The Magic Hour

The end

2007-07-21T02:00:00.000-04:00

Thanks for spending the evening with me, Potterphiles. Check out early excerpts from this blog in today's News & Record, along with some staff photos (which I can guarantee look better than mine do) from earlier in the evening.

Back outside

2007-07-21T01:50:00.000-04:00

The staff just shut down the cafe and starting shuffling people out the door.

At about 1:40 a.m., a staff member came outside and shouted that the last customer was at the register. The last book was about to be sold. Wait - maybe not. A few shoppers are still trickling in, and staff are letting them by with instructions to turn right and go straight to the register.

It seems Barnes & Noble had an endless supply of books.

People have gathered in small pockets outside to chat before they head home. From a crowd of hundreds (at least seven or eight hundred, by my count) we're down to maybe 20 or 30.

The store is in shambles. Books are strewn everywhere, along with coffee cups, soda and juice bottles, napkins and other trash. Every table looks like shoppers pawed it over from 7 p.m. straight through to midnight.

As I headed out the door, I walked past a table of Harry Potter merchandise. I wonder how much related swag the store sold while shoppers whiled away the hours.

We probably won't know. Local booksellers don't often reveal their sales figures, though the big companies will release chain-wide numbers early next week.

Winding down

2007-07-21T01:30:00.000-04:00

The last customers who pre-ordered their books made it through the line a few minutes ago.

Now the cashiers have started taking orders from customers who just showed up - the people who have been waiting outside the store all evening and peering in the windows.

An employee just opened the front doors and hollered, "OK, everybody come in!"

From the relatively small size of the crowd, I'm assuming some shoppers went elsewhere instead of waiting. And others probably just called friends inside and asked them to pick up an extra book.

The book

2007-07-21T01:25:00.000-04:00

Don't worry. There will be no spoilers here.

But in case your book hasn't arrived from Amazon.com yet, or if you haven't yet made a trip to the store, here's a closer look at J.K. Rowling's magnum opus.

The cover:

The inside front flap doesn't include the typical jacket summary. Aside from the price and the art credits, the flap just includes a single sentence: "We now present the seventh and final installment in the epic tale of Harry Potter."

The back flap doesn't even reveal that much. I'm not going anywhere near the back pages, other than to tell you that, in the service of journalism, I accidentally saw the last sentence while checking how many pages there are: 759. You probably could kill someone with this book. If Harry offs Lord Voldemort, that's probably how he kills him - dropping a nearly 800-page hardcover Potter book on his misshapen head.

Other than that, I'm not peeking. After this distribution shindig is done, I plan to head home and curl up on the couch. And I'm hoping to stay awake until it's over - one way or another.

The line keeps winding ...

2007-07-21T01:15:00.000-04:00

They hit the letter "O" just after 1 a.m.

I feel kind of guilty, sitting here with my book (which is tightly wrapped in the bag to keep people under the illusion that I'm still waiting and still have a reason to be here).

But before I packed Harry Potter up, I posed for a picture to commemorate the moment (you know, in case the embarrassing blog isn't enough):

Purchased: Two Harry Potter books

2007-07-21T01:00:00.000-04:00

That's right - one for me and one for someone waiting outside in the parking lot.

When I reached the register, the clerk (who I've been annoying all evening by butting in up front with my camera and laptop) just asked me how many books I wanted.

I swiped my credit card. I signed the slip. She handed them over the counter.

Before tonight, I wondered why Barnes & Noble didn't just ask customers to pay when they pre-registered. But that 10-second transaction was so simple, that I guess there's no need for them to monkey with matching up names and payment slips with copies of the book.

I came back to the cafe, hands full of computer, book, a camera and coffee. And as I sat down, a young girl asked me if she could see the cover. I handed her the book. She pronounced it big. And heavy.

Who said Harry Potter was for kids?

2007-07-21T00:50:00.000-04:00

One of the highlights of my evening so far, as I wait for my book and blog in a corner (I'm now kneeling with my laptop on a table next to the cash registers at the front of the store) is seeing people from work throw themselves into a celebration of all things geeky.

For example:

Meet my editor, Mr. John Nagy. He says this hat belongs to his daughter, but I think he made it especially for this festive occasion.

Into the line

2007-07-21T00:30:00.000-04:00

I've made it into the winding line that's snaking its way throughout the store.

