Harry Potter
I know there is an absolute hatred of the Harry Potter books amongst your good selves, but at least hear me out.

I know they are not brilliant works of fiction, or works of anything most of you with give any credit to, but they have such a special place in my heart.
My Brother and his wife live in Edinburgh, and as such, they heard about the books very early on. They sent mini-me the first one in 1998 when he was 7 and I was just moving on my own with him from Liverpool to Bristol to go to university.
Even at that age he was a voracious reader, and he bleated on about the book day in day out, ‘Mum, MUM, MUM, MUM you HAVE to read this’ until one day on the train going back home to see my mum, I reluctantly agreed.
I will never forget his little face as he sat, all blue eyed and blonde curly haired desperately awaiting my approval on a story that he had thrown himself into wholeheartedly and was so excited about. I have to admit I was hooked.
I loved it, I loved the idea! But I especially loved that he loved it too.

From that point on, every new book that came out turned into a fight…Who ever bought it first, and yes, he did on one occasion go to the midnight opening of Waterstones (even with my sneering) to buy it first, got to read it. We would wrangle and flap and bribe each other as to who would get to read it one evening or the other, one chapter at a time. Desperately trying to remember which bit each of us were up to as to not give anything away for the other, but SO wanting to talk about where we were up to.

They grew up together, their lives were intertwined, the experiences, loss, love, friendships, maturing, responsibility and all that it contained touched mini-me and me as we lived what happening from the page. We talked about it for hours, giggling at the humour, upset at the disasters, and ever excited at what would happen next. Although their ages were slightly different, there was a feeling of growing up together that he wasn’t aware of, but I was.

The last book came out 10 years after our adventure started, and as I read the closing chapter, laying on the sofa, on my own, I struggled to finish it, I’m not ashamed to say, I cried, like a baby. This part of our lives together had come to a close, life had flown by quicker than I ever could have imagined it could.

At the end of it all?

After all those years of torment, angst, struggles, heartache, fun, crazy emotions, loss of parents, and everything that a boy could cope with, he had grown into a man. He had cemented his future, one who could stand on his own two feet and was confident to face the world as an adult. He was an independent man, not a boy anymore, someone who had made his mark in the world and someone who his mother, would be very, very, proud of.
( Herb Alpert's Taxi Driver I have very beautiful lips, Sat 7 Jan 2012, 23:54, 14 replies)

Oh my!

(shezam slouching towards nirvana., Sat 7 Jan 2012, 23:58, closed)

I think a lot of the anti Harry Potter stuff is just people deciding to be anti anything that is popular/mainstrem/successful without ever having read the books themselves (or even seen the films). A bit like NME readers who sneer at any band who aren't new and fresh and unheard of.

If nothing else the Harry Potter books got a lot of kids into reading, and that's not a bad thing.
(Bitter and Twisted, Sun 8 Jan 2012, 0:14, closed)

For me admitting to liking harry potter to my friends
Is like admitting to listening to maroon five or watching eastenders.
(shezam slouching towards nirvana., Sun 8 Jan 2012, 0:20, closed)

Hear hear. I've not read any myself and have only seen the first movie, but I completely agree that if the books helped lots of kids get into reading then thats a good thing.
( enoughblueskyforsailorstrousers, Sun 8 Jan 2012, 0:47, closed)

It is generational too I think
mini-me is now 21 and has a certain snobbery (VERY SNOBBISH) about him when it comes to music especially. BUT, as he grew up with Harry Potter, he will defend it no matter what.
( Herb Alpert's Taxi Driver I have very beautiful lips, Sun 8 Jan 2012, 0:57, closed)

I've only read a few of the books.
She should've just sold the rights and employed a good screen writer to help her do the rest.
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Sun 8 Jan 2012, 7:02, closed)

Oh no it didn't
Research has shown that Harry Potter made no difference whatsoever to children's reading.
(ubergeekian, Sun 8 Jan 2012, 14:41, closed)

I think a lot of the anti Harry Potter stuff is
because it's tired, shockingly-written, predictable bilge.
( Tab Hunter Make this useless process end and so, begin again, Sun 8 Jan 2012, 17:08, closed)

^Nicely done.^

( number5 has been fighting tramps and losing., Mon 9 Jan 2012, 8:13, closed)

^click^
Liked your post. I read to my kids each night and to be honest don't think I will stop until they shout, "get out of my room you dirty fucker, I'm trying to shag my wife/husband."

