The Harry Potter Lexicon Decision

The U.S. District Court Judge Robert P. Patterson issued his ruling in the case Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. et al vs. RDR Books et al. He ruled in favor of J.K. Rowling and against Steve Vander Ark in the matter of book The Harry Potter Lexicon going beyond fair use of copyrighted material and found that it infringed on Rowling's intellectual property rights.

The full 68 page decision can be read here.

I blogged about this case last year when the lawsuit was filed. In that post I was upfront saying that I had met Steve Vander Ark on two occasions and had corresponded with him a few times via email. I classified our relationship as acquaintances, but not as friends.

(I honestly do not think that I rank high enough on his radar screen to be considered as anything more than an acquaintance.)

In that post I had not taken any definitive side on the lawsuit because I felt that there was not enough public information on the case, I knew there was enough legal ambiguity on the issue of fair use and copyright law, and I did not want to take sides based on emotion or out of a sense of loyalty.

Now that the decision has been rendered, I still wish that RDR Books had responded in a more forthcoming manner when they were first contacted by the lawyers from Warner Brothers. For starters, I think they should have provided a copy of the manuscript for review.

If there could have been modifications made to the manuscript at that stage ameliorating objections from Rowling, then the book might have been published without the lawsuit being filed. However, that is a big, "What if?" and it is impossible to go back in time to reverse the events as they happened.

Here is the statement by Jo Rowling on the ruling that appears on Publisher's Weekly online:

“I took no pleasure at all in bringing legal action and am delighted that this issue has been resolved favourably,” said Rowling in a statement. “I went to court to uphold the right of authors everywhere to protect their own original work. The court has upheld that right. The proposed book took an enormous amount of my work and added virtually no original commentary of its own. Now the court has ordered that it must not be published. Many books have been published which offer original insights into the world of Harry Potter. The Lexicon just is not one of them.”

I take that to mean that as long as writers include sufficient original commentary and provide new insights on her series, she will probably not interfere with the publication of companion books.

That is good to know, because I have friends who have published books in the past analyzing the Harry Potter series and are working on future books as well.

I am referring to John Granger's work whose most recent books include How Harry Cast His Spell: The Meaning Behind the Mania for J. K. Rowling's Bestselling Books and The Deathly Hallows Lectures: The Hogwarts Professor Explains the Final Harry Potter Adventure.

I am confident that Rowling will not have a problem with any of Granger's companion titles for he definitely provides analysis and original insight to her work and -- while I may not always agree with his arguments -- his writings are always thought provoking.

The ruling against Vander Ark will stop the Harry Potter Lexicon from being published in book form, but he has another book about the Harry Potter series in the works. His other project is a travel guide for Potter fans. It will be titled: In Search of Harry Potter and has not yet been released.

The Guardian mentions the forthcoming book as:

The independent publisher describes the resulting book as an "extraordinary travel book" which "evokes the myths and magic of Harry Potter". Methuen managing director Peter Tummons said that at present, each chapter includes a "few words" taken from the Harry Potter books themselves. "We've asked for approval but I guess in the end we will probably delete them because it may not come, or be denied." The book is illustrated with Vander Ark's own photos.

I saw Vander Ark's presentation at Sonorus in 2007 and was impressed. He included photos he had taken in Scotland of where he surmised that Hogwarts was located. It even had a sign near a rural train station saying "Keep Out" which since we are only mere Muggles, we would see as opposed to a glorious castle.

I wish Steve well with this publishing venture and that the legal wrangling on these issues will be over for all the parties. I also hope that the fandom does not respond with venom toward anyone. I could not stomach reading many of the comments posted on various fansites that spewed vitriol mostly in the direction of Steve, but some was also directed toward Rowling.

They deserve better.


ETA: After I finished this post I heard a segment on National Public Radio's Talk of the Nation interviewing an intellectual property rights attorney discussing this case. The audio will be available later here.

Orson Scott Card on the Rowling/Vander Ark lawsuit

Thanks to the wonder of Google alerts I was made aware of a recent editorial written by noted science fiction author Orson Scott Card.

He is not amused by the lawsuit filed by J.K. Rowling against RDR books in the Harry Potter Lexicon case.

In the piece Card calls Rowling a hypocrite, insane, and a puffed-up coward.

Yikes.

I guess he won't be on her Christmas card list this year.

Edited to add:

This morning after I read the post by Card, I forwarded a link to my friend John Granger. He was inspired to write a thoughtful and thought provoking post which assimilated reviews of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by Card, Steven King and A.S. Byatt and then challenged us to think about how your opinion of an author can color your interpretation of their work.

It's a great post and I recommend that you read it and give him your feedback on the topic.

---

From looking at Card's website I discovered that he is having a literary boot camp for writers this July in San Diego. The description sounds like it would be an intense experience. Registration is limited to only fifteen people for the boot camp, but there is a shorter two day (but twelve hour a day) writing class that precedes it.

Check it out if you are interested.

It would be a chance to learn from an expert.

Sins of the Media: JKR vs. Vander Ark, San Francisco vs. Marin, and Flag Pins

I apologize for the hiatus in my blogging but I have been diligently editing my manuscript, expanding scenes, adding nuances, tweaking, all based on recent feedback.

I have been itching to put down my thoughts about media coverage that has made my blood boil. There has been a lot of criticism written about the three subjects I am going to address, but I have not seen my particular angles reflected anywhere and so I shall share them with you.

Here are three recent controversies covered in the media:

1. The lawsuit between J.K. Rowling and RDR Books over the possible publication of The Harry Potter Lexicon.
2. The brouhaha about Senator Barack Obama’s comments made at a fundraiser in Northern California which included the word “bitter.”
3. ABC News recent televised debate between Senator Obama and Senator Clinton and calls to boycott ABC News.

First off comes the lawsuit by J.K. Rowling, the author of the wildly popular Harry Potter series, against RDR Books who had signed Steve Vander Ark, one of the most prominent members of the Harry Potter fandom, to publish in book form basically what was available online on Vander Ark's wildly popular website. The Harry Potter Lexicon would in essence be an encyclopedia of the Harry Potter series and because Rowling had announced she planned on writing her own encyclopedia of her series, she saw RDR’s plans as potentially threatening the success of her future book.

I mentioned in a previous blog entry my initial thoughts on the JKR/Steve Vander Ark brouhaha and classified my relationship with Steve as being an acquaintance but not a friend.

I have been paying close attention to the lawsuit because it deals with intellectual property rights, what constitutes fair use, etc. I am not an expert by any means on intellectual property law. My knowledge on the subject is based reading The Copyright Permission and Libel Handbook and Kirsch’s Handbook of Publishing Law as well as hearing a few attorneys speak on the subject a few times at various writers conferences and writers club meetings.

I care about intellectual property rights because I want to know what are my rights and responsibilities as a writer.

That means that I know enough to realize that this subject to know this case is very complex and it is not a “slam dunk” or “open and shut case.” Nope. It represents a murky area of property law and is therefore being watched carefully because it will likely be precedent setting, unless the parties take the judge’s advice and settle their disagreements out of court.

