Potter Changes the World

Standing near the door in a crowded bookstore at midnight I came to a startling revelation. I might need to break down and read this series of young adult British dark fantasy novels in order to communicate with my woman and the youngster I’m mentoring.

Watching people from six to 60 bum-rushing the counter I saw that this Harry Potter thing is not just a triumph of 21st Century marketing. It is a genuine social phenomenon.

Teen street hustler Monte and crusading business lawyer Cindy have bonded over these books and these characters in a way I never could with either of them. I haven’t read any of the books, and I haven’t paid much attention when I’ve taken them to see the movies. But you don’t have to get into the books to get the most important part. The stories aren’t so much adventures as they are morality tales. It’s about the ongoing battle between good and evil, halfway between the pure fantasy of the Lord of the Rings and the reality-based fantasy of James Bond. Like the fantasies I grew up on - Bond, Tarzan, Batman or my old role models Lew Archer and Travis McGee, people read this stuff for fun. They hardly seem to notice the moralizing, and that makes it all the more effective.

Naturally I love anything that gets Monte to sit down with a book, but the real shaker for me is that Cindy likes the books just as much. I hardly ever read fiction myself, except mysteries to test myself against the puzzle, but I’ve gotten dragged into the debates between Cindy and Monte about the plot twists.

The night after the “midnight party” we went to the IMAX and I actually watched the latest Harry Potter movie. At my place afterward I provided the popcorn and sodas and we talked... actually talked... until Monte nodded off on the sofa. Cindy leaned her head on my shoulder.

“We’re boring you to tears, aren’t we?” she asked.

“You kidding? Maybe you don’t get just how hard it is to have a meaningful discussion with a young teenager. And it’s good for him to hear stuff like the fact that this hot shit lawyer was crying when she finished a book. Listening him bitch about who died or who turned on their friends I really get to see the core of the boy. He gets the... um... I guess he gets the character of the characters. Do you get what I mean?”

Cindy said, “Reading can be a very solitary activity, but I guess we need to thank J.K. Rowling for giving us the one thing every good book ought to gives you - not just a good read, but a good reason for conversation.”