Comments on: Thank you, J.K. Rowling

By: Caroline Spector

Caroline Spector — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 15:38:48 +0000

Rory,

Ditto what Morgan said. But it’ll be longer and more painful my way.

By: Morgan J. Locke

Morgan J. Locke — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 14:25:55 +0000

I’m going to have to kill you now.

By: Rory Harper

Rory Harper — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 07:08:08 +0000

We just fininished reading Chapter Three at 2 a.m., after getting the book at a mob scene at Hastings at midnight.

Harry and Hermione died at the end of this chapter. Big shocker. Guess it’s all up to Ron now.

By: Paula Helm Murray

Paula Helm Murray — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 05:53:06 +0000

My fifth grade teacher cut a deal with me. If I finished my work I could read in class. Until she retired, she mentioned me to everyone as the child that read her way through fifth grade and got straight As.

I’m excited to get the book but we’re on a broke streak and it might not be until next weekend. (payday) I’m currently re-reading so I’ll be up to even with what’s going on in sequence.

I have very mixed feelings about the OOTP movie…

By: Steven Gould

Steven Gould — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 20:31:22 +0000

Two copies of the book arrive on Saturday–one for Noble Girl, one for Twilight Ninja.

I’m interested for sure but I’m also excited about this:

http://www.apple.com/trailers/newline/thegoldencompass/

By: AUSTINKLEON.COM » Blog Archive » AND NOW I WILL PUBLICLY DECLARE MY LOVE FOR HARRY POTTER

Thu, 19 Jul 2007 17:01:35 +0000

[...] other great posts on Harry and the gang, check out Maureen’s thoughts about it being a post 9-11 fairy tale, and Eddie Campbell’s thoughts and [...]

By: austin kleon

austin kleon — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 16:48:12 +0000

I read the first 2 books, got sick of the third one after 90 pages of “Harry remembered his second year at Hogwarts when the blah blah blahblah”

THEN, I finally gave up my Harry Potter snobbery and read #6 and loved it. Can’t wait to read #7.

By: Maureen McQ

Maureen McQ — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 15:27:14 +0000

Brad, I bet you know LOTS of fascinating if not very useful things…although useful is a relative term, isn’t it.

By: Bradley Denton

Bradley Denton — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 13:42:11 +0000

I recall that in 5th grade, I wasn’t allowed to read just anything I wanted when my work was done . . . but I WAS allowed to read the classroom’s set of World Book encyclopedias as much as I liked.

I came pretty close to getting through the whole set.

By: Connie H.

Connie H. — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 09:50:19 +0000

Heh. In 3rd grade I gave up on doing the math assignments (they were boring) on the theory that the teacher wouldn’t notice with so much to grade, and spent the in-class time reading whatever I could find in the handy little library. As I remember, I was acing each math test, so without anything ever being said, I continued to do this for the rest of the year….

By: Rachael

Rachael — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 04:56:55 +0000

Yeah, I just re-read the most recent two… and Papa and I are going to pick up Deathly Hallows at midnight.

I, also, had a crappy teacher who would take my book and put it on the chalk board railing just about every day in seventh grade. What a jerk.

By: Morgan J. Locke

Morgan J. Locke — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 02:39:13 +0000

I’m a sucker for Harry Potter. I’m going to read the seventh as soon as it comes out, then re-read them all in a row.

By: Caroline Spector

Caroline Spector — Wed, 18 Jul 2007 19:43:13 +0000

As much as I like Harry Potter — and I like it very much indeed — I think Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy is much more powerful. Pullman is hunting bigger game than Rowling.

That said, what I love about Rowling is that she takes the society of children seriously. Or maybe it’s the whole British boarding school tradition that’s also so engaging for me as an American reader. (Tom Brown School Days, anyone?)

The Dude pre-ordered my copy months ago. Unfortunately, I’m going to be in Tulsa at Conestoga so, though I’ll be Internet free, I suspect the ending will be out of the bag before I leave for home. Dammit.

By: Madeleine Robins

Madeleine Robins — Wed, 18 Jul 2007 17:13:38 +0000

Me too!

I remember crying at the end of The Last Battle, not because the world had ended, but because there were no more Narnia books to read for the first time. I expect to feel a little bit of that when I read HP7 (which I won’t get to see until Sarcasm Girl has finished it–YG is getting her copy shipped to camp, and I refuse to buy three copies just so I can read it at once). Harry Potter is not a vastly inventive series, but Rowling has woven together many many things in a new and enormously pleasing way, and I’ll miss it when the story is finally over.