The aspect of the media coverage that irked me was how some reporters deliberately inserted their opinion about Steve Vander Ark’s looks. It was uncalled for and also WRONG.

One article by the wire service Reuters said:

“An emotional Vander Ark, 50, wearing spectacles similar to those worn by Harry Potter…”

That actually made me pause in my reading because I have met Steve and I definitely would have noticed if he had worn glasses with round lenses.

For the record, Harry Potter’s iconic glasses look like this:

If Steve Vander Ark wore glasses like that it would have struck me as a bit odd, as if he were taking this fantasy thing a bit too far. I think that was the subtle (or not so subtle) intent of the reporter who filed the story.

However, it had been a year since I saw him last and people can change their eyewear. I asked a friend of mine about that and he gratefully helped scour the web to determine that Steve’s glasses were more elliptical shaped than round. They look more like this:

Another reporter, this time from the New York Times, felt it necessary to describe Vander Ark in distinctly Potterverse terms:

“The librarian, Steven Jan Vander Ark, had the mild-mannered demeanor of Ron Weasley, and the intelligence, charm — and haircut — of Harry Potter. Even his name sounds like that of a character in one of the books, if preceded by “Lord” or “Master.” Although, at 50, he is older than Ms. Rowling, 42, he looked like a schoolboy, with an unlined face and caramel-colored hair parted down the middle.”

Ahem. Anyone who is familiar with the series would know that Ron Weasley is anything but mild-mannered, and well, Harry Potter’s hair is notorious for being black and having messy cowlicks.

Steve may have a boyish face, but his hairstyle is not like Harry Potter’s. He would have had to dye it black and come to court with a bed-head.

Honestly, the reporters were stretching to make a visual comparison between a fan of the Harry Potter series and one of the characters. It annoys me because not only are these comparisons untrue, but this done deliberately. I wonder what literary character they would have chosen as a comparison if he was balding and had a comb over. Would they then just throw their hands in the air and call him Ebenezer Scrooge?

For those interested in seeing what Steve Vander Ark really looks like, here’s a decent photo.

My assumption is that the reporters who attacked his looks thought that this fifty year old guy should “get a life” and not obsess over a children’s series, so they made fun of him in the hopes of making the public dislike him for taking on a popular author. That is my reaction and admittedly, I have no real idea what the reporters were thinking when they described Steve Vander Ark in the manner they did, but it feeds my suspicions about the veracity of today’s journalists. It also makes me think that they did not know to report about the intricacies of the legal arguments and found it easier to try and entertain their readers rather than to inform.

Now onto my second subject: the media’s inability to tell the difference between San Francisco and Marin Counties.

This is another minor point, but it goes to show that the media is sloppy when it comes to fact-checking. The recent dustup about a comment made by Senator Obama regarding some people in Pennsylvania as being “bitter” was made in a private fundraiser in the town of Kentfield in Marin County. It was not in San Francisco.

In my first attempt at writing this blog entry I inserted a map from Google maps to help illustrate my point. Unfortunately, I believe that is what made Blogger eat my post. So rather than suffer a fourth blog related melt down, here is a link to a map if you would like to see where Kentfield is located in proximity to San Francisco.

I actually know two people who attended that now infamous fundraiser and so I know it was not in San Francisco. It was in Marin County.

Now, admittedly San Francisco is far more famous than Marin County, so the first accounts of this tempest in a teapot used San Francisco as a landmark for people to understand where this took place. I remember hearing reporters saying that the fundraiser was in Marin County which is north of San Francisco. Then as the talking heads furor grew, the later accounts truncated the description to being in “San Francisco.”

Why does this matter to me? Well, I know that it is wrong, and I hate mistakes being perpetuated.

This error has been repeated enough that has become The Truth and the original facts are rendered incidental. I hate that.

It is one thing for us to not understand the true origins of legends from our past, but it is another thing to willfully disregard simple facts such as location as being too troublesome to a narrative.

Another reason that this error grates on my nerves is this type of mistake is a longstanding pet peeve of a local columnist. She hates it when the geography in our community is mangled by lazy out-of-town reporters. As if consulting a map was too onerous a task for reporters to do before filing a story.

After reading several columns of her poking fun at magazines which surreptitiously move our county seat of Santa Rosa from Sonoma County to that of Napa County, I started getting a wee bit sensitive on the issue.

Why does that bother us so much? One it is sloppy and lazy, then there is also an intense rivalry with our neighboring county to the east. The mountain range that divides us is affectionately known as The Continental Divide.

Don’t be confusing Napa and Sonoma on us. As one of our local celebrities Tommy Smothers is fond of saying:

“Sonoma makes wine.

Napa makes…auto parts.”

So getting back to the media: every time they get sloppy with the facts someone notices. Now the large general audience may not recognize every error, but each time a reporter or commentator gets lazy and reports inaccuracies some people will be the wiser and they will think of it as a strike against the profession. It feeds the feeling of ill will which leads me to my third point.

The most recent televised debate between the Democratic candidates for president hosted by ABC News has been widely panned.

Charlie Gibson, George Stephanopoulous and ABC News earned every negative comment that has been hurled in their general direction. The American people deserved better than a waste of national airtime talking about flag pins and trying to assign guilt by association from the acts and words of others.

This debate was going to generate huge ratings for whatever network carried it because of the stakes involved in the presidential race, but not due to the hosts or their questions. If ABC News thought that this debate was going to showcase two of their most prominent anchors and hoped that might translate into new viewers for their nightly news broadcasts as well as their Sunday morning chat show, they were wrong.

The fallout of that debate has included calls for a boycott of ABC News. I sympathize with that gesture, but I cannot join that cause because to boycott you have to give up something. I cannot be part of a boycott of ABC News because I stopped watching network news years ago. In fact, I was unsure whether Charles Gibson was host of “Good Morning America” or the evening news. That shows how little I paid attention or even cared.

I do not watch televised local news nor do I watch national network news and have not done so for many years.

I used to watch it though. I used to watch it all the time. It was part of my daily routine along with reading the newspaper. I still read the paper, but I no longer watch network news.

The feeling of discontent with the nightly dose of carnage leading the local news grew as well as disgust with the increasing infotainment styled stories to titillate the viewers. I used to live in the Midwest and my Midwestern sensibility was shocked when on a visit to Los Angeles, the local news led off their broadcast with the day’s events in the Zsa Zsa Gabor Cop Slapping Trial.

I could understand that being the top story for “Entertainment Tonight,” but the local ABC affiliate? I was aghast. And well, to me that was the beginning of the descent of integrity of news and sliding over into what should be the domain of celebrity/sleaze tabloid shows.

At some point I stopped watching the local news and found that my attitude improved. Somewhere along the line I also stopped watching the network news. That’s the thing about habits, once you break a habit you might not pick it up again.

Therein lies the rub with network news because their viewing audience is shrinking and it is aging. The demographics for network news are getting worse every year and they are failing to attract younger audiences to replace those who have died.

