Hooray for Harry!

The Book Trout is besotted by Potter! My eleven-year-old daughter Amy and I went to a
Harry Potter party last night and had a blast. The local independent bookstore in Glens Falls, New York, Red Fox Books, partnered with the local library to deck out their parking lot and several "Diagon" alleys around them with all kinds of activities: face painting, origami, free cake, a trivia contest, a costume contest, displays of turkey vultures and owls, sales of sticky sweet Butter Beer specially brewed by the local microbrewery and a short theater production.

I mostly spent time holding our place in various lines, so my dogs are killing me this morning and my eyelids are propped up with toothpicks, but Amy flitted around with a pack of other tweens wearing her Harry Potter glasses and was so excited about getting her copy of Harry
Potter and the Deathly Hallows and staying up until MIDNIGHT! It was hard not to gush along with her, but I was mostly using my extendable ears to listen to other kids' conversations about what they thought would unfold in the final book.

Red Fox Books owners Naftali Rottenstreich (dressed in professorial robes) and Susan Fox (in witch accessories), had presold 200 copies of the book and there was a huge line of people who had not done so who were hoping for the remaining 100 other copies. Lots of gothic types strolling about of all ages, but the strongest hyper-vibrations emanated from the various elementary and junior high school kids at this Woodstock for fantasy lovers.

It really was astounding. We weren't in line to get the latest X-Box, Gameboy, I-POD, Star Wars movie premiere ticket, sale-priced plasma TV, etc. We were in line to get a book, by gum, and as a bookseller, mom, book lover, reader, that was brilliant, to use a British-ism favored by Rowling's characters.

I chugged my coffee this morning and dashed out of the house in time to open the shop, but not before peeking into the living room, where Amy was up to page 50 or so in the book, wearing her Potter specs. I said goodbye to her, and she waved me off impatiently, "Mom, Dumbledore's secrets are being revealed!".

Long live J.K. Rowling.

The Book Trout Predicts Harry Potter VII

The Book Trout and her two fingerlings eagerly await the arrival of the seventh and concluding book in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series which will arrive at the stroke of midnight this Friday. We will be going to a Potter Party at Red Fox Books in Glens Falls, New York to eagerly await its distribution and can't wait to dive in. After rereading Books 6 and 7 in the series and watching the new film based on "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix", Book 5, I, like Hogwarts Divination Professor Sibyl Trelawney (seen above played loopily by the divine Emma Thompson) have some predictions about what might happen in the final installment.

1) Aberforth Dumbledore, Headmaster Albus Dumbledore's brother, who is only briefly referred to in the books, will have a major role in the final chapters. He is the bartender at The Hog's Head, the seedier of the two taverns in the nearby village of Hogsmeade and is mentioned by Albus as having had some shady dealings in the past with a goat (?!?). In the Order of the Phoenix movie, in the scene where Harry has his first meeting with other students to see if there is interest in having him teach them some of the defense against the dark arts tactics, they meet at the Hog's Head and there is a brief shot of a rotund bartender with a long beard chasing a goat out of the bar. A minor detail in the book, but significantly included in a film that cut a lot of other more important subplots and details. I believe Dumbledore is truly dead, despite his having a special affiliation with his pet phoenix, but that Aberforth may have promised Albus to look after Harry in the event of his death.

2) I think that Neville will be killed in this book, although he will not go out without having defended Harry or jumped in the way of a fatal curse or something equally deadly from Voldemort. He will be shown to be another kind of hero, one with bravery and loyalty, but without the natural coordination and flash that Harry has. I think his mastery of Herbology will serve him well in Book Seven, and he may cure one of his buddies with some kind of herbal potion.

3) Rowling has also stated that a second major character will meet his/her demise in this "bloodbath" novel, and I think it may be Lucius Malfoy. There is a lot of sympathetic treatment of his son, Draco in Book Six, when he procrastinates and agonizes over the task which Voldemort has given him, the assassination of Albus Dumbledore. Equally, Lucius' wife, Narcissa, is also seen sympathetically in the opening scenes of Book Six, with her grave concern for Draco and his dangerous assignment. I think there could be a dramatic scene with Draco gaining redemption for himself and his mother, with some intervention in a battle between Harry and Lucius.

4) I think ultimately, Harry will end up killing Voldemort or diminishing him back to his wormlike state by destroying all or six out of the seven horcruxes, and that he will not become an Auror, but the Defense against Dark Arts instructor at Hogwarts.

5) Snape will ultimately be proven to be a hero in this book as well. I think Rowling sets up the reasons for his initial attraction to dark magic very sympathetically, i.e. parental abuse, bullying at school, and though I haven't reasoned out why Albus Dumbledore believes him to be completely trustworthy, I think he is truly a double agent for the Order of the Phoenix. Perhaps my faith in Snape lies in my crush on actor Alan Rickman, who purrs as he delivers his cutting Snape lines in the Potter films, but that simply can't be helped.

I can't wait for the delicious pleasure on Friday night. Maybe one of my predictions will be accurate, or maybe I'm like Trelawney and just off the mark entirely. In either event, I can't wait for Rowling's magic to unfold.

Waiting for Harry with Skellig

The kids are in their last quarter of school and we are making summer plans. Not too many, because we like our summers a bit lazy on the kid end as they are busy on the bookshop/gardening/adult socializing end. One of the most exciting plans is to attend the midnight Harry Potter party at our local independent bookstore on July 21st when the seventh and final book in the series becomes available. I have read each book aloud to the girls, sometimes in marathon sessions requiring multiple throat resting breaks, but for the final book I broke down and preordered two copies for each kid to consume.

Because of the long breaks between the publication of each of these eagerly-awaited books, we've taken to reading some other great fantasy fiction. I and the other Jags can recommend the mordantly funny Baudelaire orphans series by Lemony Snicket, Susan Cooper's creative and literate books, "The Boggart" and "The Boggart and the Monster", and Philip Pullman's Dark Materials trilogy.

After noting the recent ten best children's books list put together a Carnegie Medal panel to celebrate its 70th anniversary, daughter Amy and I both read "Skellig" by David Almond, the 1998 Carnegie winner. We both really enjoyed this book about a young boy, Michael, who moves with his mom, dad and sickly infant sister to a rundown house. While his parents are preoccupied with the baby's health, Michael explores a dilapidated garage in the backyard and finds a pale man in a dirty black suit weakly sitting in the back, covered with cobwebs and dead flies. At first he is terrified, but he screws up his courage and returns to find the man in the same spot the next day, unmoved. He ends up bringing him bits of food and drink and with the aid of his new homeschooled friend, the William Blake-quoting Mina, he gets the man, Skellig (a Celtic word for rock), up on his feet and moving. The rest of the book centers around how Mina and Michael perceive Skellig. Is he part bird? Part angel and healer? Is he human or divine or extra-terrestrial? It's quite an interesting plot, overlaid with side issues highlighting the difficulties of being an adolescent and therefore part child/part adult, part innocent/part worldly-wise.

As an aside, in delving into the Internet ether about the Harry Potter release date I found the Holy Observer website, a gently satiric look at contemporary religious issues. The Holy Observer piece about how to protest other fantasy titles while waiting for the next Harry Potter to come out is a hoot, especially this advice:

Whenever possible, avoid reading these books as you protest them. It's best to avoid the appearance of evil, and you never know when you may be affected. More than one Christian has become addicted to evil, thinking he was more resistant than he actually was. Don't fall prey to this common trap of the devil.