In all seriousness, it’s amazing what Rowling’s novels mean to the publishing and bookselling industries.
On its own a new Harry Potter title has the power to juice up sales significantly, not just at Scholastic but throughout the industry. (On the London Stock Exchange, the announcement of the new book’s publication date by Bloomsbury, Ms. Rowling’s British publisher, sent its shares up 2.2 percent. Scholastic’s stock price was virtually unchanged at the end of Thursday’s trading.) In a year without Harry, his absence becomes an excuse for falling sales.
In the fiscal year ending May 31, 2005, one in which Scholastic did not publish a new hardcover Harry title, for example, sales in its children’s book publishing division dropped 15 percent to $1.15 billion from $1.36 billion. Last year, several bookstore chains, including Barnes & Noble and Borders, mentioned the lack of a Harry Potter hardcover as a reason for declining sales in the second quarter.
Scholastic officials readily admit that there is no one book or series waiting in the wings to succeed the Harry Potter books, which have 121.5 million copies in print in the United States and 325 million worldwide.
I can tell you from personal experience everything in this article is the truth — even the conclusion that the finale of Rowling’s beloved series isn’t the end of the written word as we know it. Shocking!
Hogwash! Comics are still going, no matter how many times Tim Hunter and his Books of Magic get canned.