How awesome is J.K. Rowling, Part Deux

I just finished reading this book, and it's pretty awesome. It's the story of the Harry Potter fandom, and it's written by Melissa Anelli, who is the webmistress for The Leaky Cauldron, a Harry Potter news and fansite.

It's no secret that I love the Harry Potter books, and that I love J.K. Rowling. I'm also pretty involved in the Harry Potter fandom, which is why I read the book in the first place. I'm sure it seems weird to some people, but I honestly don't care. I've made some amazing friends over the years- yes, real honest-to-goodness friends. It doesn't matter that I've never met most of them "in real life". Actually, my involvement in the fandom is why I started blogging over at LiveJournal in the first place. It was an easy way for everyone to keep up with each other.

Another reason why I loved the book is because it really brings back such amazing feelings for me- like when I first started reading the books. Unless you're a reader, I don't think you can fully understand the effect a book can have on your life. It can be life-changing. The Harry Potter series was like that for me.

After I read Book 7 (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows) I remember telling someone at church about the experience. Poor soul, she had made the mistake of asking me how the book was. How was it???!?!?!?? It was wonderful, amazing, gut-wrenching, and a hundred other adjectives. I told her that I had to stop reading every ten minutes or so because I was crying, literally sobbing, at so many different parts in the book. At one point, I had to put the book down and walk away from it for about twenty minutes or so, because it was just all too much.

The lady looked at my like I had lost my mind and said, with some disbelief, "Really?"

Umm, yes, really.

Maybe it *is* a little weird to get so emotionally caught up in a work of fiction, to consider 'Harry Potter' a hobby. to spend hours and hours on a message board discussing plot points and character motivation and thinking about what exactly that gleam in Dumbledore's eye meant. But is it any more weird to do this than to spend hours and hours on needlepoint, fly fishing, scrapbooking or acting in community theatre? I don't think so.

I kind of felt sorry for the lady, actually. She was missing out on so much! I didn't even try to explain it to her, because I knew she just wouldn't get *it*. The anticipation, the excitement, the realization....everything.

I wrote the following for a friend's website prior to the release of Book 7. (Yep, she's a friend I met through a Harry Potter online community!) I got a lot of compliments on it then, and every time I've read it since then, all of those feelings come rushing back. I'm sure they'll dull over time, but I sure hope not.




Love at Third Sight: or How Harry Potter Made Me Late to My Brother’s Wedding Reception


My first encounter with Harry Potter came by way of the Rosie O’Donnell show in 1999. I was the mother of a 13 month old girly, and five months pregnant with girly #2. Still in the throes of terrible morning sickness, I didn’t move off the sofa all that often. I read a lot of books and watched a lot of TV. During this time, having been inspired by Oprah, Rosie launched her own “book club”, this one being aimed at children. On this fateful day, (the date of which escapes me, because, let’s face it- it was eight years ago and I was pregnant! It’s a miracle I remember anything at all!) Rosie’s guest was a British author named J.K. Rowling, and she was talking about her latest book, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.

Needless to say, I wasn’t impressed.

Well, that’s not exactly the truth. I was impressed with J.K. Rowling. Her life story was inspirational- a single mother, living on welfare, writing out her story on bits of napkins and paper in a coffee shop, all while her small daughter napped in the pram.

I wasn’t impressed by anything else. I’m the first to admit it; I often will judge a book by its cover. As Rosie held up the American hardback edition with Mary Grand Pre’s artwork on the cover, all I could think was, “Urgh!”. Nothing about it appealed to me. Not the drawing, not the colors, nothing. That was the first strike.

The next strike was that the book was being promoted as ‘Children’s Fantasy’. I’ve never considered myself a fan of the fantasy genre, and in my mind, a book about a boy wizard certainly fell into the category. Strike three was that I was the mother of a toddler and pregnant. I didn’t get out a lot. Even if I had been desperate to read the book, it would have taken time and effort to track it down, and I just didn’t care that much.

My next encounter with Harry came about nine months later. My husband and I had moved in with my parents and younger siblings. I was now the mother of a 20 month old and a three month old. To say it was a stressful time would be an understatement. One day in June 2000, amid all the chaos, my 11 year old brother Matthew reminded my mom that she had promised to purchase him the new Harry Potter book when it was released in a few weeks time. Harry Potter? That name sounded familiar. Oh, that’s right! I saw a Harry Potter book on Rosie. Evidently the author had done quite well for herself in the proceeding nine months, and now a new release by her was quite a big deal.

The release day came and went.

I still felt like the books wouldn’t be my cup of tea. Matthew raved about them, and told me I just needed to give the books a chance. Finally, I gave in- I decided to read the books. I went to Matthew and asked to borrow his copy of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. Huh. He had loaned it to a friend who hadn’t given it back yet. I wasn’t about to start a new series without reading book one! So much for that idea. About a month later, I volunteered at a school book fair. A paper back copy of Sorcerer’s Stone was for sale. I picked it up for $5.99 with the idea that I would put it away and give it to Matthew for Christmas.

Encounter number three happened in Early November. I was cleaning out a closet and came across that paperback. I was at loose ends, book-wise. I put it on my nightstand with the intention of starting it that night. This time, I actually followed through. I think you can figure out the rest of the story.

I was hooked, big time.

I flew through the first three books in two days. I finished Prisoner of Azkaban late on a Thursday night. As luck would have it, Matthew had loaned out his copy of Goblet of Fire to another friend. Starting that book would have to wait until I could get to the store the next morning and buy myself a copy. This posed another problem. We were supposed to be on the road first thing that morning, on our way to Florida to attend my brother’s wedding reception.

Talking my husband into stopping at the store on the way out of town wasn’t a big deal. The difficulty came in trying to meet the needs of two small children while trying to read this amazing, inspiring, jaw-dropping piece of fiction, all while traveling in a car. Luckily, it all worked out.

We were only moderately late the reception.

Thus began my obsession with Harry Potter. It’s been seven years now, and we’re almost at the end of the adventure. My girlies (now 8 ½ and 7) have grown up with Harry Potter as a part of their lives. My husband has been drawn into the world, as well. I discovered the amazing Harry Potter fandom that exists online. The movies have added another exciting dimension. I’ve planned vacations – nay, entire summers – around the release of a new Harry Potter book three times. And now it’s all coming to a close.

It took my third encounter with Harry Potter to finally discover the magic. It seems fitting in a way that this will be the third book I anticipate, and it happens in the year that I will turn 30. Surely someone out there could find significance in all of this through arithmancy or divination. I can only hope that I get to spend my next thirty years enjoying Harry, Ron, Hermione and all of the other magnificent characters J.K. Rowling has created just as much as I have for the past seven.

Something tells me that won’t be a problem.