The News & Record's cops reporter just helped me out by snagging my hot coffee out of my hand. In exchange, he wants me to buy a book for a friend who is waiting outside with a wristband toward the back end of the line.

I only registered for one book, so we'll see how this goes.

Snape and Bellatrix mug for the camera

2007-07-21T00:14:00.000-04:00

I caught back up with Bellatrix Lestrange and her partner in crime, Severus Snape.

Snape's real name (and for some reason, everyone here asks me whether it's their real name or their character name I'm looking for) is Rob Kipp. He works at Barnes & Noble and has been glowering all night as he tromps about the store, helping customers.

Bellatrix, as I mentioned before, is Grimsley High School senior Anna Eusebio.

The magic begins ...

2007-07-21T00:01:00.000-04:00

After counting down the last minute, with the crowd yelling each number louder than the last, employees tore into the boxes and pulled out the first copies of the 750-plus page tome. One of the first customers shouted and held his book up in the air.

And the boxes are unveiled

2007-07-20T23:55:00.000-04:00

A thrilled chorus of shouts and a round of applause goes up throughout the store at the Barnes & Noble employees rip sheets of thick blue paper off the front of the boxes of books. Just five minutes now ...

Herbology with Professor Sprout

2007-07-20T23:25:00.000-04:00

Kathy Barham went all out for tonight's Potter party.

The 45-year-old Burlington woman made three costumes this week: One for herself and one for each of her daughters.

Barham, who says she drove to Greensboro because the midnight release party at Barnes & Noble is the best around, came dressed tonight as Professor Sprout, the Hogwarts herbology teacher. Thus far, she's the only one I've seen in that costume.

When I ask about her character choice, she leans close to me and says: "I found the material for a dollar a yard at Wal-mart."

She laughs.

"I though wow, it looks kind of Sprout-ish."

Her long taupe-colored robes come with a matching pointed witch's hat and a brown tote bag full of fake flowers and plants.

One of her daughters is dressed as a living picture frame, like the ones that populate the walls of Hogwarts castle. The other is dressed as Tonks, the auror who can change her appearance at will. This particular Tonks has pink hair, which she's given up on and is holding in her lap.

Barham is still sporting her long grey wig, but she says her head is getting hot fast.

She won't get to read the book until her daughters finish. The family is getting two copies, and it will be a race to see who reaches the last page first. Mom gets to read it last, she says.

Too tired for Potter

2007-07-20T23:22:00.000-04:00

There's a father asleep on the thin store carpet, a jacket pillowed under his head, while his young kids play nearby.

From the prior Potter event I've attended, I was expecting the kids to be passed out by now while their parents frolicked about. Maybe dad was worn out by all the trivia.

I'd take a picture, but that seems sort of cruel.

The first group lines up

2007-07-20T23:19:00.000-04:00

It's 11:19 p.m., and a woman just got on the loudspeaker here to ask the first group of shoppers who pre-ordered their books to start lining up near the registers.

Shoppers who ordered in advance have pumpkin-colored wristbands (I'm wearing one and will throw a picture of it up here shortly). They're in groups of 50 or so, each group labeled with a letter. (I'm in group "I," which means roughly 400 people are in line ahead of me.)

Shoppers who just showed up today, without an advance order, are wearing blue bracelets. And they'll be the last to get their books.

The excitement level in the store shop up quickly - as did the noise - after the announcement.

Bellatrix Lestrange and I have a pleasant chat

2007-07-20T23:01:00.000-04:00

Anna Eusebio has a passion for the baddies.

Tonight, she came dressed as Bellatrix Lestrange, the deranged cousin and eventual killer of Sirius Black, to volunteer at this local Potter party.

Her favorite character: Severus Snape.

"He is multidimensional," she says. "And you can't tell if he is really evil."

Tonight, Eusebio, who is 17 and a rising senior at Grimsley High School, is manning the jelly-bean game. Young kids are guessing that the jar holds 1 million beans, while a pair of teenage girls are measuring the jar with a piece of paper, convinced they can mathematically calculate the jar's capacity. Their eventual answer: 5,000. A good try - but probably wrong.

The beans do have realistic flavors, Eusebio says: "Vomit does taste like what it would probably taste like if you threw up in your mouth."

She's read all the books in the series and seen all the films. And, of course, she has the newest book on order. But with work at 8 a.m. Saturday and summer reading - Dr. Zhivago - looming, she probably won't find out the fate of the boy wizard for a few more days.