The televised news media has become largely scandal and celebrity driven. I remember being in an airport several years ago and catching CNN covering some aspect of news in our federal government I was interested in, but they interrupted that story to show a press conference about the “Runaway Bride.”

Disgusted, I left that television monitor and found a quiet place to read a book while waiting for my plane.

Time and again the American populace is treated with tabloid news stories rather than covering stories of substance. It makes me sick. If I want tabloid news, I’ll seek it out.

It may sound strange, but I now get my televised news from The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, The Colbert Report, and also Countdown with Keith Olbermann.

Two are comedy shows and one is overtly biased news. I appreciate them because they cut through the spin and point out hypocrisy either through satire or by droll comments.

This habit started by my catching one episode of “The Daily Show” and enjoying the satirical take on the news. I tuned in again and again, soon it was became a habit and part of my routine. A similar thing happened with Olbermann’s show. I caught one night’s show, I liked it, later I saw another and another. Now I specifically schedule time to watch its initial broadcast or I try to catch a rebroadcast. Every day.

I need that filter for my news, because many times reporters act like dictation machines and do not take the time to do any fact checking. I want statements by public officials to be analyzed for veracity and rectified against the facts. If I did not have Olbermann and Stewart to filter my news I would probably sound like a crazy woman screaming at the television set "Do they think the American people are irretrievably stupid or that we simply have a memory of a gnat?"

It would not be pretty, so for the sake of my sanity and for my family I refrain from watching unfiltered news.

I realize that I am not the only one who turns to Stewart and Colbert for news. Frankly it is an indictment against the mainstream media that many people prefer to turn to comedy shows to get their news rather than ABC, NBC, or CBS.

The saddest thing is that we need a press corps that will ask tough questions and dig to find hidden truths. I believe that the people have a Right To Know. The press is the only profession that is specifically given Constitutional protections from interference by our government.

I wish that the news media would stop covering nonsense stories such as whatever Britney Spears or Paris Hilton are doing today and cover stories which actually impact the health and welfare of the American public.

I do not care that none of the three major presidential candidates choose to wear flag pins on their lapels. It is an insignificant fashion statement and irrelevant in determining who would best lead this country.

Instead I would prefer that the media asked questions like “how do you plan on forestalling possible bankruptcy of our federal government?”

Linda

Oh and in case anyone was wondering, I am not directly related to Nash McCabe. She is the woman asked that silly question about flag lapel pins. Although who knows? Maybe she or her husband are fifteenth cousins seven times removed or some such thing.

The Vander Ark/Rowling Brouhaha

I feel as if I need to comment regarding the lawsuit filed by J.K. Rowling against Steve Vander Ark and RDR Books.

I feel obligated if for no other reason than I publicly lauded Mr. Vander Ark previously on this blog when I castigated the interview of Jo Rowling conducted in 2005 by Melissa Anelli and Emerson Spartz and suggested that Vander Ark would have been a better choice.

I think at this point I need to make a disclosure about my previous interactions with Steve.

I consider him to be an acquaintance, not a fandom friend. I doubt that he would disagree with that assessment.

I have fandom friends. Some I have met in person, others only via the warmth of email correspondence.

A few fandom friends I have met in person. I also have fandom acquaintances that I have met, but have not developed any sustained correspondences.

In all likelihood, Steve probably does not really know or care who I am.

My fandom credentials were based primarily in the shipping realm and that is a topic he did not care much about.

I've corresponded with him a few times over the past six years. It would have been intermittant and also not at any real length. I have also met him twice.

Once was at Nimbus when he gave a presentation with my friend Penny Linsenmayer on the Geography of Harry Potter and I introduced myself to him after the talk. The second was at Sonorus this past June when I introduced myself to him before the talk.

Our talks were brief and well, perfunctory. I did not reference our intermittant email exchanges, nor try to engage him in speculations.

He may or may not have even recognized my name since I am sure he has corresponded with thousands of fandomers, whilst I could probably claim a tenth or less of that number.

Okay? I know him, but not well.

He came across as being the consummate fan. He was devoted to the Potterverse and spent countless hours obsessing over the minutest detail.

In fact it is due to his wildly popular website that I first realized some of the discrepancies in the books. Small, seemingly insignificant details such as dates of events not meshing with calendars. Or even the whole Marcus Flint being a burly 6th Year Slytherin in the first book, and that Flint should not still have been at Hogwarts during the third book.

Hence the term "Flint" to describe canon mistakes or "inconsistencies."

Steve is a powerful public speaker and his slide show presentation at Sonorus was fabulous.

I was not surprised to learn that he wanted to write a book chronicling all the work he did analyzing the series. I think there is a market for his book.

I was surprised to learn that Jo Rowling sought to stop the publication of his book.

First of all, I do not believe that it will compete at all with any future definitive encyclopedic book on the Harry Potter series that she will write.

It cannot.

She said that she would provide backstory for characters that due to space and other plot considerations did not appear in the books.

I for one would love to know more, much more about Sirius Black. Forget Dumbledore's sexuality, I want to know about Sirius's sex life. I want to know if he was straight, gay, bi-, tri- or a monk. If she does that, I will certainly buy one more of her books.

I expect that she will include things in her tome that have been cut from the books due to editorial decisions. She had an "Easter Egg" on her website of a song she wrote for Nearly-Headless Nick that was cut from the book. She also included sketches she made of characters. Those are cool extras. Things that Steve Vander Ark in a million years could not create, because he is not the author of the Harry Potter series.

He is merely someone who has spent an inordinate amount of time analyzing the series and categorizing it.

The two are not the same.

Anyone who is a fan of the series that is willing to plunk down $30 for Steve's book will certainly be willing to purchase Jo's book once it is available.

That said, I have read the lawsuit that was filed and am a bit dismayed at the response by RDR books.

It appears by the various press coverage that they have not provided Rowling or her legal representatives with a manuscript of the forthcoming book.

I do not understand why they were unwilling to do so.

If they were as careful to not infringe on her intellectual property rights as they claim, then they should have nothing to hide.

I do not know if they consulted with intellectual property attornies during the pre-production of the book or not, but they should have.

Just because J.K. Rowling's publishers have not sued the publishers of other Harry Potter companion books in the past is no guarantee that they would not in the future. If you were to have great chunks of text in the book, I would expect that she would want to be compensated.

They should have had an eye towards that possibility.

If they did not, then they were ill advised on the project.

According to The Leaky Cauldron's coverage, the initial correspondence by the lawyers representing Warner Brothers issuing cease and desist letters to RDR Books constituted:
"an attempt to open a dialogue. "

There is also this summation of the position from RDR:

RDR claims not to have given JKR’s people a copy of the book because “we don’t have a copy to give them…because the book hasn’t been published yet.” Asked why they didn’t hand over a manuscript, Mr. Harris said, “how would it benefit us in any way? This is the result of a barrage of letters from their lawyers in the last two months. Late i the game they came forward and wanted to see the manuscript, after they’ve been threatening to sue us and everything. How is it going to help us in any way to show them the manuscript except to provide them with more information. At this stage are they going to say, ‘Oh, we’re sorry?’ and go away? I don’t think so.”

