Librarians to guard Potter book secrets
In a world where leaks about the latest entertainment products hit the entertainment pages every day, the contents of the last Harry Potter book have been shrouded in impenetrable secrecy.
So far.
"They're making me bend over backwards with all this paperwork," said Alice Johnson, youth services programmer and school liaison for the Prospect Heights Public Library.
J.K. Rowling's final installment of her magically successful Harry series, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," is shipping out this week under cover of probably the heaviest security blanket in the history of literature. As of this paper's printing, not one leak about the seventh book's plot had escaped from publisher Scholastic, Inc.'s clutches - but if one does, the whole world will know about it in hours.
Given the fantastical nature of the book set at Hogwarts, it seems fitting to hear librarians' tales of keeping secrets in locked cabinets in locked chambers.
"Very few people are allowed to handle it," said Carolynn Muci, public relations/marketing for the Mount Prospect Public Library.
Muci and Mary Ann Sibrava, assistant head of youth services, said the hottest releases in the adult-literature realm now usually come with affidavits on which bookstore personnel and librarians must promise secrecy, but that Harry Potter was the first aimed at young readers to require such treatment. Copies of a new release generally arrive at libraries and retail outlets 10-14 days before their shelf dates, Sibrava said; "Hallows" appeared only five days before it went public.
She said her staff was able to catalogue their 40 print copies and 10 audiobooks in the slashed timeframe.
"It's just that much less sitting around," she said.
Of course, librarians in Mount Prospect and Prospect Heights unanimously scoffed at the idea of sneaking a peek. Although they will be some of the first people on Earth outside of the Scholastic camp to possess the tome, they each promised to not surrender to sinister temptations.
"We're bound not to," Sibrava said.
In a time when hype-building is an industry of its own, when everything from movies to presidential candidates climb over each other to break into the public's attention, Scholastic is hiding its biggest draw away. Local libraries noted the role they played in the reversal, but said being part of it was not all that interesting.
"These books have always had a life of their own," said Sue Seggeling, Prospect Heights' head of youth services. "As for the silence, that's it's own hype, isn't it?"
But sometime long from now, when the movie version of "Hallows" is sitting on DVD store shelves, the hype will be over, and the test of time will begin for the most popular character of recent years. How Harry and Voldemort will compare to other timeless heroes and villains will take years to sort out - but the local fans think it will be favorable.
"When I revisit it with grandchildren, it'll be great all over again," Sibrava said.
All said Rowling's material would shine in any time, they said, as it already stands apart amid a resurgence in fantasy literature.
"In my opinion, she's had to compete with a lot of great books out there," Seggeling said. "I think the series will be read. I think it has all the elements."
Readers will judge for themselves at bookstores around the northwest, beginning at 12:01 a.m. Saturday. Library users will have to wait until 9 a.m. - by then, fast readers and fast bloggers may have made their hero's fate public knowledge - but as Seggeling put it, no one is likely to know the contents of the books until those hours arrive.
"Everybody wants it and no one can have it until the day it's out."