Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

JK Rowling has revealed that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows will be the title of the seventh and final installment in the Harry Potter series.

The name of the long-awaited seventh and last Harry Potter book has been revealed today in a puzzle on the author’s website. Booksellers are already predicting that the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows will be the literary event of the year but a date has yet to be set by JK Rowling’s publishers, Bloomsbury.

On her website Rowling, 41, admits that she is still writing the book about Harry’s last year at Hogwarts school. She said: “I’m now writing scenes that have been planned, in some cases, for a dozen years or even more. I both want, and don’t want, to finish this book.” But she reassured expectant fans: “Don’t worry, I will.”

The multi-millionaire recently hinted that two characters are expected to die in the finale – and Harry himself might not survive – saying: “We are dealing with pure evil here. “They don’t target extras, do they? They go for the main characters – well, I do.”

Ms Rowling reveals the title of the book through a puzzle and a game of hangman.

Booksellers predicted that demand for the book will be even higher than the last one, Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince, which broke UK records by shifting 2,009,574 copies on its first day of release. Kes Nielsen, Head of Books Buying at Amazon.co.uk, says: “The book’s release will be met with an unprecedented level of excitement but also a sense of sadness. Over the past 10 years, so many people have been enchanted by the world and characters that JK Rowling has created. It will be like saying goodbye to an old friend.

I certainly can’t recall anything like this level of pop culture hysteria around a book series previously. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy came out decades before the advent of the modern hype machine and no other books that I can think of so captured the imagination of children and adult readers alike.

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James Joyner
About James Joyner
James Joyner is Professor and Department Head of Security Studies at Marine Corps University's Command and Staff College. He's a former Army officer and Desert Storm veteran. Views expressed here are his own. Follow James on Twitter @DrJJoyner.

Comments

  1. Is it still hype when the books are good enough to deserve the attention?

  2. Alex Knapp says:

    “Is it still hype when the books are good enough to deserve the attention?”

    Amen, Stormy Dragon. How rare is it that a best-selling book, much less a best-selling series is not only well-written, but has a broad appeal to children and adults alike?

  3. Steve Verdon says:

    Hmmm, I thought the release was going to be something like 7/7/07. At least that is/was the rumor.

  4. kiy says:

    It’s devil and lucifer worship. Flying around is bad wether awake or asleep.

    Lord of the rings isn’t the super collider in Germany. There already is a time gate thing at DOD, so don’t try to hook in the ring things.

  5. Felicity says:

    I understand from one of the presenters at Lumos (the big summer 2006 fandom convention held in Las Vegas) that he heard on the QT that the tentative release date for Book 7 is September 1, 2007. I know 07/07/07 is popular in fandom (seventh book and all), but that’s the anniversary of the London tube bombings, so it’s not likely that Rowling and her publishers will upset the UK public by issuing the last book on that date. Also, the movie of OotP is opening on 07/13/07, so it’s not likely that the HP book and movie marketers are going to step on each other’s toes by releasing the last book and latest movie within a week of each other. In fact, I would expect the UK and US book publishers to have an agreement with Warner Brothers NOT to release the last book within a specified number of weeks of the movie.