Excuse me, but if you have garnered the interest of WB's lawyers they will want to make sure that their legal rights have not been infringed. Prior or post publication if they do not like your book, they will probably sue.

Warner Brothers is a huge company, RDR Books is a small publisher. I would bet that WB is can afford to incure massive legal bills more than RDR Books.

Even if the judgment goes RDR's way and they are allowed to publish the book as is and without giving any monetary compensation to WB, there is no guarantee that any judge will obligate WB to pay RDR's legal bills.

I think RDR should have shown their manuscript to Warner Brothers' legal counsel and then made any modifications if that would have resolved the issue.

None of the approximately 30 companion books on the market received any permission from Jo Rowling, Scholastic, Bloomsbury, Raincoast, or Warner Brothers as far as I am aware. This is the first time that I believe she has sued to stop a companion book.

One other interesting thing to note is that there is another Harry Potter themed book that might be released on the same date of November 28th, 2007 that Steve Vander Ark's book is due out. This book actually has the word "encyclopedic" in its title:

Mugglenet.com's Unofficial Harry Potter Companion: The Encyclopedic Guide to the Books, Movies and More by Emerson Spartz and Ben Schoen.

However, then again that book might have been killed.

It is listed on Amazon.com, Amazon.ca, Amazon.co.uk. There are no cover images, but that is not an unusual thing for Amazon.com . I have seen forthcoming books that are due out in paperback that would have the same cover as the hardcover version not having an image shown on Amazon.

The Canadian site has a different availability date than the American or British websites. It says:
Availability: Currently unavailable. We don't know when or if this item will be back in stock.

More ominous is that the book is not mentioned anywhere on the publisher's website. One would think that since their best selling title was the previous Mugglenet.com's book that they would proudly be mentioning a follow up book by the same authors.

They aren't.

The only mention of an upcoming title for their teen category is Secret Book of Dragons due out in January 2008.

So it may be that Ulysses Press was contacted by JKR's lawyers and the project was scuttled.

If so, I'd like that to be part of the press coverage.

If on the other hand, the Mugglenet.com book comes out later this month and Ulysses Press worked with her lawyers to alleviate any concerns regarding her intellectual rights, then I think that should be discussed in the press coverage as well.

Moving on to a related topic:

The disputed timeline.

I remember after the DVD of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets came out that there was a bit of elation in the fandom. Because we thought it settled the question of Hermione's age.

People were wondering (and debating) whether or not she was born in 1980 or 1981. Was she eleven years old when she started at Hogwarts on September 1st, 1991 or only ten?

There were a few canon clues, but none definitively answered that question.

Steve Vander Ark took the position that canon suggested 1981, but that 1980 could not be ruled out.

He put 1981 on his timeline on the Harry Potter Lexicon.

On the DVD extras, they had a timeline of the Wizarding world. It also said 1981.

Then again, according to Steve it was his timeline verbatim.

Supposedly, JKR signed off on the timeline and the fandom started to think that the question of Hermione's age was resolved.

Of course we now know that she was born in 1980. Otherwise Hermione would still have been an "underage witch" at the beginning of Deathly Hallows and that would have seriously impacted the plot.

Steve Vander Ark has sued Warner Brothers for taking his timeline for their DVDs without his permission. He is seeking compensation.

I do not know the dollar amount he is seeking.

Warner Brothers disputes his claim.

Frankly, without having access to all the primary documents, I believe that the likely scenario is someone at Warner Brothers was assigned to come up with some elements for CD-Rom for the DVD extras. These are things that would insure that fans actually purchase the official studio DVDs and not just buy pirated copies of the feature length films.

I can envision a twenty-something assigned the task who found Steve's website and decided it was cool and snagged it. Without even sending him a notice or asking for permission or even offering some money to him.

They could have offered him a few hundred bucks for the privilege, which would have probably been less than Warner Brothers' snack budget for a single day of filming. More importantly, I think Vander Ark would have been elated to have his name and website URL appear on a Warner Brothers DVD.

Instead, I believe this proverbial twenty-something just put that timeline in the in-box of their boss and the executives at Warner Brothers never knew its origins.

I do not believe that Warner Brothers knowingly violated his copyright. However, if one of their employees did the deed, I believe they are still legally responsible.

(Note: I am not a lawyer. This is simply my personal opinion and how I would come down if I were a juror and if the facts of the case were as I hypothesized.)

I look at the cover of Steve's book and I concur with the lawyers from Warner Brothers. There is not a prominent disclaimer on the front cover stating that this book is not endorsed by J.K. Rowling like the one by George Beahm. It could be considered as misleading by consumers. Then again, other companion books have not included such disclaimers on their front covers and she has not sued them.

Oooooh, I discovered another ominous sign. Steve's book is no longer listed on Amazon.com. I was going to reference his cover from there and could not find it. Not under his name, nor under the title.

It is still listed on Amazon.ca and Amazon.co.uk - both have the publication date as November 5th. I wonder if it will actually ship or if the lawsuit will halt its distribution in other countries.

If anyone in Canada or in the U.K. has ordered the book and gets it, please let me know. I am curious as to whether or not it will be blocked.

Overall, I find this whole affair to be dismaying.

I think the marketplace is large enough to accomodate a hard copy version of the online Harry Potter Lexicon that J.K. Rowling praised and an encyclopedic book by the author herself.

I also wish that the publisher for Steve Vander Ark had shown more professionalism in this matter.

Time will tell what happens in court, but it is not a happy day for the Harry Potter fandom-at-large or the publishing world.

Linda

The Interview From Hell

I promised that I would discuss my reaction to the transcript of an interview Jo Rowling
gave back in 2005 to two members of the online Harry Potter fandom. I will do that, but first I’d like to put it into a broader discussion of reader expectations and authors disappointing their fans.

J.A. Konrath has a marvelous blog for writers which informs and inspires. Last December he wrote a post Reader Expectations regarding the one author who had influenced and inspired him the most. He wrote about Thomas Harris and how utterly disappointed he was with the novel Hannibal.

Konrath wrote that post as a fan and as a fellow writer. The discussion in the comment trail was fascinating for it brought out many writers, published and unpublished, who have different thoughts on the issue of what authors owe to their readership.

I also contributed to the conversation and brought up examples from the HP fandom, and specifically referenced the Interview from Hell. Interestingly enough, I had two New York Times Bestselling authors reply to my post and they gave their own perspectives as to authors interacting with their fans. (I replied to both of them via their own blogs and email because it soon became OT for Konrath’s blog. I am also now fans of their work and follow their blogs.)

One was Tess Gerritsen and she wrote a post on her blog expanding on her thoughts of fans being huge critics of whatever she wrote. It was entitled, “You Can’t Please All Readers All the Time” and I agree with her basic premise. Authors have to be true to themselves and their artistry, but they need to realize that they may not live up to the expectations of their readership.

