I don't recall a time before or since when a kids' book series, or any book for that matter, was so popular as Harry Potter was. This book series was so popular that book stores were having midnight release parties. The last four books in the series all set records as the fastest selling books in history.
The photo above is from a release party at my local Barnes and Noble for Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, the penultimate book in the series. According to the exif data, this photo was taken on 9:37pm on July 15th, 2005. The book was released at midnight. During the hours leading up to the release, there were all kinds of fun activities going on throughout the store, all with a Harry Potter theme. I took my kids to this event and a similar one for the final book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, a couple of years later. I don't recall if I attended similar events for any of the earlier books. The irony is, I think I was more excited than my kids were.
I was already an adult when I started reading the Harry Potter series but ended up enjoying it immensely. I finished the first book in the series not long before the first movie was released in 2001, near Thanksgiving if I recall correctly. At the time, I thought the first book was just ok. Actually, I felt that way about the first two books. But afterwards, I thought they improved greatly. I'm not sure when the series peaked for me. Perhaps with Goblet of Fire. However, I enjoyed them all as well as the movies. It's rare that characters on screen match how you imagined them in the book so well but the Harry Potter movies managed that for me (Lord of the Rings is another movie franchise that did that well). But as for excitement about an upcoming book release, nothing beats this night. It's hard to believe it was nearly 20 years ago.
