Harry Potter dead???

[Sex and Death]

The Long Walk I loved that one. One of the books he wrote under the pseudonym Richard Bachman. I bought the collection of 'Bachman's' novels years ago.

I liked Rage a lot, although in these post-Columbine days it would never be published.

I lovedThe Running Man as well. The novel was much better than the stupid movie.

There was another as well, which I remember little about except I liked it.

I like King best when he keeps himself short. Otherwise, too much stuff in his books to keep me interested.

And Needful Things was a rip off of Something Wicked This Way Comes.

It surprised me that my favorite SK was the Gunslinger series...until the last chapter in the entire series, which was laughable and a great disappointment, but also fitting for SK and his very blue collar-everyman sensinilities.

Roland is an unapologetic man on a mission. Too few of those in modern and postmodern literature, popular lit or literary fiction, let alone the flesh 'n blood world. Strangely, SK has that aspect in him. Gotta respect that. SK is a messenger for his muse. He's full of real humility...knows he's not playing god, let alone being god.

S&D

 

[Guest]

I never cared for King's books. Too much superfluous bullshit in the first chapters to keep me interested in the real story. I love the movies made from his books and he does have some damned good plot lines. I just can't read it.

Never read any of Irving's books and not really interested in attempting them. (Ok, somebody send me one and I'll try it) Saw Garp, Robin Williams was brilliant, as always. And it was, again, a good story.

Harry Potter? Saw the second one at the theater, a friend made me go, The effects were great, the story a little bland for what it was. Just wasn't impressed enough to go buying books or seeing any more movies.

Irving can be a little awkward to read sometimes. A Prayer for Owen Meany remains my favorite of is, although I've read a few others. And he's no lightweight on character torture and death, but he leaves the little animals out of it. He's also very funny -- if you like somewhat absurd humor.

You want to borrow a copy of one of his books, lemme know. I have most of them.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

I haven't read the sixth one as yet, so responses spoiler-free please.

whoa, glad you said that... almost slipped something earlier, glad I didn't...

 

[Sex and Death]

As far as the main thrust of this thread, I think SK is right, Potter shouldn't be killed.

It may seem contradictory to say, but most of the violence in Harry Potter is out of place, while in SK's stories it is congruent with the implied world. Violence in Harry Potter is just arbitrary and detracts from the story. Rawling doesn't write violence well at all. I still don't get what pissed Voldemort off so much, and he doesn't sell as a genuine bad seed or psycho/sociopath. I think he should be in the Wussy thread.

S&D

 

[CrimsonMaiden]

Rowling said point-blank in an interview that she would not kill Harry. (I can't remember where I read it but it was an interview with a main Harry Potter fansite.)

 

[Svenskaflicka]

I bet JKR will do a Frodo on Harry. Remember the end of the Ring-trilogy, where Frodo isn't really dead, but he travels to the land of the elves, where you live for ever without aging?
I bet Harry will fall through the veil and meet Sirius and his parents on the other side, and they'll tell him that wizards and witches don't really die, they just continue to exist in a different form in a different world...

...kind of like Nangijala .

 

[cantdog]

Road Work was the other Bachman book. That one was good, too...

edited to add: Rage is no longer in print. They don't sell it.

Yeah. Rage was supposed to have been read by the Columbine kids.

I love the Laurie King books, but she is brutal to her characters, sometimes. Her female protagonists often end up maimed. Then, as the series continues, we see them still maimed, still limited by old injuries, laboring under those handicaps. This is far from usual in detective fiction.

 

[cantdog]

Irving can be a little awkward to read sometimes. A Prayer for Owen Meany remains my favorite of is, although I've read a few others. And he's no lightweight on character torture and death, but he leaves the little animals out of it. He's also very funny -- if you like somewhat absurd humor.

You want to borrow a copy of one of his books, lemme know. I have most of them.

I liked Owen Meany. You are not the only person I know who thinks it his very best.

 

[Quiet_Cool]

Road Work was the other Bachman book. That one was good, too...

edited to add: Rage is no longer in print. They don't sell it.

I have a collection of the original four Bachman books. The ones you mentioned. I only read "Rage," and it was pretty good, though simplistic. There was also "Thinner," and then "The Regulators," not that this is the topic right now.

As for Harry, if he has to die, sobeit. If not, if the story doesn't demand it, then sobeit as well. I gathered the impression from the article, however, that Rowling wasn't trying to say that her reasoning for killing characters had something to do with toughening up the audience. Inversely, I felt that she meant that she felt the concept of doing so was less a "violation" of the status of her books (being directed toward young adults) for that reason, that young adults have to learn to become not-so-young adults.

Q_C

 

[Boota]

I don't care if she kills Harry or not. I just want to read the story as she writes it. I recently read all six books back to back and she hasn't disappointed me. She'll do whatever the story calls for. If people don't like it - fuck 'em. It's her story, her characters. She can kill them with impugnity. If Harry dies he will die cool, and that's not so bad.

Personally, I don't think she'll kill Harry. She'll bring him back to Hogwarts as a teacher in Welcome Back, Potter.

 

[Tom Collins]

I don't care if she kills Harry or not. I just want to read the story as she writes it. I recently read all six books back to back and she hasn't disappointed me. She'll do whatever the story calls for. If people don't like it - fuck 'em. It's her story, her characters. She can kill them with impugnity. If Harry dies he will die cool, and that's not so bad.