That leads me back to discussing the interview that Jo Rowling granted to Melissa Anelli of The Leaky Cauldron and Emerson Spartz ofMugglenet at the launch of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (HBP).

Recent fans to the online Harry Potter fandom may not understand why that interview is treated with such disdain in some quarters. In fact, a few weeks ago, I pointed a friend of mine to the Leaky Cauldron so that she could view the covers of the forthcoming seventh volume. She later told me that after going to the website to see the covers she read the online interview. She sounded as if she had just discovered something new and exciting. I shook my head and interjected my opinion as it being "The Interview from Hell." She became utterly confused because she was unfamiliar with the online fandom, and had no idea how that interview needlessly insulted the intelligence of many dedicated fans.

So for those readers of my blog who are like my friend and are scratching your head in wonder, I shall go over it in painstaking detail.

Jo Rowling hand picked two people to interview her, and according to her own words on her website, she wanted people who would care about the whole online fandom:

Why Melissa and Emerson? Because I knew, from having trawled their sites, that they know their Harry Potter back to front, that they care, not only about the books, but about the community of fans on the net, and that they were clever and funny and that I was going to enjoy meeting them at least as much as they would enjoy meeting me.

…(snip)…

I must say that I was impressed and moved by how many fellow fans posted congratulations to them when they announced on their sites that they would be interviewing me. The thrust of most comments was that they deserved the interview as a reward for all their hard work; it was uplifting to see so many people express generous and fair-minded good wishes!

They were both, as I had known they would be, wonderful. Funny, bright, completely committed to getting some proper answers out of me. We were supposed to be together an hour: two had passed before any of us noticed and if I hadn't had a baby to feed, I think we could have gone on most of the night.

The transcript of the interview, plus their own individual reports on their time in Edinburgh, can be read on the-leaky-cauldron.org and on mugglenet.com. I will only say that I hope you enjoy reading the interview as much as I enjoyed giving it.

---

Unfortunately I did not enjoy reading the interview as much as she enjoyed giving it.

Hardly.

The two people Jo picked were partisans in the shipping wars and were gleeful in being proven right. Now, for those wondering what the term “shipping wars” means, I shall explain. It is a slang term short for relation-ship. Those who advocate for specific romantic pairings are referred to as “shippers.” There are different kinds of shippers, such as preferential shippers who simply prefer playing matchmaker to different characters independent of whether or not they are likely to occur in the story, and then there are shippers who argue over those pairings they believe are going to happen in the storyline.

Prior to HBP, and the TLC/Mugglnet interview, there were strong arguments for either Harry/Hermione (H/Hr) or Ron/Hermione (R/Hr) as happening in the story (or canon – another fandom term.) The H/Hr shippers basically subscribed to the literary convention of The Hero Gets the Girl where the main male character becomes romantically linked with the main female character. A similar convention is also known as Best Friends Turned Lovers where two friends come to realize that their relationship has evolved from friendship into love.

The Ron/Hermione (R/Hr) shippers argued on behalf of the literary convention of Unresolved Sexual Tension or UST romantic pairings and compared them to Elizabeth Bennett/Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice.

H/Hr shippers didn’t care for the idea of the literary convention of The Sidekick Getting the Girl and The Hero Getting the Sidekick’s Little Sister.

Okay, for those who were blissfully unaware of the shipping wars, you should know that prior to the publication of HBP that countless hours were spent analyzing and arguing about the text of the series in regards to shipping. Passages were posted time and time again and trumpeted as being proof of whatever position the ship debater was trying to make. There was copious evidence cited which supported both sides as being possibilities. I recognized and admitted that JKR could have been writing R/Hr and H/G all along, but I thought it was H/Hr. That is because I thought of Ron/Hermione and Harry/Ginny as literary red hair-ings.

I was arguing in favor of more subtle clues.

I also wasn’t squeamish about the idea of love triangles. They work well in literature and Jo used them extensively in Goblet of Fire (GoF) and Order of the Phoenix (OotP), and I had no doubt that she would finally use the members of the trio in a love triangle.

Ron/Hermione shippers for the most part couldn’t tolerate that idea. They didn’t want Harry and Ron competing over Hermione. I welcomed the idea because I thought it would make for good drama.

The shipping wars were divisive and the most emotionally charged of all the debates, and both Melissa and Emerson knew that full well. However, rather than attempting to be ambassadors from the whole fandom, they allowed their partisan nature of being Ron/Hermione and Harry/Ginny shippers to come to the fore.

They not only insulted the intelligence and sanity of H/Hr shippers in the interview, but their insults extended to editorial comments in the transcript that wounded the feelings of their debate opponents. This editorializing reflected poorly upon their professionalism and caused unnecessary divisiveness in the fandom as a whole.

See page 2

MA: How much fun did you have with the romance in this book?

JKR: Oh, loads. Doesn't it show?

MA: Yes.

JKR: There's a theory - this applies to detective novels, and then Harry, which is not really a detective novel, but it feels like one sometimes – that you should not have romantic intrigue in a detective book. Dorothy L. Sayers, who is queen of the genre said — and then broke her own rule, but said — that there is no place for romance in a detective story except that it can be useful to camouflage other people’s motives. That's true; it is a very useful trick. I've used that on Percy and I’ve used that to a degree on Tonks in this book, as a red herring. But having said that, I disagree inasmuch as mine are very character-driven books, and it’s so important, therefore, that we see these characters fall in love, which is a necessary part of life. How did you feel about the romance?

[Melissa puts her thumbs up and grins widely while…]
ES: We were hi-fiving the whole time.
JKR: [laughs] Yes! Good. I'm so glad.
MA: We were running back and forth between rooms yelling at each other.
ES: We thought it was clearer than ever that Harry and Ginny are an item and Ron and Hermione — although we think you made it painfully obvious in the first five books —
JKR: [points to herself and whispers] So do I!
ES: What was that?
JKR: [More loudly] Well so do I! So do I!
[All laugh; Melissa doubles over, hysterical, and may have died.] (emphasis mine)

--

Honestly was there a need to include Melissa doubling over with laughter to the point of hysteria and the “may have died” comment – other than to insult those who disagreed with them?

I recognize that both Melissa and Emerson were sleep deprived due to jet lag/time change as well as reading a massive book in the span of a single night. However, they chose to write up their transcript and inserted the hurtful editorial asides, what did they expect in return?

The interview continues showing evidence of deliberate insults to those whom Melissa and Emerson disagreed.

