Star Wars with occasional sarcasm
Talk about being spoiled. Some idiots posted the big spoiler from the end of “Half-Blood Prince” on a banner over a motorway in the UK. Not even PG is that mean.
Pirated copies of the book are already for sale in Mumbai and apparently it is also available on the internet. What I want to know is who the hell can type that fast?
Okay. We’re a bit biased towards Star Wars on this site. But we also have a lot of other fandom interests.
The one that is obsessing many of us lately is Harry Potter. So it is this Creator of which we speak.
JK Rowling (she who has launched millions of readers) invited the leaders of her two favorite fan sites to interview her during the release weekend festivities. The one-hour interview turned into two-hours that will be covered by both sites over the next week, or so.
Transcripts are the same on both sites, but reports are different. So we’ll just link you to the main page so you can catch up as you’re able.
Hear that George?
I don’t think anyone needs a reminder, but Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince goes on sale at midnight tonight.
Hype yourself up with a series of articles from USA Today, starting with Fans wait for midnight and Potter book.
Back cover of the Bloomsbury children’s edition of Half-Blood Prince released, includes cover copy; new information revealed. Could be considered spoilery. There’s a ton of other stuff, including the entire cover of the Scholastic deluxe edition, so I’m just going to refer Potterheads to The Leaky Cauldron and The Daily Snitch. There are (what is assumed to be) actual, concrete spoilers out on the internet, so tread carefully.
I do have to admit that I’ll be there at the midnight sale to pick up my copy of the next Harry Potter installment.
But I am quite intrigued by the level of hype surrounding its release. Is this what it looks like for the non-obsessed Star Wars fan out there? Did it really get this large?
I guess so.
No need to list everything here. Head on over to The Leaky Cauldron to watch the coverage of books being shipped. (Of particular interest is the autographed book being given away to a library.)
Personally, I’m informally refusing to go see Spielberg’s War of the Worlds in the theatre because Tom Cruise is insane. (Although mostly it’s because I’m cheap and lazy and already spent too much time in the theatre watching ROTS.) You can’t hold an actor’s Scientology-induced dementia against H.G. Wells, but you can read the entire text of the original War of the Worlds online for free, since it’s out of copyright. Dark Horse, the folks who bring us SW comics, are also getting in on the public domain action with an eComic adaption. This book cover collection of the various editions of the sci-fi classic is also worth a peak. For a more classically flavored take on the definitive alien-invasion tale, I’d also recommend Alan Moore’s League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 2.
For those inclined towards a more modern era of WOTW, War of the Worlds Invasion: The Historical Perspective is a great resource for info on Orson Welles’ infamous 1938 radio broadcast, as well as many other adaptions and historical information. They even have a blog.
Having witnessed – several times – the raucous explosion of theory and speculation that followed each reveal of the new Harry Potter cover art, I truly enjoyed McSweeney’s Things you can learn about the plot of the next Harry Potter book just by looking at the cover art. Sadly, it’s closer to the serious speculation than you’d think. Which proves my theory that rabid HP fans are totally crazy.
Of course, all hardcore fans are crazy. Even I’m not going to deny that one.
Matt Stover’s the subject of this brief article. Not too much new here, but it’s good to see that he’s still getting local press coverage.
Emerson Spartz, creator of Mugglenet, got an invitation to Scotland to interview J.K. Rowling. Lucky kid!
In other fiction news, the folks over at Bookslut have an interview with Lois McMaster Bujold.
Okay. Harry Potter is an amazing series, but it’s not worth dying over, folks.
Two men tried to sell off stolen copies of the new Harry Potter book to some tabloid papers (are we at all surprised?). In a move that many actors would appreciate, shots were then fired at the reporter when he tried to get away with the book without paying the 50,000 pound fee. (Again, not so surprised, here.)
However, Scholastic announced that all copies are safe and will be kept well managed by bookstores, if they want to get any further copies.
Thanks to The Leaky Cauldron for their intrepid reporting.