K. Rowling" at the top of the list. It's two sided, so after you finish the first half, be sure to click on the arrow on the right-hand side to read the second half. It's hand-written, so it takes a little while to read. After you read it, come back to Wizards Wireless and vote in the new poll in the sidebar.

J.K. Rowling posted a short account on her website about writing the story (she says she felt like a relapsing addict) and confirmed that she is NOT working on a Harry Potter prequel book.

I thought it was a great little vignette of Sirius and James on the motorbike. It takes place a few years before the first chapter of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and it's delightful to see Sirius and James having so much fun. It whetted my appetite for more about the pre-Harry days, but it sounds fairly definite that there are no plans in the works for that. Alas.

The Order of the Phoenix has T-shirts? I thought they were a (relatively) secret society.

New edition of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

Scholastic is releasing a special 10th anniversary edition of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. There's new cover art depicting Harry looking into the mirror of Erised, as well as additional artwork from Mary Grandpré. Plus, there's a tantalizing comment in the press release about bonus material from J.K. Rowling. To see the new cover up-close and personal, plus a beautiful illustration of Hagrid and the first years sailing across the lake, go to Scholastic's website.

I love the new cover, particularly the way you can just barely see the shadows of Harry's parents in the mirror. I'm not quite sure why there's a skull and a glass eye on the right hand side of the illustration.

My husband recently made an interesting point about the cover of the American edition of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. There was such an unbelievable amount of secrecy about revealing the plot of the book before the publication date. And, yet, the cover of the book shows the absolute climax of Book 7 and the whole series.

It was right under our noses for 3 1/2 months and nobody picked up on it. I've got to give Scholastic a lot of credit for being gutsy.

There are two new polls up on the sidebar about the new edition. One of them asks if you like the old cover better than the new one. Here's a picture of the original cover of the American edition so you can compare:

Poll results: Harry Potter books

I tallied up the results of this poll a while ago but keep forgetting to post them.

The question: Which books mentioned in the Harry Potter series would you like to read?
The answers:

• Tales of Beedle the Bard (11 votes)
• Enchantment in Baking (10 votes)
• Hogwarts: A History (10 votes)
• Curses and Counter-curses (Bewitch Your Friends and Befuddle Your Enemies with the Latest Revenges: Hair Loss, Jelly-Legs, Tongue-Tying, and Much, Much More) by Professor Vindictus Viridian (9 votes)
• Basic Hexes for the Busy and Vexed (6 votes)
• History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot (6 votes)
• Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore by Rita Skeeter (6 votes)
• Rune Dictionary (6 votes)
• Adventures of Martin Miggs, the Mad Muggle (5 votes)
• Charm Your Own Cheese (5 votes)
• Home Life and Social Habits of British Muggles by Wilhelm Wigworthy (5 votes)
• Powers You Never Knew You Had and What To Do With Them Now You've Wised Up (5 votes)
• Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts (5 votes)
• Saucy Tricks for Tricky Sorts (5 votes)
• Weird Wizarding Dilemmas and Their Solutions (5 votes)
• Advanced Potion-Making by Libatius Borage (4 votes)
• Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander (4 votes)
• One Minute Feasts: It's Magic! (4 votes)
• Practical Defensive Magic and Its Use Against the Dark Arts (4 votes)
• Standard Book of Spells by Miranda Goshawk (4 votes)
• Blood Brothers: My Life Amongst the Vampires by Eldred Worple (3 votes)
• Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection by Quentin Trimble (3 votes)
• Invisible Book of Invisibility (3 votes)
• Men Who Love Dragons Too Much (3 votes)
• Numerology and Gramatica (3 votes)
• Ancient Runes Made Easy (2 votes)
• Death Omens: What To Do When You Know The Worst Is Coming (2 votes)
• Defensive Magical Theory by Wilbert Slinkhard (2 votes)
• Dragon Breeding for Pleasure and Profit (2 votes)
• Flying With the Cannons (2 votes)
• Magical Drafts and Potions by Arsenius Jigger (2 votes)
• Moste Potente Potions (2 votes)
• One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi by Phyllida Spore (2 votes)
• Sonnets of a Sorcerer (2 votes)
• Unfogging the Future by Cassandra Vablatsky (2 votes)
• Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration by Emeric Switch (1 vote)
• From Egg to Inferno, A Dragon Keeper's Guide (1 vote)
• Intermediate Transfiguration (1 vote)
• Jinxes for the Jinxed (1 vote)
• Magical Me by Gilderoy Lockhart (1 vote)
• Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling (1 vote)
• Monster Book of Monsters (1 vote)
• Quidditch Through the Ages by Kennilworthy Whisp (1 vote)
• Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches (1 vote)
• Voyages With Vampires by Gilderoy Lockhart (1 vote)
• Wanderings With Werewolves by Gilderoy Lockhart (1 vote)
• Appraisal of Magical Education in Europe (0 votes)
• Break With a Banshee by Gilderoy Lockhart (0 votes)
• Flesh-Eating Trees of the World (0 votes)
• Fowl or Foul? A Study of Hippogriff Brutality (0 votes)
• Gadding With Ghouls by Gilderoy Lockhart (0 votes)
• Gilderoy Lockhart's Guide to Household Pests (0 votes)
• Handbook of Do-It-Yourself Broom Care (0 votes)
• Holidays With Hags by Gilderoy Lockhart (0 votes)
• Magical Water Plants of the Mediterranean (0 votes)
• Nature's Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy (0 votes)
• Prefects Who Gained Power (0 votes)
• Spellman's Syllabary (0 votes)
• Travels With Trolls by Gilderoy Lockhart (0 votes)
• Year With The Yeti by Gilderoy Lockhart (0 votes)