ES: Harry/Hermione shippers - they're delusional!
JKR: Well no, I'm not going to - Emerson, I am not going to say they're delusional! They are still valued members of my readership! I am not going to use the word delusional. I am however, going to say — now I am trusting both of you to do the spoiler thing when you write this up —
[More laughter.]
JKR: I will say, that yes, I personally feel - well it's going to be clear once people have read book six. I mean, that's it. It's done, isn't it? We know. Yes, we do now know that it's Ron and Hermione. I do feel that I have dropped heavy -
[All crack up]
JKR: - hints. ANVIL-sized, actually, hints, prior to this point. I certainly think even if subtle clues hadn't been picked up by the end of "Azkaban," that by the time we hit Krum in Goblet...
But Ron — I had a lot of fun with that in this book. I really enjoyed writing the Ron/Lavender business, and the reason that was enjoyable was Ron up to this point has been quite immature compared to the other two and he kind of needed to make himself worthy of Hermione. Now, that didn't mean necessarily physical experience but he had to grow up emotionally and now he's taken a big step up. Because he's had the meaningless physical experience - let’s face it, his emotions were never deeply engaged with Lavender -

[Much laughter in which Melissa emits a "Won-Won"]

JKR: - and he's realized that that is ultimately not what he wants, which takes him a huge emotional step forward.

ES: So he's got a little bit more than a teaspoon, now there’s a tablespoon?

JKR: Yeah, I think. [Laughter]

MA: Watching all this, were you surprised when you first logged on and found this intense devotion to this thing that you knew was not going to happen?
JKR: Yes. Well, you see, I'm a relative newcomer to the world of shipping, because for a long time, I didn't go on the net and look up Harry Potter. A long time. Occasionally I had to, because there were weird news stories or something that I would have to go and check, because I was supposed to have said something I hadn't said. I had never gone and looked at fan sites, and then one day I did and oh - my - god. Five hours later or something, I get up from the computer shaking slightly [all laugh]. 'What is going on?' And it was during that first mammoth session that I met the shippers, and it was a most extraordinary thing. I had no idea there was this huge underworld seething beneath me.
ES: She's putting it into a positive light!
JKR: Well I am, I am, but you know. I want to make it clear that delusional is your word and not mine! [Much laughter.]
MA: You're making our lives a lot easier by laying it on the table -
JKR: Well I think anyone who is still shipping Harry/Hermione after this book -
ES: [whispered] Delusional!
JKR: Uh - no! But they need to go back and reread, I think. (emphasis mine)

--

Okay, now that was the part where I felt insulted by Jo Rowling.

I realize that she has more to do everyday than trawl internet sites and understand the myriad discussions of the fandom, but she let us know that she was aware of the shipping wars. She referred to that in an interview in 2003 with Jeremy Paxman at the launch of OotP.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/uk/newsid_3004000/3004878.stm

JEREMY PAXMAN: So there will be some pairing up will there in this book?
JK ROWLING: Well in the fullness of time.

JEREMY PAXMAN: Unlikely pairings? Not Hermione and Draco Malfoy or anything like that?
JK ROWLING: I don't really want to say as it will ruin all the fan sites. They have such fun with their theories ... and it is fun, it is fun.

--

I interpreted that as meaning that the romantic pairings wouldn’t become evident until the end of book 7. Once she revamped her website she mentioned the topic of shipping several times. The first and most important was in her first set of questions she chose to answer on her FAQ page:

Does Hermione love Ron or Harry?

I can't believe that some of you haven't worked this one out yet, but I'm not going to answer because that would spoil the arguments, which I enjoy.

--

She enjoyed the arguments. Or so she said. Then she decided to disregard what she had previously said to Jeremy Paxman and went out of her way to sink some ships. She sunk the Draco/Hermione ship with this quote in an online chat:

http://www.accio-quote.org/articles/2004/0304-wbd.htm

Chibimono: Do you have any future plans in particular for Draco Malfoy?
JK Rowling replies -> I've got plans for all my characters. Actually, this is a really good place to answer a question about Draco and Hermione, which a certain Ms. Radcliffe is desperate to have answered. Will they end up together in book six/seven? NO! The trouble is, of course, that girls fancy Tom Felton, but Draco is NOT Tom Felton! (My daughter likes TF very much too, because he taught her how to use a diablo)

She also used her website to sink the Neville/Luna ship

Section: Rumours

Luna and Neville will hook up in HP&THBP

The Luna/Neville shippers are much less vehement and scary than the Harry/Hermione, Ron/Hermione tribes, so I hope I won’t receive too much hate mail for quashing this rumour. I see Neville and Luna as very different kinds of people and while they share a certain isolation within Hogwarts, I don’t think that’s enough to foster true love - friendship, perhaps, although I think that Neville would always find Luna’s wilder flights of fancy alarming. (emphasis mine.)

--

Vehement and scary. So she was aware of the passion. You would think that she’d spend some time figuring out exactly how best to defuse the situation knowing that her fans really cared about these debates.

She further teased Ron/Hermione and Harry/Hermione shippers with this next post:

Section: Rumours

Dumbledore is really Ron/Harry ‘from the future’

Your inventiveness knows no bounds, and I do not mean that sarcastically; these theories open up exhilarating new vistas of possibility… but they’re wrong. Could it be that by speculating that Harry/Ron becomes Dumbledore, you are seeking reassurance that neither dies young?

I’ve also heard a whisper about Ron and Hermione’s son time-travelling, so I shall go further and tell you that NONE of the characters in the books has returned from the future. As for the idea of Ron and Hermione having a son… (chuckles as the distant roars of a million shippers reach my ears, all cursing me to an eternity of unsatisfied curiosity).

--

So when in the Interview from Hell, JKR suggested that Harry/Hermione shippers go back and re-read her books, I felt personally insulted.

I expected more from her.

I know the first five books in the HP series frontward and backward. I can generally find a passage I am looking for within about fifteen seconds. That means I not only know which book it comes from, but which chapter and what comes before and after it.

I don’t have that ability with HBP, because I have not re-read that book. That interview left a bad taste in my mouth for the series as a whole and I now consider myself as a recovering fandom addict.

I believe that I know her books in closer detail than she does. I’m not trying to boast, but that is something else she confessed to earlier in that same interview:

http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/#static:tlcinterviews/jkrhbp1

ES: This is kind of a strange question but how many times have you read your own story?

JKR: That is not a strange question, it's a very valid question because once the book is published I rarely reread. A funny thing is when I do pick up a book to check a fact which I obviously do a lot, if I start reading then I do get kind of sucked in myself and I may read several pages and then I put it away and go back to what I’m doing, but I would never, if for example I was heading to the bath, and I wanted to pick up something to read, I’d never pick up one of my own books. Therefore there are thousands of fans who know the books much better than I do. My one advantage is I know what’s going to happen, and I’ve got a lot of backstory.

--

To confirm my supposition that Emerson did not attempt to be an ambassador for the fandom-at-large is this quote from his own summary of the events of traveling to Scotland and meeting Jo Rowling:

Emerson's write up: http://www.mugglenet.com/emscotland2.shtml

Harry/Hermione shippers can expect me to be even more arrogant and cocky
thanks to my recent vindication (see interview or just the last four books). "...Anvil-sized hints..."

--

He was as good as his promise and created a special board to collate comments by H/Hr shippers and include his own running commentary.

:Sigh:

I wish things had been handled differently.

For starters, I wish that Jo Rowling had picked people who were more mature and responsible. It would have made a tremendous difference if someone like Steve Vander Ark had been asked instead of Emerson Spartz. I cannot imagine Steve openly ridiculing members of the fandom whose theories were proven wrong.

