8 July, 2000
Friday night, 11.00. Sick of watching TV, and not tired enough to go to bed, I decided on a lark to go over to 57th St. Books and check out their Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire release party. So, I got in my car and drove the 14 blocks or so. Parked on Woodlawn at 57th St., and walked towards the store.
Now, I wasn't sure what to expect, but I sure wasn't expecting a crowd of over 30 people outside the store, or the 150-200 people who must have been IN the store. I have never, ever seen such a density of people in a bookstore. The only time that comes even close is when I went to a Robert Jordan booksigning at The Stars Our Destination, and this beat that occasion by an order of magnitude. I knew that Harry Potter was popular, but I had no idea so many people would be willing to stay out past midnight just to buy the latest book!
I was kinda worried that I wouldn't actually be ABLE to get a copy, since I hadn't reserved a copy in advance. (Like I said, this was pretty much a spontaneous decision.) However, one of the clerks told me that they had ordered 500 copies, so there shouldn't be any problem. (500 copies!) I was really impressed by the variety of people in the store. Parents who'd come with their kids, parent who'd come with their kids, but who intended to read the book first, grad students from the RI, black folks, white folks, people ranging from about age 3 to about age 83. Heinrich Jaeger (a physics professor) was there!
The bookstore staff were all dressed up as wizards and witches, as were quite a few of the customers, and there were games for the kids, and refreshments, and decorations. I actually had several non-Harry Potter books I wanted to get, as well, so I bought those, although it wasn't easy to move around the bookstore with all those people in there.
Anyway, at around 11.30 ( the book was to go on sale at midnight) the bookstore staff started getting people organized. People who had reserved copies lined up inside the store (poor them), people who had NOT reserved copies lined up outside. I managed to get outside fast enough to be near the front of the outside line. (Yeah me!) I must say I was glad I didn't have to wait inside the bookstore, which was sweltering hot due to the number of people packed in there. The AC didn't stand a chance.
Waiting in line was actually the funnest part of the whole outing. My line-neighbors were: 1) a mom who'd come with her son (about 10) who couldn't wait for the next day to get the book, 2) a high school freshman and her little brother, who both intended to buy copies, and 3) a pair of CPS teachers who'd come from someplace out fo Hyde Park, because they didn't have a midnight sale in their neighborhood. It was really neat to talk to a bunch of random strangers who I'd never have met under normal circumstances about books. All sorts of books, not just Harry. The high school student in particular was very well-read, and incredibly sharp.
(While we were waiting, some old lady tried to cut into the front of the line, which went around the corner down Kimbark by that point. The lady at the front of the line told her off, backed up by me, and she just couldn't believe that anybody would dare to tell her to get in the back of the line. I mean, sure I felt a little bad telling an 80-year-old woman to shove off, but if she's in good enough shape to be going to a midnight book sale, she's in good enough shape to wait in line like everybody else. Sheesh!)
They finally started selling the book, and the first person out of the store was a little girl-- she couldn't have been older than 6 or 7-- clutching a humongous tome and smiling like she'd just won a lifetime supply of toys. She looked ready to go home and read it straight through. Hell, when I was that age, I'd have been seriously daunted by a book that big. (734 pages!) Of course, when I was that age, we didn't have Harry Potter.
The reserved-copy people took until about 12.40. The store folks were really nice and brought out snacks for those of us standing outside. Eventually, they started sending us into the store to get our books. They let us in ten at a time, to keep things from getting too crowded in there. I've got to say, they did a supurb job of crowd control, especially considering that they probably never had anywhere near that many people in and outside the store, ever.
I got my book, said "bye" to my line-mates, and got home a bit past 1.00 am. Since I lack the infinite energy of a 7-year-old, I went straight to bed without cracking the book open.
Of course, the bloody lakefront reconstruction crew was hard at (loud, loud, loud) work by 8.30 am the next day, so I got up plenty early to read the book.
How was it? Good. Lots of developments on both the personal and fighting-evil levels. I'm not going to say anything else here, because I don't want to spoil it even a little bit for anybody else.