Personally, I don't think she'll kill Harry. She'll bring him back to Hogwarts as a teacher in Welcome Back, Potter.

Oh, dear God! I didn't know you had it in you, Boota. I think I'm in love...

 

[cantdog]

Welcome Back, Potter... love it.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

As long as she kills Ginny Sleazy, I'm happy...

Or atleast writes something that stops that bitch from sicking her filthy claws in Harry in the last book!

 

[Sex and Death]

I don't care if she kills Harry or not. I just want to read the story as she writes it. I recently read all six books back to back and she hasn't disappointed me. She'll do whatever the story calls for. If people don't like it - fuck 'em. It's her story, her characters. She can kill them with impugnity. If Harry dies he will die cool, and that's not so bad.

Personally, I don't think she'll kill Harry. She'll bring him back to Hogwarts as a teacher in Welcome Back, Potter.

We all have our sacred cows, eh.

I don't like a lot of her choices as an author, but I don't feel I deserve a fuckem. She's mediocre writer with a great imagination and an exceptional nose for marketing and choosing publicists.

I enjoy the series a lot, and it's certainly one for the popular literature history books.

If she kills Harry, I hope she doesn't do it as arbitrarily and as cheaply as she's killed others. I'd like to read The Adventures of Harry the Auror someday, and see him teaching dark arts at Hogwarts.

S&D

 

[Munachi]

I bet JKR will do a Frodo on Harry. Remember the end of the Ring-trilogy, where Frodo isn't really dead, but he travels to the land of the elves, where you live for ever without aging?
I bet Harry will fall through the veil and meet Sirius and his parents on the other side, and they'll tell him that wizards and witches don't really die, they just continue to exist in a different form in a different world...

...kind of like Nangijala .

except they die TWICE. that's consequent though, i guess. except i liked the idea of nangijala better than that second place, because in the long run fires and fairy tells must get boring, i suppose...

 

[Wildcard Ky]

In a recent interview, Rowling said that two characters will definitely die in #7, and that she was still undecided about Harry.

Obviously, the loser of the Harry/Voldemort battle will die. My other guess is that Snape will die defending Harry.

 

[Boota]

There are a lot of scenarios I could see playing out in the last book. I really don't think Harry will die to end the series, though. I wouldn't be surprised to see Draco Malfoy die accidentally by his father's hand in the heat of battle. I think Draco might step up and side with Harry at the end. I'd be surprised if Ron or Hermione died. Neville Longbottom will probably turn out to be some bad ass wizard and he could die fighting. As was mentioned already, Snape is a likely candidate. Possibly too likely, if she's trying to throw a curve.

I don't think she'll kill one of the main three primarily because it's not what the audience wants. That's the very reason I'd do it, but she's a much nicer person than I am.

 

[Wildcard Ky]

What sucks is that it will be 11 more months before we can find out.

From what I've heard, the 7th book will be released on 7/7/07

 

[Tom Collins]

What sucks is that it will be 11 more months before we can find out.

From what I've heard, the 7th book will be released on 7/7/07

Jesus...that would be so obnoxious. I'm gonna be pissed if they hold that book for months after she's finished writing it just to release it on a specific date. I already have to wait an extra 6-9 months to get the damned thing since I started buying them in trade size paperback instead of hardback. Basically, I have to wait til a friend buys it and reads it before I can unless I want to buy the damned thing twice, which I don't.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

Jesus...that would be so obnoxious. I'm gonna be pissed if they hold that book for months after she's finished writing it just to release it on a specific date. I already have to wait an extra 6-9 months to get the damned thing since I started buying them in trade size paperback instead of hardback. Basically, I have to wait til a friend buys it and reads it before I can unless I want to buy the damned thing twice, which I don't.

Library!!!

 

[Guest]

Library!!!

Are you on the waiting list already?



I do love that, and how our library will mail them out to you when they finally arrive. Such a treat to come home to a brand new book in the mail!

But I'm awfully hard on books. I have paperback copies of the hardbacks I truly love and they are all over the house. I literally read 'em until the pages fall out.

Thank goodness our kids are the same way.

 

[RogueLurker]

Library!!!

Not sure what your library system is like, but for a book like that, the waiting list will be in the high hundreds ... and for the new HP, they'll start the list six months before release date. It's liable to be out in paperback before it comes available through the library.

PS Tom, you need a literary sugar daddy to keep you up to date on the newest releases.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

Not sure what your library system is like, but for a book like that, the waiting list will be in the high hundreds ... and for the new HP, they'll start the list six months before release date. It's liable to be out in paperback before it comes available through the library.

PS Tom, you need a literary sugar daddy to keep you up to date on the newest releases.

Just get your name on the list early... and then it's a race, whether or not you'll get called or it will come out in paperback first...

 

[RogueLurker]

Just get your name on the list early... and then it's a race, whether or not you'll get called or it will come out in paperback first...

I haven't even read the last one ... but we'll probably buy the new one when it comes out.

 

[BustyLaTarte]

From what I've heard, the 7th book will be released on 7/7/07

Blech. Seems dumb to make people wait so long just for a silly gimmick. Who ever remembers the exact date a book is released anyway?

My birthday was 6/6/06 this year, and I remember they released that godawful Omen remake that day. I don't believe the date did anything to help their abysmal box office.