The interview would still have had questions about shipping, because every administrator of a HP fansite would be well aware that it was a “hot topic.” However, the tone of the interview would have been vastly different.

Furthermore, I wish that the discussion regarding the romantic element had veered into another direction entirely. It might have defused things in a way people wouldn’t have expected.

This idea comes from a discussion I saw on the Harry Potter for Grown Ups List Serv – Off Topic Chatter from January 2003 and a discussion about the four kinds of love:

Eros, Philos, Storge and Agape.

One of the most memorable aspects of that discussion was the pet peeve that audiences (movies, television series, or books) are trained to see friendship between males and females as only being a prelude to them hitting the sheets together. The idea that men could not be friends with women “because the sex part always gets in the way” was the underlying philosophy of Harry Burns in the movie When Harry Met Sally…

I wish that Jo had spent time waxing philosophical and saying one of the things she wanted to show in her series was the idea that boys/girls and men/women could establish and maintain friendships without eros complicating things. I would have appreciated that more than her emphasizing that she didn’t want Ginny to be the first girl that Harry ever kissed.

I also wished that Jo Rowling had said something different on her website to acknowledge the passion and dedication that many of her fans had shown to her hero and her main female character. I had hoped that she might show appreciation for all the shippers who were devoted to both sides of the shipping divide by giving a joint fansite award.

I envisioned an award given to Sugarquill and Portkey because of the prominence they earned by championing their respective ships.

Alternatively, I thought it would have been good to have given a fansite award to Fiction Alley since they are open to ships of all shapes and sizes. I wanted her to make a statement acknowledging that she appreciates having fans who are as are creative and passionate in their love of her characters and the Potterverse. That would have gone a long way to make peace in the fandom.

She didn’t do anything like that.

The Leaky Cauldron was the only fansite given an award in 2005. Then in 2006 she gave an award to a Portuguese language website from Brazil.

In other words, she chose to do nothing and hoped it would all just blow over. Another thing that JKR did to insult her fans was in her remarks about Emerson and Melissa on her website. She mentioned how she contacted Emerson by phone to invite him to interview her.

“I was worried that Emerson, who was not expecting anything at all, might simply hang up on me; as I heard his Dad walking away from the telephone to fetch him I was trying to think of way to prove it was really me and not some angry Harry/Hermione shipper trying to lure him down a dark alleyway. However, I didn't need to offer an impromptu quiz on the sub-plots of books one to five; he believed me, he could make it: we were set!” (emphasis mine)

In that same post she referred readers to her website to read the transcript. So it is likely that she had read the transcript and felt that it was safe to poke fun at H/Hr shippers. Because she probably believed Emerson and Melissa’s assertions that we were a small, but vocal minority in the fandom. As if it is socially acceptable for an author to insult the intelligence and integrity of their fans. She could have at any time simply made a statement on her website like she did with Neville/Luna.

We deserved better at the hands of Jo Rowling.

Honestly, we were creative in our theories, but that is because the series itself is extraordinarily inventive. To show how weird interpretations can get I will mention the example of a metaphorical reading of a movie that baffled the screenwriter. William Goldman was interviewed in 1994 about the phenomenon that is the legacy of the movie “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” which he won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay in 1969. He mentioned that the movie was such a strange hit and that it impacted people so strongly in the late 60’s and early 70’s that there was a theory floating around that the movie was about the Vietnam War. That “the Super Posse was the government and Lyndon Johnson coming to get you, and Richard Nixon.” He was “staggered” when he heard that theory, but he had heard it from many people at the time and no one seemed to know where that idea had started. Goldman however, was willing to speak out publicly against that theory. (From the DVD interview with William Goldman.)

If you would like to see one of the influential essays showing a literate and persuasive argument that there was sound textual evidence for a Harry/Hermione romantic relationship in the series, I recommend you read Penny Linsenmayer’s Partners and Friends Essay. I challenge anyone to read it and come up with the conclusion that it is “delusional.”

I wish Jo Rowling had chosen to respond with her fans in a manner different than she had.

I wrote to her, included my suggestions on how to help heal the fandom, and I included on a CD many of the detailed essays I had written in support of H/Hr so she could get an idea of some of the rationale used to defend that reading of her series. I did not hear back from her, but then again who am I except for just another fan and an unpublished author? I do not know if she ever received my correspondence.

I did not write to Emerson for I felt it would be a waste of my time and he might instead take any criticism from me as a badge of honor. I didn’t want to swell his head any further than it already was. Afterall, he prefaced his special Wall of Shame with this description of himself:

"A note from the unprofessional, arrogant, unprofessional, insensitive, unprofessional, immature, inconsiderate, unprofessional, irresponsible, unprofessional, juvenile, unprofessional, tactless and unprofessional Wall of Shame founder and caretaker, Emerson:"

Any message I would have written would have used the term unprofessional in it, and therefore it is doubtful that I would have elicited a twang of remorse or pang of conscience in him.

I did not write to Melissa for I felt that as a journalist, she should have known better. I felt that my condemnation of her unprofessional behavior probably would have been considered as merely sour grapes.

In case anyone is interested, this is a link to my acknowledgment of defeat in the shipping wars.

Overall, I do not regret having spent time in the fandom and having spun many creative theories. I do wish that Ms. Rowling acted differently in regards to what she knew was a topic of intense and passionate interest among her fans.

Elaine Cunningham had suggested in her response to my post on J.A. Konrath's blog that authors avoid internet fandoms and not insert themselves into debates. J.K. Rowling's actions show what can happen when you not only learn about fandom debates, but insert yourself in them by actively teasing fans and then insulting them.

I shall now try to follow Tess Gerritsen’s advice:

“And to all those nitpicky readers, the ones who think they’re so much smarter than the writer they’re complaining about, here’s a revolutionary idea: go write your own damn book.”

I am doing just that and I vow that once my trilogy is published, that I shall not treat my fans in the fashion that I am criticizing with this post.

Linda

In Defense of L.O.O.N.ish-ness and problems I have with the Harry Potter books

In trying to think of a good title for my blog that was different from others, I harkened to the term League Of Obsessive Nitpickers from the Harry Potter for Grown Ups (HPfGU’s) list serv.

Last night I was talking on the phone with a local high school student whom I agreed to mentor in her senior writing project. In the course of our conversation, she brought up the subject of the Harry Potter series and asked if I was familiar with it. There was this awkward silence when I tried to figure out how to politely say, “yeah, in fact I’m in recovery from having overdosed in Harry Potter fandom politics.”

Yes, I will read the seventh book, but I’m not as excited as others to read the final installment. Because I’ve been greatly disappointed with the last two books. I admit that it is due to my own unreasonable expectations.

I haven’t spent anytime yet on this blog telling about my not so secret obsession with the Potterverse. Many of you who have stopped by and read my blog have come from my dear friend John Granger’s website where he does an amazing job of analyzing aspects of the HP books with a particular emphasis on alchemy and Christian symbolism.

