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It's nearly two o'clock in the morning and I've just returned home, with my family and two of my daughter's friends. We've just come from a bookstore. That's right. A bookstore, at 2:00am.

Of course it can only mean that the sixth installment of the Harry Potter series has just been released. I was number 236 in the queue for those people who had reserved a copy (or copies) of the book.

While I won't get around to reading it for six months to a year, my nine year old daughter will have it read within the week.

I was glad we took in the event however. As I wrote in an earlier blog, I'm glad to see so much excitement over a book. Certainly it's tremendous marketing, as the books are really only average at best. But to get people excited for a book should certainly help the literary market in general. Is there a down side to have kids see so many people turn out and wait, eagerly, to purchase a book? One of my daughter's friends who went to this bash with us is a troubled reader. I don't know anything more than that she is getting tutoring help this summer for her reading. What a positive reinforcement I would think this was, for her to see the energy surrounding a book. I wonder if it was encouraging for her to see my daughter read an entire book (book "G" in the A to Z Mysteries series) while we waited (or was it discouraging because she couldn't do that?).

Congratulations, J.K. Rowling, on your success. Would that it were mine.