It's getting festive in here

2007-07-20T22:52:00.000-04:00

Barnes & Noble hasn't made a dramatic transformation into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, or anything. But this place looks totally different than it does on a typical Friday night.

There's a sign reading "The Sorcerer's Bank" over the cash registers where in a little more than an hour customers will start paying for the first few copies of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows."

One corner is done up as a version of the joke shop run by Fred and George Weasley in Diagon Alley. Games including jeopardy and trivia have been going on in every corner. Nearby, a group of kids in black robes and Muggle clothes are guessing just how many Bertie Botts beans are crammed into a jar. The one who makes the best guess wins the prize. Hopefully, the jelly beans come with a taste tester who will let you know whether the yellow one is lemon-flavored or some sort of cleaning fluid.

At a table in the middle of the cafe, a woman is holding a small model golden snitch, complete with white wings that dwarf the tiny ball. Kids are playing with Harry Potter action figures, wrapping themselves in long knit scarves of Gryffindor colors and playing card games. A few are quietly tucked into corners, reading books.

The demographics here are spread far and wide. It's mostly adults, but there are a lot of kids and teenagers milling about. Everyone - except for the Barnes & Noble employees taking out the trash and lugging around carts of ice for the cafe - seems excited.

Lord Voldemort's about

2007-07-20T22:44:00.000-04:00

Walking in the door earlier, I saw a man dressed as Lord Voldemort. My heart pretty much froze. This might be the best getup I've seen all night.

To my left right now, there's a woman done up like Professor Trelawney, the Hogwarts divination teacher who made the initial prophecy about Harry and the Big Evil Lord V. She's got the messy hair. The huge glasses that make her eyes look as big and slick as fishbowls. The flowing garmets. The iPhone she's clicking away on sort of breaks the illusion, though.

Sorry about that brief interruption

2007-07-20T22:39:00.000-04:00

This laptop's acting like it ate a bad Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Bean - maybe booger. Or vomit.

But I've got it back running properly ... here's hoping.

Meet Robert Harris

2007-07-20T22:25:00.000-04:00

Meet Robert Harris. He's 77 years old and a lifelong Greensboro resident. And tonight, the sometime actor is playing Albus Dumbledore. Harris, who was walking with a cane amid a swirl of robes, gladly posed for a picture outside the store. These clothes came from his collection of costumes at home, he said.

While I took pictures, Harris told me a little bit about his acting career, which includes small parts in movies such as "Junebug." He hasn't read the Harry Potter books (and I couldn't bear to break it to him that Dumbledore dies in book six), but he decided to come dressed as the Hogwarts headmaster because, he says, they look a bit alike.

Another great Snape debate

2007-07-20T22:07:00.000-04:00

I'm standing up, resting the laptop on a thick banister. And the people at the table nearest me are debating the relationship of Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape. And whether the former Potions master will turn out to be good or evil ...

In a totally different world

2007-07-20T22:02:00.000-04:00

Well, your faithful Harry Potter correspondent has made it. I braved the crowds and even faced off against Lord Voldemort (or at least, someone dressed and made up like him) to stake out my space in the Barnes & Noble cafe.

There are so many people here I can't even count them. Hundreds. Some are dressed like normal Muggles, but a lot are wearing witches' hats or round black-framed eyeglasses. A Barnes & Noble employee staffing the bracelet distibution outside is wearing black robes and a witch's hat. A girl who just walked by was wearing a convincing imitation of a Hogwarts school uniform - and had no shoes on. Maybe that's supposed to be a combination Harry Potter and hobbit thing, or something.

Store hours: A redux

2007-07-20T21:30:00.000-04:00

In case you haven't caught up with local schedules in the paper, here's the skinny on some Potter-related store activities as we head into the evening:

* I'll be blogging live starting around 10 p.m. from Barnes & Noble at Friendly Center in Greensboro. We'll have a News & Record photographer on-scene earlier than that. The party starts at 7 p.m. Staff will start handing out books at 12:01 a.m. Saturday, first giving them to people who pre-ordered copies and then to people who stopped by during the day today to pick up admission bracelets without pre-ordering. I just talked to store staff, and there are still some bracelets left. But they're going fast. And if you show up after midnight, you're out of luck. The store will remain open until the last braceleted customer is served - likely between 1:30 a.m. and 2 a.m. The same goes for other area Barnes & Noble stores. The Greensboro store is expected a crowd of more than 1,000 people.

