Fans prepare for 'Prince' release
LONDON, England (AP) -- It's time for Harry Potter to work his midnight magic on Muggles once again.
From Edinburgh's medieval castle to suburban shopping malls, fans were getting ready to dress up, line up and stay up late Friday to nab the first copies of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince."
It has become publishing's most lucrative ritual: hundreds of British bookstores planned to open just after midnight (2300 GMT), when copies of the schoolboy wizard's latest adventure go on sale.
Thousands of Muggles -- Potter language for humans -- were expected to queue amid heightened security in London, where last week's terrorist bombings cast a shadow over the event.
"We're very much of the message that it's business as usual -- London's open for business and we want to celebrate this book," said John Webb, children's buyer at bookseller Waterstone's, which expects 300,000 people to attend midnight openings at more than 100 stores across Britain.
British publisher Bloomsbury, which expects to sell hundreds of thousands of Potter books this weekend, was gathering 70 competition-winning children from around the world inside the thick stone walls of Edinburgh Castle for a midnight reading by author J.K. Rowling, who lives in the Scottish capital.
Elsewhere, bookshops promised jugglers, fire-eaters, magicians and face-painters to entertain waiting fans eager to solve the hinted-at plot mysteries: Will Harry's teenage friends Ron and Hermione find romance? Which major character will die? What more will Harry learn of his nemesis, the evil Lord Voldemort?
In London, events were muted by the July 7 subway and bus bombings, which killed more than 50 people. Book and magazine chain WH Smith announced it was scrapping a planned midnight launch at King's Cross Station, from whose fictional Platform 9 3/4 Harry catches the train to Hogwarts at the start of each term. At least 26 people died in a bomb blast on a subway near King's Cross on July 7, the deadliest of the day's four attacks.
WH Smith spokeswoman Sarah Hodson said it would be "insensitive and inappropriate" to hold the event at the station. She said the store at King's Cross -- now swarming with uniformed police and wary commuters -- would remain open into Saturday morning so fans could purchase the book.
London's Metropolitan Police said the force was liaising with organizers about policing events at bookstores in the city.
Since Rowling -- then a struggling single mother and aspiring writer -- introduced Harry and his fellow students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry to the world in 1997, the books have become a global phenomenon, selling 270 million copies in 62 languages and spawning a series of Hollywood films. Rowling is now the richest woman in Britain, with a fortune estimated by Forbes magazine at US$1 billion (euro825 million).
Each book's publication is preceded by months of carefully orchestrated publicity, hype and plot hints, and surrounded by intense security.
Amazon.co.uk has set up a secure 200,000 square foot (18,500 square meter) warehouse to pack the books. Canadian publisher Raincoast sought a court injunction after a store in Vancouver accidentally sold 14 copies of the book last week. A judge ordered the customers not to talk about the book, copy it, sell it or even read it before its official release.
Even the Pope has become an unwitting instrument of Pottermania. German writer Gabriele Kuby, author of "Harry Potter -- Good or Evil?" has claimed Pope Benedict XVI said the books "deeply distort Christianity in the soul." Kuby said the Pope's comments came in letters written in 2003, when he was Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger. The Vatican had no comment on the claim.
Launch events are planned from Manhattan -- where Barnes & Noble is holding a "Midnight Magic" party at its Union Square store -- to Mexico City, where the Libreria Gandhi book store scheduled a midnight sale and a daylong Potter festival on Saturday, even though the book will be available only in English.
Some have suggested the Potter spell may be fading. The gap between books -- the last, "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," was published two years ago -- means many early Potter fans are now young adults whose interest may have waned.
However, sales remain robust. More than 1.4 million copies have been ordered through online retailer Amazon; WH Smith said it had received 500,000 advance orders, compared to 280,000 for "Order of the Phoenix." Publication has sparked a now-traditional price war, with many chain retailers selling the book for about half the 16.99 pounds (US$29.95, euro25) cover price.
U.S. publisher Scholastic is releasing more than 10 million copies. Waterstone's predicts 2 million copies will be sold in Britain and 10 million worldwide in the first 24 hours.
Al Greco, a publishing professor at Fordham University in New York, said sales remained strong in part because "the target audience runs from juveniles through adults, which didn't initially take place with the first couple of books."
Amazon reported that advance orders of the "adult" edition -- identical inside but bearing a more muted cover than the children's version -- were up 17 percent from the last book.
"I think the books just really spark children's imaginations -- and adults', too," said Waterstone's buyer Webb. "They're just really good stories at the core."