Harry Potter

[Buck]

Oh no you did not just compare quidditch to hockey.

*shakes fist at departing df*

[Amelia]

I dont think there is anything wrong with Harry Potter, its just that I wont read them because they are young adult books and I, as an adult, didnt enjoy them. I also wont knock an adult who reads them and if one kid starts to get interested in reading them YAY!

[Buck]

I say burn them all for being witch lovers, but I don't think everyone follows the way of the Inquisition.

[Amelia]

I was flipping through radio stations and it was around the time that the last hp book was coming out and I stopped at one and it was a religious station and the guest that they had was saying that the hp books are wiccan propaganda to lure young children into wicca.

I laughed so hard.

[AquaFizz]

Oh my gosh.

I think that's the worst part of my job. We get crazies in like that on a quasi-regular basis.

I had this one woman, everything I recommended to her, she asked, "Is it pure?" Harry Potter was out. So was Warriors because it was talking, fighting cats and that "just isn't real" or something "god created." Any book about a Princess was out, too, because that was making idols. (Which, I'm not exactly sure is true...but whatever) It was insane. Mostly because everything out these days is either fantasy (in one way or another) or catty, mean girls. Another woman came in and said her niece wanted to read 'Twilight' but that she thought that was "evil" and wanted me to recommend something else.

People are so messed up-it's really hard not to judge them.

[gelflingjen]

I think one of HP's major strengths is that it is perfectly gratuitous. It feeds that part of us that is starved first as a child and then as an adult. It feeds it with things that are forbidden to it but which it secretly craves. Things like danger, magic and heroism. I know other books do this but something stops them being quite as gratuitous about it, almost as if the author is constantly reining the story in, telling themself not to get carried away with the story, after all they need to have some "realism" to be taken seriously. HP has no such limitation, which means that for every exciting character, plotpoint and setting, Rowling gets carried away and takes us to the next level, sating our cravings like not many other authors dare. I think people are forgetting just how damned enjoyable these books are when they criticise them. In my opinion there are very few authors who have let loose their imaginations so willingly and cleverly as Rowling in both adult and children genres.

Well said. Reading them is like playing noholdsbar pretend with a child. While the books never once let me forget they are intended for kids, at the same time, they reel me in completely. I read kids books in part because I am interested in how we are relating and what stories we are telling our kids. When those who study lit look back on this time and ask why some of the most popular books of the day were Rowlings, what answers will they come up with?

The other reason I read kids/YA books is because I love the simplicity of the morality. Not to get too HP-lover-ish on you, but I like that the 'bad guy' is this lonely, untrusting fool who has taken his hardships and turned them to dominance, Hitler-like obsessions for 'purity', and perverse emotional satisfactions, while the 'good guy' has taken his rocky lot and turned it into a way to serve his community, a dedication to non-violence (when possible), and seeks loving and trusting friendships.

Simple...sweet...why not?