{"id":29462,"date":"2019-04-26T08:00:34","date_gmt":"2019-04-26T12:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=29462"},"modified":"2019-04-26T08:00:34","modified_gmt":"2019-04-26T12:00:34","slug":"29462","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=29462","title":{"rendered":"The Harry Potter Conundrum"},"content":{"rendered":"

Everyone who works in children\u2019s books is familiar with the Harry Potter conundrum. Written over a 10-year span, the books increased in complexity and emotional heft book by book as the characters aged up with their audience. Kids who read the first charming, magical romp when they were seven were 17 by the time the 700+ page final tome rolled around. Not a standard model for series publishing for children, the series nonetheless defined the childhoods of a generation of readers and captivated adults in equal measure.
\nIf you\u2019ve ever worked in a bookstore, you also know that Harry Potter conversations themselves are rife with tricky interactions. Many a precocious six, seven, or eight year old has read Harry Potter, leaving their parents confident that they are ready for something just as thick or written at an equal level (which by book seven basically means YA). It\u2019s almost a bookselling clich\u00e9 at this point\u2014that everyone\u2019s gifted grandchild has read Harry Potter years ahead of their peers and needs something new to challenge them at their \u201cadvanced level.\u201d
\nAs much as the clich\u00e9 is based on real bookstore dynamics, these conversations don\u2019t make me roll my eyes. I understand why it\u2019s so confusing. Harry Potter has entered our cultural zeitgeist to the point where kids are motivated to read beyond their comfort zone just to find out what the excitement is about. It doesn\u2019t mean that going back to something a little lighter is a backslide, and it also doesn\u2019t mean their attention will be held by something equally hefty and involved. That\u2019s what I tell parents and grandparents all the time, and, honestly, they usually get it.
\nBut reading level isn\u2019t the only issue at play. By the time the fantasy has careened to its riveting yet somber end, a large number of beloved characters have met grisly ends, and everyone who remains carries indelible scars of trauma and loss. Taken as a whole, this is not a series for your average eight or even nine year old, especially when you add in its sinister explorations of intolerance and totalitarianism. But the pull of Harry Potter is strong. Eager to share the magic of the wizarding world with their kids, parents want to rush in where booksellers often urge caution.
\nLike many booksellers, I used to believe that it was better to just wait. After all, why rush into something too early if you\u2019ll get the most out of it by holding off a few years. But book one is luminous and magical and perfectly pitched to enchant younger readers with the allure of worlds unseen. Who doesn\u2019t want to share a piece of that with their emerging reader? As a parent of one of those dreaded precocious readers who wants to read everything and has heard so much about Hogwarts and Harry Potter, I suddenly found myself wondering: why not?
\nIf book one is perfect for him right now, why not let him have that experience? I talked to him about why the whole series isn\u2019t right for him right now, and we made a deal. We\u2019ve been reading the first book together the first time so we can share the experience and talk about it. And then he can reread it as many times as he wants before we read the next one. And when will that be? Well, for now \"\"<\/a>we\u2019ve decided six months until book two and we\u2019ll see how that goes. Maybe we\u2019ll feel ready for book three in six months after that or maybe not. Book three starts transitioning to a markedly grittier tone, with the terrifying threat of the dementors and the arrival of Sirius Black. I talked to some friends, and one reported that they\u2019re reading a chapter every other week to spread it out over a longer period of time. Another reported that her kids adored books one and two\u00a0but started getting nightmares at book three, so they stopped for a while. And\u00a0of course it only gets darker from there. But that\u2019s okay. We can wait.
\nWith months or even years between each installment, it might take us a long time to get to the end, but why does Harry Potter have to be all or nothing? After all, anticipation of the next book is half the fun. Just remember what it felt like for all of us the first time around!
\n(Oh, and we don\u2019t plan to get the illustrated editions any time soon, as magnificent as they are.\u00a0The true joy lies in imagining the world for yourself, as a like-minded customer and I agreed earlier this week.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sure, the series gets really dark. But who says it has to be all or nothing?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29462"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29462\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}