Will this sell more than the usual Britney/Angelina/Lindsay covers?

HAHAHA.

But what about Dumbledore/McGonagall?

The last of the Harry Potter series may have been released, but J.K Rowling still knows how to get her books in the news!

Dumbledore was gay, JK tells amazed fans

David Smith
Sunday October 21, 2007
The Observer

There could hardly have been a bigger sensation if Russell Crowe, Rod Stewart or Sven-Goran Eriksson had come out of the closet. Millions of fans around the world were yesterday digesting the news that one of the main characters in the Harry Potter novels, Albus Dumbledore, is gay.

The revelation came from author JK Rowling during a question-and-answer session at New York's Carnegie Hall. It instantly hurtled around the internet and the world. News websites in China and Germany announced starkly: 'JK Rowling: "Dumbledore is gay".' One blogger wrote on a fansite: 'My head is spinning. Wow. One more reason to love gay men.'

After reading briefly from her mega-selling book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, on Friday night, Rowling took questions from an audience of 1,600 students. A 19-year-old from Colorado asked about the avuncular headmaster of Hogwarts School: 'Did Dumbledore, who believed in the prevailing power of love, ever fall in love himself?'

The author replied: 'My truthful answer to you...I always thought of Dumbledore as gay.' The audience reportedly fell silent - then erupted into prolonged applause.

Rowling, 42, continued: 'Dumbledore fell in love with Grindelwald [a bad wizard he defeated long ago], and that added to his horror when Grindelwald showed himself to be what he was. To an extent, do we say it excused Dumbledore a little more because falling in love can blind us to an extent, but he met someone as brilliant as he was and, rather like Bellatrix, he was very drawn to this brilliant person and horribly, terribly let down by him.'

She added: 'Yeah, that's how I always saw Dumbledore. In fact, recently I was in a script read-through for the sixth film, and they had Dumbledore saying a line to Harry early in the script saying, "I knew a girl once, whose hair..." I had to write a little note in the margin and slide it along to the scriptwriter, "Dumbledore's gay!"'

Amazed by the warm reaction of the audience, Rowling, on her first US tour in seven years, joked: 'Just imagine the fan fiction now.'

Pretty cool of J.K to have the balls to reveal this. The people who already allege that Potter promotes witchcraft and all things evil must be absolutely seething right now!

This news lead is kinda amusing too. What, are Crowe, Stewart and Ericksson supposed to be the absolute bastions of heterosexuality or something?

End of an Era

I guess the cultural phenomenon that is Harry Potter is as good as any a reason for a first post. I finished reading The Deathly Hallows over the weekend, and subsequently fell into a semi-funk over the next few days. It's just sad to think that we won't be getting any more new adventures of Harry, Ron and Hermione, that we won't get to share their world anymore. Sigh.As for the book itself, I mostly loved it, but have a few complaints of course. The main one, which I've seen many raise, is the rushed ending and crappy epilogue! Children's book or not, Harry Potter is rightly considered an epic, and thus, requires a thorough enough ending to provide closure. Jumping from defeating Voldie to 19 years later was too abrupt. There needed to be an additional chapter between. It could be set immediately after, or a few days, or months. Something where we see Harry and gang dwelling on the fact that they've finally done it. Someone who has cursed his life for 17 years has been vanquished, surely we ought to have some reflection of that? LOTR is obviously the main comparison - Not that it had to be as long-winded and meticulous as that, but it's been such an arduous journey, we need to see how it's changed them, how life would never be the same again, like how the Ring quest has so profoundly changed Frodo, Sam, etc.

And what of the Ministry? Of the issue of class warfare between elves, goblins and wizards? Of the fact that Harry just found out the man he hated his entire school life was actually a hero? Of Snape's vindication? And we don't even get to see Ron and Hermione actually getting together? All the build-up to a kiss, and then it's 19 years later and three kids?

One area of writing where I think J.K Rowling is not quite adept at is definitely romance. Lupin/Tonks get together in the background, pop out a kid, and then die in the background. Point of it being (besides the so-what parallel between Harry and Teddy Tonks)? I love Lupin, but hardly give a shit about the couple. But the main failure is Harry/Ginny. It is such a shallowly depicted romance, more telling than showing, that I have a lot of problem believing Ginny is his one true love. It doesn't help that Ginny, from a shy girl in books 1-3, suddenly pops out of nowhere in 5 with a personality transplant to become a Lily Evans clone who is of course sassy, kick-ass, beautiful and popular, and Harry. similarly out of nowhere, just likes her in 6. Again, telling rather than showing. I think Luna would even be a better fit for Harry. Or better, get rid of love interests, this is a adventure/fantasy story and we don't really need romance sub-plots.

And the saccharine, sappy ending was more than I could take. Albus Severus? Seriously? For future re-reads, I've decided I will stop before the epilogue and pretend it doesn't exist.

Also, Harry's seemingly free and easy access to Voldie's thoughts? Reeked so much of convenient, lazy plot device. Just highlights the overall rushed feeling of the book, I think (which is what the ending does as well). It's as if J.K couldn't be bothered to think of a way to show what Voldie was doing, so she just repeated the mind-reading thing over and over.

Ok criticisms aside, I still really loved the book.

- Neville's character arc from 1 through 7 has been well-fleshed, and to see him become a hero in Hogwarts, leading the resistance in the trio's absence is really heartwarming. Him lopping off Nagini's head was one of the best moments of the series.
- Hermione - love her. So resourceful, so smart, and so loyal. She wiped her parents' memories - that's hardcore.
- Dumbledore - interesting to see the fleshing-out of a flawed DD.
- "The Ministry has fallen. Scrimgeour is dead. They are coming." - The most chilling line of the book.
- Harry and Ron's discussion after Ron retrieved the Sword heroically. (Paraphrasing here) "It's not as cool as it sounds." "I already told you before that it wasn't." Really shows the full-circle journey from Ron's jealousy of Harry initially to understanding him now.

I can't wait for the movie. It's gonna be action-packed, and WB better break the bank and give us an all-out effects extravaganza. Let's see: Flight from Privet Drive, Gringotts' breakout, the massive Hogwarts battle with moving knights, tables and chairs, flying crystal balls, plants, et al - these sets are gonna be amazing.

Sigh. The end of an era. Let's hope J.K gets bored sitting around her billions of dollars, changes her mind eventually and comes out with new books of the HP world.