If you want a really heavy serious read go get some freaking Kafka put a beret on your head, crowd into a basement bar in Berlin and discuss The Trial (which is a bloody trial to read), whilst listening to some overrated home made wankish poetry. Might as well put the world to rights whilst your at it, like that ever worked...

If you want something really easy, fun, magical and simply entertaining then the Harry Potter books are superb. They are not meant to be classics, they are meant to be harmless entertaining escapism for kids and adults alike.

Kids love the HP books because they like to play pretend. Adults who love them remember what it was like to play pretend.
( sutit only the crumbliest, flakiest posts, Sun 8 Jan 2012, 1:01, closed)

re harry Potter
I have to say that your post touched a nerve as I have read all the Harry Potter series (and queued at bookstores at midnight and then stayed up all night to read it before dawn.)
My one regret is that my daughter who is a voracious reader will not even pick one up. I have no idea why - she reads lots of fantasy type books and in fact reads lots of books period but although the whole series is sitting on our shelves waiting to be read she just ignores them.

I am not young I am almost 60 but I enjoyed them immensely.

I think there is an inverted snobbery about the books a kind of 'If they are that successful, they must be rubbish' kind of view. I personally will stick my neck out and say that I find them very well written indeed.
(Stunt slug If God existed I'd want to fight him, Sun 8 Jan 2012, 1:52, closed)

She doesn't read them
because you do. Simple as that. Kids don't like their parents' favourite music, their parents' favourite clothes or their parents' favourite books.
(ubergeekian, Sun 8 Jan 2012, 14:43, closed)

this isn't true in my house
although if mini-me liked my favourite clothes there might be something he needs to tell me.
( Herb Alpert's Taxi Driver I have very beautiful lips, Sun 8 Jan 2012, 19:55, closed)

I'll have to concur with that.
I didn't read 'em though but spent an absolutely blissful summer last year listening to the audiobooks read by Stephen Fry.

Hooked I was. So much so that I've been craving something similar to fill the void.
( dirtyscarab intends to live forever. So far, so good..., Sun 8 Jan 2012, 5:00, closed)

I loved the Harry Potter books.
The first one was given to me when I was 8, and it was the first novel I ever read. And I still reread them. I have copies that are so dog eared and worn that they're just about falling apart. Top series.
(Poppet some assembly required., Mon 9 Jan 2012, 6:36, closed)

Me too
Our daughter was eleven when the first book came out, but only caught on with book 2. We both read them to 'see what all the fuss was about' and thus got sucked in.

It's not that they're particularly well written, but the scope of the series is brilliant - start when they first go to 'big school' and end up when they enter the big world. There are good bits and bad bits, plenty of loose ends and contradictory bits, e.g. how come none of Harry's generation became animaguses(animagi?), that would have been really useful wouldn't it? How do witches/wizards ever get married to muggles? In the books, the two worlds hardly ever meet, certainly not socially. But most of all, why the hell didn't Voldemort kill Harry the good old fashioned way when he found that magic wouldn't work??? Cut his head off with a sword and you've won!!

But, having said that, yes, I queued up at midnight with my daughter for book 4, yes we discussed them, picked them apart, yes we went to the films too, and I have no shame.

I read 'proper literture' too, Rushdie, AS Byatt, Rose Tremaine, Carol Shields, VS Naipaul, Joyce etc. I read detective books: Connolly, Rankin, Deaver (even Dick Francis!), I read (and re-read) Terry Pratchett when I can't find anything else to read and I've read Harry Potter too - big deal.

What I can't stand is people that sneer at anyone for reading a book, when they themselves watch, say, Tomb Raider films or James Bond or Lord of the Rings....or porn or war films or SciFi etc. etc.

Just fucking live and let live!
(Che Grimsdale Best before:, Mon 9 Jan 2012, 13:38, closed)

This post would make a fantastic ending to a book.
Seriously, I felt like I'd got to the end of the last chapter where the heroine, you, having described in pages past the trials and milestones in a life shared with your son, close out by letting us know how it all turned out.
The first line would have normally put me off, but I was intrigued and glad that I read it all.

*doffs cap in your direction*
( NooShmoo It's a fantazmagorical pile of ultra bollocks, Mon 9 Jan 2012, 18:09, closed)