# J.K. Rowling **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 5, 2002, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415 "2002-06-05T01:11:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lok](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e8c25b/32.png) [@Lok](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lok)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2002, 5:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/21 "2002-06-07T05:09:39Z")
Diane Duane’s “So You Want to be A Wizard” series. 5 books in the main YA series, and 2 so far in the more adult spin off about the wizards of the People. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2002, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/22 "2002-06-07T05:19:37Z")
Sigh…I never meant that I was without anything to read until book 5… ---
**Author:** ![Doug\_Bowe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df788c/32.png) [@Doug\_Bowe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doug_Bowe)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2002, 5:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/23 "2002-06-07T05:58:44Z")
Far from it, Rilchiam. You started a wonderful thread. It even got a response from our own more lovable version of Draco Malfoy…pldennison. Keep up the good work! ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2002, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/24 "2002-06-07T06:27:59Z")
I’m glad I’m not the only one who suffered a little cognitive dissonance when confronted with the spectacle of Chris Columbus dissing hacks. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2002, 10:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/25 "2002-06-07T10:04:50Z")
Heehee! ---
**Author:** ![ISiddiqui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/97f17d/32.png) [@ISiddiqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ISiddiqui)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2002, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/26 "2002-06-07T18:25:50Z")
I agree with the poster that said she is probably planning everything out for the last 3 books. It is my opinion that she is probably psedo-writing the last 2 books as she is writing number five. Remember the first four came out pretty quickly, indicating that she planned them out before the first one even came out. Now, I guess she is trying to plan out the end in detail and make it as good as it gets, because it is close to the end, and she can’t get there (to number seven) and say, ooh, I should put this in five. So therefore she is doing it all now, and I think 5, 6, and 7 will come out pretty quickly in succession after that. As for GoF, that was actually my 2nd favorite Potter book (PoA is my fave). I really liked it. _shrug_ ---
**Author:** ![pesch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pesch/32/4925_2.png) [@pesch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pesch)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2002, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/27 "2002-06-08T00:03:13Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by pldennison \* > \*\*Do the words “A Chris Columbus Film” really make anyone shiver in anticipation? \*\* About as much as “An Ivan Reitman film.” Another living, breathing example of a hack. ---
**Author:** ![Neidhart](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Neidhart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neidhart)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2002, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/28 "2002-06-08T01:33:40Z")
> [@](#): > > One name: Diana Wynne Jones. “The Ogre Downstairs” was my favorite novel when I was 10!! ---
**Author:** ![TigoleBitties](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cab0a1/32.png) [@TigoleBitties](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TigoleBitties)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2002, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/29 "2002-06-08T03:35:33Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by WSLer \* > \*\*Gee, you must not be a Thomas Harris fan, since it took him 11 YEARS between Silence Of The Lambs and Hannibal. > \*\* Wuugh…bad example. He obliterated the mystique with Hannibal and that ending A better example may be the Gunslinger Books by old Stephen King. Yes I admit he has slipped over the years but there is something about ol Roland that has me itching for the next ones. There was a big honking stop between the 3rd and the 4th (9 years I think?) and now we hear Stevie may give up the word processor of the gods (whether it be before or after the series, I do not know). But if it means he needs time to work em out…so be it. Same with Rowling. From the Biography I saw, she has em pretty well mapped out as far as major plot, characters, and circumstances. She will probably wack together the book then spend most of her time reworking it here and there (On the same Biography, she counted no less than 7 rewrites of pieces in the first book) If it means getting them as good as the other were, I can wait. And I can wait without having anymore movies too (it was a good movie but my imagination is better)😉 ---
**Author:** ![Heloise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e36b37/32.png) [@Heloise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Heloise)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2002, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/30 "2002-06-08T04:18:20Z")
> [@](#): > > Warners short list for director of “Azkaban” (scheduled for 2004–yes, the studio will skip a year) includes Callie Khouri, Kenneth Branagh and–no kidding–Alfonso Cuaron (as in “Y Tu Mama Tambien”). How can Kenneth Branagh be in Azkaban when he is playing the idiot professor, Gilderoy Lockhart, in Chamber of Secrets? ---
**Author:** ![Orual](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/779978/32.png) [@Orual](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Orual)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2002, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/31 "2002-06-08T04:39:18Z")
Well, directors don’t generally appear on screen… ---
**Author:** ![Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2002, 5:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/32 "2002-06-08T05:58:46Z")
I have to agree with **Chronos**. Rowling is releasing books, a more permanent art form, not screenwriting a forgettable TV series that future generations will not see. Does anybody here really know how long it took C.S. Lewis between “The Silver Chair” and “The Horse and His Boy?” Does anybody remember the anticipation betwen “Taran Wanderer” and “The High King?” Between “Henry IV” and “The Merry Wives of Windsor?” Rowling is very fortunate that her books are even a success within her own lifetime. Some authors aren’t given their accolades until long after they’re dead. Of course I hope the next book will be good. I haven’t been disappointed so far. “Goblet of Fire” could have been trimmed down to 200 pages, but the Chronicles of Narnia could have done without “The Magician’s Nephew,” in my opinion. So what? If I had seen a noticeable drop in quality from Book One through Book Four, I would worry. But “Prisoner of Azkaban” is, so far, my favorite of the four. As far as the movies go, my only concern is that Rowling will have trouble separating her vision of the books from what the movies have incorporated into them. So far, they’re very similar, but not exact, and some of the visualization is slightly different. Quirrell is seen to die in the film, and not in the book. The Quidditch match looks different than I had expected. Neither is necessarily better from a story-telling standpoint. Thank God there isn’t an extended Harry Potter universe. “The Chronicles of Neville Longbottom.” “Marcus Flint, M.D.” “Seamus Finnegan’s Rainbow.” Ugh. She’s wise, at least, to keep the writing to herself. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2002, 9:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/33 "2002-06-08T09:22:37Z")
**Fish** , I love **The Magician’s Nephew**. The book does not need to be removed from the series; it just has to stay in it’s rightful position: Book Six, not Book One! ---
**Author:** ![Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2002, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415/34 "2002-06-08T09:58:16Z")
Mebbe so, **Rilchiam**. I’ve always thought of it as being Book Six, too. However, it was my least favorite of the stories as a youth, and even less favored now that the symbolism is clearer to me. My point was only that the best stories aren’t necessarily the first ones written, or that a long wait is indicative of a desperate problem of the writer to think of something good. Take _The Hound of the Baskervilles_, for instance, which I consider to be the best of the four Holmes novels. Anyway, enough hijack. Back to your regularly scheduled thread. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling/112415.md?page=1)