I agree, I'd love to read The Tales of Beedle the Bard. Thanks to Amazon (see this post) we can now at least read plot summaries of each story. Maybe this book will be published one day. That would be wonderful.

I'd also love to get a copy of all the cookbooks in Mrs. Weasley's kitchen. Enchantment in Baking and One Minute Feasts: It's Magic! would both be a real asset in my ridiculously busy life.

I'd like to read all the Gilderoy Lockhart books (although it appears that no one else would)... simply because I need a good laugh. Think of the humor value of those books!

I'm surprised that Defensive Magical Theory by Wilbert Slinkhard got any votes... it was the assigned book in Professor Umbridge's class and sounds very boring.

I'm curious about the rest of The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore, particularly the chapter about Harry and Dumbledore. But I also think this book would drive me crazy and I'd end up flinging it across the room before long.

If I lived in the wizarding world, I think I'd be the only person (other than Hermione) who would have read Hogwarts, a History from cover to cover.

For those who voted for Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander and Quidditch Through the Ages by Kennilworthy Whisp you're in luck. J.K. Rowling has published these books and they're very funny (and useful when reading the Harry Potter series). I highly recommend them for die-hard Harry Potter fans.

Harry Potter: In essence divided

I don't usually post about the Harry Potter movies (my main interest is really in the books)... but I thought this piece of news was pretty big.

The Los Angeles Times has just confirmed a longtime rumor that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows will be split into two movies. The movies will be filmed at the same time, but will be released in theaters six months apart.

You can read more about it here at The Leaky Cauldron.

What do you think? See the new poll.

Books and literature in the Harry Potter series

Since this blog is about books and Harry Potter, it seems only natural for me to talk about the books that are mentioned within the Harry Potter series.

J.K. Rowling liberally sprinkles book titles throughout the series, and I've posted a new poll listing some of my favorites. There are 60 books listed, so it doesn't contain every title mentioned in the series (if you're looking for that, see this list at the Harry Potter Lexicon.) But, if the book is featured in my poll, it means that it figures significantly into the plot. Or it's on Harry's initial shopping list in Sorcerer's Stone. Or I think the title is cool. Clearly, I used rigorous standards.

Grammy Award for Harry Potter

Jim Dale won a Grammy award last night for Best Spoken Word Album for Children for the recording of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Although, he's received six Grammy nominations for Harry Potter, this is only the second time he's won. I'm thrilled, because I think that the audio version of Deathly Hallows is the best of all seven.

Why do I like Jim Dale's narration so much? See this post.

New J.K. Rowling Interview

There's a wonderful new and lengthy interview with J.K. Rowling in the Spanish language newspaper El Pais.

Here's the original interview in Spanish, and here's the English translation, available at the Leaky Cauldron.

Spoiler
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for
those
who
haven't
finished
reading
Harry
Potter
and
the
Deathly
Hallows.

Here are a few quotes from the interview that really stood out to me:

Rowling (discussing chapter 34 in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows): "For me, that chapter is the key of all the books. Everything, everything I have written, was thought of for that precise moment when Harry goes into the forest. That is the chapter that I had planned for 17 years. That moment is the heart of all of the books. And for me it is the last truth of the story. Even though Harry survives, of that there was no doubt, he reaches that unique and very rare state which is to accept his own death. How many people have the possibility of accepting their death before they die?"

