Neither British version has any illustrations, except on the cover, and the Hogwart’s crest inside.
I have to admit, I like the Grandpré illustrations in the American version, but I don’t think I could handle the grating little changes in the British version – especially the philosopher’s stone being changed to sorcerer’s stone.
(Anyone who’s interested in the book covers can find a complete set of them here. The American covers, interestingly, are standard but not universal – France, Germany, Japan, Finland, and several other countries use neither the British nor the American. Anyone who’s never seen the American chapter pictures by Grandpré can find them here).
It may be the uniform worldwide release date for English-language editions, but thus far foreign translations have taken much longer. It was over a year between the English release of OotP and the Japanese translation (I believe translations into European languages were done more quickly).
Of course you can buy the books in English even in Japan. In fact, I have been in Japanese bookstores where the “English section” was really just the Harry Potter section.
Given that the HBP storyline was at one point going to be in the second book, I’d say that it’s possible that the HBP is a character who remained in the second book even after the storyline was cut out. Rowling does say that we shouldn’t expect to find the HBP storyline in Chamber of Secrets, as it was totally removed (though something Harry finds out in CoS mirrors something he finds out in HBP: I wonder WHICH thing that Harry found out it was though…), but she doesn’t say anything about characters. So Hagrid isn’t impossible. That said, I don’t see it. Hagrid is a fun character, but I just don’t see him getting his own major storyline that’s central for a book anymore than I do Ron. He’s a series player. So I vote someone new.
I DO think that the term “HBP” is something of a sacrastic term: something I can hear Draco Malfoy say sneeringly.
Hm, I should hang around Cafe Society more because I started a thread in MPSIMS about this same topic, and the mods closed it. :smack: Anyways, WOOHOO!! I absolutely positively cannot wait! I’m going to camp out in front of Chapters out of pure teenage hysteria!
BTW, for some reason, I’ve stuck the notion of Godric Gryffindor as the HBP. Just don’t ask why. I do hope that JKR will make Snape the DADA teacher. He’s been trying for so long!
Ah, I’m glad that this book won’t be released too too long after the last one. Hopefully the last one in the series will have a quicker time to shelf. Though I am excited. The puzzle pieces should be falling into place in this one, if anything to prepare for the finale of the 7th Book.
I also like the padding. It builds a world, rather than simply telling a story.
If anyone is interested, I just noticed you can preorder from Costco and the price is only $16.99 + $3.15 S&H. Nice savings off the $29.99 list. I wouldn’t be surprised if Sam’s Club doesn’t have something similar.
The Half Blood Prince is #1 in pre-orders. Borders is at 40% discount. I shall wait until someone sweetens the deal.
Joanne Rowling, you enjoy that pile of cash.
What’s the big deal with preordering the book from Amazon.com? Every bookstore, Walmart, Kmart, Best Buy, Target and Costco will have pallets of it on July 16.Plus it would be simpler to go out and get it locally rather than risk missing the UPS delivery guy.
As for the pile of cash, I read somewhere that JK Rowling is worth something like a billion dollars (or was it a billion pounds?). Either way, I had no idea there was that much money in this thing. (I am a little proud of myself for discovering the books before my friends did.)
I don’t know what the big deal with preordering is. I enjoy going to the store myself and squealing over the book with the rest of the Harry Potter mob. And JKR is worth more than the Queen, so I’m guessing it’s pounds.
Can’t find the cite at this moment, but Jo said that she meant them to come out in the order they did and the editor reversed them without her okay. I’m sure this info is available on mugglenet.com somewhere.
Why not? I think there is more to Neville than meets even his eye!
So glad there are these books–and so glad I have kids who love them. I would read them anyway, but it’s nice to read them aloud.
I wouldn’t count on it getting any sweeter than that. It’s basically a loss-leader as it is.
The bookstores buying through distribution are getting 40% off list (so they’re paying the same thing you are if you buy from Borders). The ones getting it from Scholastic directly are getting a 44% to 46% discount. Full-service bookstores and small local stores can’t afford to operate on a 6% margin.
The big chains can run on lower margins (although not that low) by hiring minimum-wage workers who know nothing about books (and not hiring enough of them to be of any real help to shoppers anyway).
Online stores like Amazon can run on much tighter margins because of their reduced overhead, and they make some extra money in the shipping charges, so they’re doing better than it looks.
