“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”
The last Harry Potter book came out at 12:01 AM, last night. I read it straight until about 6:00 AM, by which time I had to read each page approximately three times, in order to comprehend what was printed on it. I went to sleep until about 11:00 AM, then I woke-up and finished the book. It’s a wonderful story, “Deathly Hallows” is, and the ending is happy, but… I’m sad. Harry Potter has been a big part of my life. I’ve read these stories since they first came out, gone to midnight release parties (at independent booksellers, natch) for each new book. And I keep forgetting that this will never happen again. This was the first time that I took a nap, in the middle of reading a new Harry Potter book; I still find myself thinking things like “I won’t do that, with the next book.”
There won’t be a next book. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is the last in a wonderful and surprisingly political series of novels. I can still make predictions for what will happen, what has happened, off-page, but a new book will neither confirm nor deny my guesses.
Thank you, Jo Rowling. You have given me one of the greatest joys of my childhood, which is now over, anyway. The excitement of waiting for a new Harry Potter book is comparable, for me, only to the excitement that an actor has, just before stepping onstage on opening night.