The chapter she is talking about (The Forest Again) where Harry walks into the Forbidden Forest to consciously face his own death, is probably the most powerful (for me) in the whole series. I was crying as I read it, because I believed Harry was walking to his death. It makes sense to me that she planned it for 17 years, because it's an absolutely crucial moment.

Rowling (talking about Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix): "The fifth book is the darkest of all because there is an absence of anticipation and an oppressive atmosphere. I think because of that, people didn’t like it as much. Even though there are readers who prefer this book to the others, they are a strange minority."

I give Rowling a lot of credit for saying this. Very few people like the fifth book. Lots of people have been unable to get past it (which is unfortunate, because I think the sixth and seventh books are better). I'm impressed that she's able to recognize that the fifth book isn't as likable. I think that's hard for an author to admit. It also intrigues me that she says that the book wasn't supposed to be enjoyable.

If you have a moment, I highly recommend taking a look at the full interview. There are a lot of interesting comments in there.

Looking for opinions!

An Ohio children's librarian has created a blog with lots of intriguing questions about Harry Potter, but hasn't received any comments to date. If you have any opinions about Harry Potter (and if you're a reader of Wizards Wireless, then you probably do)... head on over to Deconstructing Harry and add your 2 knuts.

Stir up your cauldron

Wouldn't a nice butterbeer be the perfect thing to ring in the new year? Author Brian Mandabach has provided a multitude of butterbeer recipes on his blog. They include one for pyromaniacs (that has flames and everything), one that features a dose of butterscotch schnapps, a lovely non-alcoholic version appropriate for house elves (and kids) and an ice cold version. Check them out, they sound delicious.

Happy new year!

Harry Potter: the Next Generation

J.K. Rowling has posted a handwritten family tree on her website with the full names of the children and spouses of introduced in the epilogue of Book 7.

Spoiler
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if
you
haven't
finished
the
7th
Harry
Potter
book.


My thoughts about what was revealed in the family tree:

Bill and Fleur have three kids? I can see that.

Charlie never got married? That's surprising. He seems like such a nice guy.

George married Angelina? Is it Angelina Johnson? Interesting, because Fred is the one who took Angelina to the Yule Ball. Their son is named Fred... which makes complete sense.

I don't recognize the woman Percy married. It's touching that he named his daughter after his mother- it shows that they really reconciled.

I don't recognize the woman Draco married. Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy- that's a rough name for a kid.

The names of Luna's kids seem appropriately dreamy and Shakespearean.

I love the middle names of Harry's kids:
James Sirius- it's lovely that Harry honored them both. What an appropriate name for that kid. He seems like a mix of James and Sirius.

Albus Severus: we already knew about from the epilogue, but I like that both Snape and Dumbledore are honored together.

Lily Luna: How nice that they named their daughter after Luna. That really shows the strength of Harry and Ginny's relationship with her.

I also love that Arthur and Molly are Harry's inlaws and that Hermione and Ron are Harry's sister and brother in law.

What do you think?

Have a very Harry Christmas

I wish you a merry Christmas today.

And if you're a a Harry Potter fan:

Wizards Wireless is honoring the occasion by playing "A Cauldron Full of Hot Strong Love" by Celestina Warbeck all day.

Your presents will appear magically at the foot of your bed (I hope you don't receive any from Kreacher, Lavender Brown or the Dursleys.)

Mrs. Weasley knitted you a lovely sweater and baked you a dozen homemade pies.

Hagrid made you a big box of treacle fudge, which you should warm up in front of the fire before eating.

Don't eat chocolate cakes left in the Entrance Hall as they may be filled with a sleeping draft.

Dinner will be served in the Great Hall, and you don't have to sit next to Professor Trelawney unless you want to.

Make sure to pull a wizard cracker during dinner.

Remember that the mistletoe is probably full of knargles.

Don't forget to visit your relatives at St. Mungo's.

Be sure to leave a wreath of Christmas roses on your parents' graves.

You should feel free to pelt Percy with mashed potatoes if he shows up at your house uninvited.

Have a lovely day (and you earn ten points for Gryffindor if you recognized what Harry Potter book the title of this post comes from.)

J.K. Rowling podcast- Part Two

Here's the second part of the Leaky Cauldron's podcast with J.K. Rowling. Be sure to check it out.

There's more about it in this post. Here's the first part of the podcast, in case you missed it.