First off, I want to stress that I adore the Harry Potter series. I do. I was floored when I first read the books to realize that the plot lines were intricately woven not only in each volume, but between the volumes. I had never read a series where things that were introduced in a previous book were clues laid for subsequent books.

I had initially read the books in November 2001 when the first movie came out. Having had experience in trying my hand at writing and adapting screenplays, I actually enjoy reading books and then seeing how a screenwriter condenses the plot, characters, etc. to fit the running time for a movie. I had read the first two books and was about halfway through Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban when I saw the movie.

I remember sitting in the movie theatre and watching as Hagrid fell out of the sky in the flying motorcycle and then feeling floored. I remembered then that he had said that the motorcycle belonged to young Sirius Black. A character briefly mentioned in the first chapter of the first book and then never again until book three where he was the titular character.

I went home and confirmed that indeed he was mentioned in the first chapter, in a throw off manner. As if it wasn’t really important. Just an amusing aside, except it wasn’t an aside at all. It was a clue for future plot points.

I was impressed.

I finished reading the third and fourth books (the series was only 4/7^th completed at the time), then I began reading again from the beginning. I was so impressed that I began analyzing the plot structure. It was during my third or fourth read of the series and that I began dissecting things. I made lists of all the characters, all the potions, all the animals, etc. I didn’t realize that I was reinventing Steve Vander Ark’s wheel. I could have saved myself the trouble and merely looked at his website. However, it was good practice for me and honing my analytical skills.

After doing that, I started talking with others whom I knew had read the books. None seemed to share my intense interest in examining the evidence for clues of future plot points. I started to feel a little weird. Then I went online and discovered the global online HP fandom.

It was then I found my niche with the HPfGU list, which led to my writing online fan fiction at Fiction Alley, Portkey, Fanfiction.net and becoming a prominent ship debater. (Ship is slang for relation-ship and an immense amount of bandwidth was/is consumed with people arguing for various romantic pairings of fictional characters.) I spent a lot of time arguing why I felt the Harry/Hermione ship was the ultimate romantic pairing of the series. For those who are wondering, in the online community I am known as either Athena or Pallas Athena, and yes, I did represent the H/Hr ship at the Nimbus Symposium in Orlando in 2003.

My nerdy fandom creds are showing.

Back to L.O.O.N.s…I spent about eight solid months reading the HPfGU’s list and was fascinated by the level of discourse and intense scrutiny of the text (AKA canon.) People would ask a question and if they didn’t have a solid grasp of canon then others would chime in and cite from the books showing that their premise was wrong due to X,Y and Z in chapter 12 of the Chamber of Secrets (Cos). People were polishing their imaginary League Of Obsessive Nitpicker badges, and since I had taken the time to create my own schematic of the series I felt like I was one of their kindred spirits.

I wrote my own fifth year fic based on different theories I happened to favor that were spun on the HPfGU’s list, and one that was truly my original theory. Most have been totally eviscerated by new canon, but a few other minor points still might come true.

Thing is, I spent a lot of time considering where I thought canon was going to go in book 5. There are a few aspects that I didn’t know where Jo Rowling was going to go and so I consciously decided not to explore them. I expected that she would deal with it, but she didn’t and to me it is a gaping plot hole.

Most people don’t even recognize that there are things missing that bother me intensely. It is only when I point them out do they realize their omissions. The things that bother me the most were sins of omission and not sins of commission.

In my talk last night with the high school senior, she said how much she like Half-Blood Prince (HBP) and I felt guilty to say that I didn’t like it. Then I told her a few of the reasons why and afterwards she felt like she should have noticed these things as well.

Okay, here’s a list of what bothered me:

Barty Crouch, Jr.’s soulless body.

What happened to it? Here we have prima facie evidence that something grossly wrong had occurred. This man had been declared dead and buried at Azkaban prison years ago, and yet his living body is found at Hogwarts after the death of a student in the TriWizard Tournament. What? No investigation? And where did this zombie-like thing go? Is it hooked up to feeding tubes in St. Mungo’s?

Lack of penalty for assaults on students.

At the end of Goblet of Fire (GoF) and Order of the Phoenix (OotP), Harry and his friends attacked Draco Malfoy and his gang of Slytherins. They were left on the floor of the Hogwarts Express with footprints on them, or they were stuffed into an overhead bin.

So, why wasn’t there any disciplinary action taken after these assaults? I tell you I if went to the train station to pick up my child after a year of being in a boarding school and he didn’t come off the train safe and sound, I would hold the school accountable. If I had to go onto the train and I found my child unconscious after being attacked, I’d be livid.

I’d want to see those responsible punished. Severely.

I actually worked that into my fifth year fic, and I was critical in my reviews of others fifth year fics for not including something which I felt would naturally follow in the continuing narrative.

Jo didn’t see it the way I did. She not only forgot to have that in the beginning of the school year in OotP, but again in HBP.

No punishment followed Harry and friend’s physical punishments of the bad boys. What kind of message does that send to children? If you are favored by the headmaster you can do anything you like?

As a parent, I don’t like that at all.

Lack of respect for Sirius Black.

Okay, I’ll admit that I adored the fictional character of Sirius Black. I was just a sucker for a handsome man who was wrongly accused and imprisoned for a crime he didn’t commit. I felt sorry for him having to live in Azkaban for 12 years, live in the Forbidden Forest for another year, and then subsist on rats and live in a cave for another.

I wanted so much more for his character. I wanted him to be safe, warm, well fed, have a romantic partner, and yes, I wanted him to be exonerated.

My fate for his character arc was so much different than Jo Rowling’s. She made him suffer, suffer, and suffer.

Then she killed him.

Then she really made me mad. Killing him was one thing, but her treatment of Sirius’s character after his death is what really infuriates me.

No funeral.

No memorial service.

No formal anything for Harry to grieve, or for anyone else to grieve the loss of Sirius Black.

Now, if there’s no body, it makes it hard to have a funeral, but you can gather people together to talk about that person’s life and what they meant to you.

She didn’t do that. Jo did have a funeral for Albus Dumbledore, which she needed to do.

Jo also had Hagrid blubber over the death of Aragog. Harry attended the service that his friend had for a monstrous man-eating spider.

Nice. Yet, no one could do the same thing for Harry’s godfather.

And what really bothers me the most about this is that I know that Jo knows better. She was asked after Goblet of Fire about bringing Cedric’s corpse back.

Saving Cedric's body reminded me of the Hector Patroclus Achilles triangle in the Iliad.

JKR: That's where it came from. That really, really, REALLY moved me when I read that when I was 19. The idea of the desecration of a body, a very ancient idea... I was thinking of that when Harry saved Cedric's body.

--

So Jo drew upon the classical poem the Iliad for Cedric, and yet she did nothing for Sirius after killing him off.

There is still a question in my mind as to whether or not Sirius was fully exonerated by the Ministry of Magic.

I Don’t Know The Answer. And it bugs me.

Okay, that’s all the time I have today to state the problems I had with the last two books. There are more, but that’s enough for people to chew on right now. If you’d like to share your thoughts with me, please feel free.