Harry Potter

Love it or loathe it, J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series has been a publishing phenomenon. At first I was hesitant to actually read the books because of all the hype but I finally gave in. The surprising thing was I liked the books although I was by no means a fanatic. It takes a good storyteller to appeal to such a wide audience when the target demographic was solely kids.

I was working at a bookstore at the time "The Deathly Hallows" came out and helped plan our midnight release party for it. However, I didn't get to actually go to the actual event but it was great to see how excited people were getting about a book.

Even after closure was brought to the series, the story continues on with its successful movie franchise. And there will surely be other ways to keep making money out of this machine.

The most exciting Harry Potter news is, of course, the upcoming release of "The Tales of Beedle the Bard" on December 4, 2008. Only one of seven of the author's handmade collection of fairy tales was to be available to the public and that only through a bidding war which was eventually won by Amazon for almost $4 million. The money raised went to the Children's High Level Group, a charity co-founded by Rowling.Earlier this summer, it was announced "The Tales of Beedle the Bard" was going to be released to the public after all. There will be the standard edition that goes for $12.99 which contains the new stories, an introduction by the author, reproduced illustrations from the original book, and commentaries by Professor Albus Dumbledore. Then, there will be the Amazon.com exclusive collector's limited edition which will be a replica of the original auction copy which contains the new stories, an introduction by the author, and ten new illustrations. It'll come with a velvet bag with Rowling's signature and an outer case that looks like a textbook from the Hogwarts library. The price is $100 but net proceeds from both editions will benefit Rowling's charity.

And next month, on September 23, a special anniversary edition of "The Sorcerer's Stone" will be republished with a brand new cover. Will that be enough for even the die hard fans to go out and buy it? I'm guessing yes. To further celebrate the release, there will be a "Harry Potter Cover to Cover" read-a-thon taking place at Scholastic's headquarters in New York City.

Even though this is probably unnecessary, here are the titles in the Harry Potter series and its related books all written by J.K. Rowling:

Book 1: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
Book 2: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
Book 3: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Book 4: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Book 5: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Book 6: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Book 7: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Fantastic Beasts & Where to Find Them
Quidditch Through the Ages

On the movie front, "Half-Brood Prince" has been pushed back to July 17, 2009 from the original release date of November 21, 2008. "The Deathly Hallows" will be made into two parts and be released on November 2010 and May 2011 respectively.

It's interesting to note, that the new book craze- Stephenie Meyer's Twilight saga- is following in the same footsteps as its predecessor. "Breaking Dawn" had its own midnight release parties and the "Twilight" movie will be taking over the November 21st release date.