I found myself WITHOUT A BOOK on the flight back from D.C. Which is insane, because I have three shelves of unread books in my home, most of which I have been DYING to read and just haven’t had the time to do so. But, what can you do. With mombrain and the fact that I pack for everyone in my family, it was bound to happen. (How I would love to be my husband, who merely has to stroll into an airplane with his ticket without worrying about whether he packed dental floss. Because that is my job. But also: I’m such a control freak I like everyone to look nice. Whenever Mike packs he thinks that one pair of everything is okay for a whole week, which is just, so gross, but then that is what guys are like.)
Anyway, no books for me since I forgot. So I bought Harry, A History, a history of Harry Potter fandom by the webmistress of the Leaky Cauldron, the biggest Harry Potter fansite. It was a very interesting read, half of the time I was facepalm in horror and the other half I was really enjoying it. You know, part of you wants to go Shatner on SNL and yell “Get a Life!” and the other part is kind of happy that all these people found friendship and happiness through a book. You know? The best parts by far are when J.K. Rowling makes her rare appearances. Did you know that she wonders about Albus Severus Potter??? How cool is that!!! And hello: we would all buy a new Albus Potter book, right? I mean, totally.
The interesting part also for me was to find out that J.K. still holds a grudge against the New York Times Bestseller list since they split the list into two—Adult and Children’s after her books took up the first FOUR places on it. And the list has now been split into a myriad categories since then even. I forgot that there used to be just one Children’s List, now there are four kinds of Children’s Lists. (When you have three books in a series you get calculated in the series list, which is where Blue Bloods was counted). But not many people know that this has happened to the list. Most people still think of the New York Times list as, well, one list.
Like my dad for instance.
Here’s what happened when I hit the list.
“POP! WE HIT THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER LIST!!!”
“OH MY GOD!!!! I’M SO HAPPY!!! THAT IS HUGE!!!”
“I KNOW! AND AT NUMBER FOUR!!”
“OH MY GOD! NUMBER FOUR!! NUMBER FOUR!! THAT IS SO HIGH!! THAT IS SO BIG! OH MY GOD! I AM SO HAPPY! MY HEADACHE IS GONE!!”
A few hours later, via emails, my dad found out that I had hit the New York Times CHILDRENS list.
“What is this Children’s List? Is that still the New York Times list?”
“Yes Pop. This is where JK Rowling and Stephenie Meyer’s books are counted.” (One of the disadvantages of writing about vampires is that ever since Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight books have hit so big, now instead of my dad asking me why I’m not on the level of Danielle Steele, now he asks why I’m not like Stephenie Meyer. Sometimes my dad just says to me, out of the blue: STEPHENIE MEYER!!! And you know what he means: If she can, why can’t you? I’m lucky I know my dad is just joking. That is how we show love in my family. By endless teasing. A’s are never enough when A pluses are being handed out.)
“What? I don’t get it! What is this Children’s List? Where can I see it? I need proof.”
“It’ll be on the website and on the paper on Sunday.”
“Okay. I need proof.”
Note the LACK of Oh-my-gods and CAPS once my dad found out I’d hit the “Children’s List”. Sigh. On the one hand: it would be nice if the New York Times list was still ONE “The New York Times List” on the other hand, the children’s list IS STILL the New York Times list. And it’s really freaking hard to get on it. LOL.
But yeah. I’m with you J.K. I’m with you.
xoxo
Mel