Joanna Rowling did a great job keeping the Harry Potter series compelling for original readers who were 10 to 12 years old when Harry was introduced in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone but who are now heading off to college or even jobs.
J.K.Rowling has hit upon a unique formula of aging Harry as the series progresses—he was eleven in the first book and is now sixteen in the new one. However, it’s unclear how interesting he will be to older teens on the verge of adulthood.
With a planned initial printing of 10.8 million copies – compared to 8.5 million of the fifth book - Harry’s American publisher, Scholastic Books, is investing in optimism.
“Of course, we’ve lost some, but I don’t believe we’ve lost (a lot of) readers,” says Barbara Marcus, executive vice-president of Scholastic in charge of children’s book publishing.
“I believe we have expanded to parents, aunts and uncles and grandparents. Then we have the new readers. The beauty of the children’s market is that our readers come into the market and they grow with us.’’
There are more than 103 million books now in print in the US and when a new Harry book comes out it accounts for about 10 per cent of Scholastic’s annual $2.2 billion in revenues.
The first book in Harry Potter series remains a top-seller. Rather than signaling a tail-off in interest, Scholastic says the high number of young readers is growing into the series.
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