* Borders on High Point Road is running a similar system. Store employees plan to line up shoppers about 10 or 15 minutes before midnight, handing out books first to the customers who pre-ordered and then to the last-minute shoppers. You might get a book if you show up there late, but there are no guarantees the store won't run out. Borders expects to close around 1 a.m. The same goes for other area Borders stores.

* The UNCG Bookstore will reopen at 10 p.m. and start selling books at 12:01 a.m. The store is located in the Elliot University Center and offers the same discount as the big chains. (It's owned by Barnes & Noble.) Again, last-minute shoppers have to wait behind customers who pre-ordered their copies.

* Waldenbooks in Four Seasons Town Centre will be open until 2 a.m. Customers can walk in to buy a book up until closing time but, again, supplies aren't unlimited. The same goes for other area Waldenbooks locations.

* Area Wal-Mart Supercenters - which are open around the clock - also are hosting parties starting around 8 p.m. Books go on sale at midnight. You'll still have to fight the crowds, but there's not a backlog of pre-registered people here. Regular Wal-Mart stores are observing normal hours.

* Shakespeare and Co. Books in Kernersville will stay open until 12:30 a.m. for a book party. Call the store for details at 993-1050.

* Kmart on Bridford Parkway in Greensboro and on Huffman Mill Road in Burlington will be open until 1 a.m. for book parties.

Countown to Potter party patter

2007-07-19T23:53:00.001-04:00

For years, I refused to read the Harry Potter series.

It was one of those things that became a fad too quickly.

My brother was reading it. My mother was reading it. Everyone I knew had their face stuck in one of those huge books with the funny covers and the characters with strange names.

It was only a matter of time until I got sucked into the madness, caught up in the story of the boy wizard, his tragic backstory, his seemingly impossible quest and his circle of brave friends.

I don't remember when I first picked up a Harry Potter book. I'm sure it was my brother's fault. He's three years younger than I am and was never a huge reader until about the time he started plowing through the Potter series.

Fast-forward a few years, and I've read each book of J.K. Rowling's blockbuster series at least twice. Some of them - "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" - I must have read more than three times. I've seen all the movies (and they don't measure up to the books) and I've speculated about how it's all going to end. (I'm not making any predictions here, and I haven't been reading any spoilers or speculations online.)

I bought the fifth book in Germany, a few days before I flew back to the United States from Europe. And I read the entire thing during the flight. For the sixth book release, I sheepishly hit up a midnight sale, having pre-ordered my book a few weeks early. I read it all that night and into the following morning. In one sitting.

I wouldn't call myself a Harry Potter fanatic. I don't use words like "muggle" in conversation, and I certainly don't plan to dress up for the book release party. I haven't marked Potter events on my calendar, and I didn't rush out to the midnight showing of the most recent movie (though I did see it during opening week).

But I'm definitely a devotee. Each book in the series has been better than the last, and reading Harry Potter brings me back to some of the books I loved as a kid: Those well-loved paperbacks by C.S. Lewis, Roald Dahl and Edward Eager, to list a few.

And, of course, I have my favorite characters. The central trio is great - and who can help but love our hero - but I've been most attached to players like Dobby the house elf, Sirius Black, Tonks, Rita Skeeter and Dolores Umbridge (who might be the most evil woman I've ever encountered in print). And, whether he turns out to be good or evil, I'm fascinated with Severus Snape.

These are just a few of the reasons that, when the opportunity came up to live-blog about a Potter release party for the seventh book in the series, I jumped at it. I'm a little embarrassed to say I'll be spending a Friday evening at a bookstore with people wearing fake eyeglasses, scar tattoos, Hogwarts-themed clothing and funny hats. But it's an experience I wouldn't miss.

After all, it's supposedly the last one.

So tonight, starting around 10 p.m., you can find me parked at a cafe table or wandering the floor at Barnes & Noble at Friendly Center, where I'll be grabbing stories and snapping pictures to post online. If there's something you want to hear about - or if you have a question about the Potter party - let me know. I'll try to answer it here.

And I'll be blogging until 1 a.m. or so, whenever the store closes.

Except, of course, when I head up to the counter to get my book.