Details for J. K. Rowling's next novel

[Captaindemotion]

Damn typo! I better copyright that before Saatchi and Saatchi get to it!

 

[Starkers]

Are they still going?

 

[Sci]

^ She doesn't hate all politicians. She was an enthusiastic supporter of the last Labout government, even under Gordon Brown.

Indeed, she and the former Prime Minister are good friends, apparently.

Rowling's attitude towards politicians and political leaders is a bit more complex than just dislike -- even in the Harry Potter books, some political leaders are seen in a good light, and many of the main characters go on to work for the Ministry of Magic. It's not that she's anti-politician, per se, so much as it is that she depicts political systems as often falling into the hands of people who are more interested in power and self-glorification than in good governance.

 

[Hound of UIster]

^ She doesn't hate all politicians. She was an enthusiastic supporter of the last Labout government, even under Gordon Brown.

Could have fooled me.

Every politician and bureaucrat (even the good ones) are depicted in a negative manner.

At least Paul Cornell was more enthusiastic and open in his support of Labour.

 

[Captaindemotion]

^ She doesn't hate all politicians. She was an enthusiastic supporter of the last Labout government, even under Gordon Brown.

Could have fooled me.

Every politician and bureaucrat (even the good ones) are depicted in a negative manner.

At least Paul Cornell was more enthusiastic and open in his support of Labour.

I don't know if she could be much more enthusiastic and open than this:

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1894410_1893847_1894201,00.html

Back in the mid-1990s, when he was new labour's brooding, intellectual heavyweight, I was a lone parent struggling to get by. He said he was not interested in stigmatizing the poor but in finding solutions for their predicament. I was tired of hearing government ministers lambaste the likes of me as irresponsible scroungers. I wanted Gordon Brown in charge.He went on to become one of the longest-serving Chancellors of the Exchequer that Britain has ever seen. While our economy grew strongly, he could have stood back and done nothing; on the contrary, he brought in and continually drove up the minimum wage, and 600,000 children and a million pensioners were raised out of poverty. Brown believed the wealthy would always be able to look after themselves; it was people at the other end of the economic scale that government ought to be helping.
When capitalism shuddered on its foundations last year, Brownite words like responsibility and morality started issuing from the unlikeliest politicians. Global financial regulation, something Brown had advocated long before last September, shot to the top of the political agenda. Now Prime Minister, Brown took a lead among European leaders in setting a course for economic recovery. He hosted the most important meeting of the world's major economies in years. In doing so, the British press said, he had become "Chancellor to the world."
The son of a Presbyterian minister, with a formidable intellect and a work ethic to shame a nest of ants, the 58-year-old Brown is frequently dubbed "dour." I know him as affable, funny and gregarious, a great listener, a kind and loyal friend. These are strange and turbulent times, but issues of fairness, equality and protection of the poor have never been more important. I still want Gordon Brown in charge.


Read more: http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1894410_1893847_1894201,00.html #ixzz1sad7m6fU

 

[Starkers]

Ah good old Gordon "I have eliminated boom and bust" Brown.

The same Brown who loved the poor so much he elimitated the 10p tax rate so they all had to pay more. The same Brown who sold Britain's gold reserves when the price was at a 20 year low and raided the pensions...

Sorry Rowling always gets my goat when she starts talking politics ever since I read/saw an interview with her where she basically said "Well I could have got a job but then I wouldn't have been able to write about my little boy wizard..."

 

[Argus Skyhawk]

The cover of The Casual Vacancy has been released.

 

[Lonemagpie]

Hm, the sort of cover that tends to go on retro-chicklit from publishers like Arrow. Welcome to 1935 or so...

 

[Lonemagpie]

Ah good old Gordon "I have eliminated boom and bust" Brown.

The same Brown who loved the poor so much he elimitated the 10p tax rate so they all had to pay more. The same Brown who sold Britain's gold reserves when the price was at a 20 year low

And who, in fact, announced the sale well in advance so that the price could drop as far as possible because everyone knew the market was about to be flooded...

All things considered, right now I'd rather have Major and Lamont in charge - because they're the ones who, when we were last in recession in 1993/4, actually dealt with it correctly.

Which is why it always baffles me that Cameron and Osborne are doing *exactly* the opposite of what actually fucking worked...

 

[Hound of UIster]

They are Tories.

It's not really baffling at all.

 

[Starkers]

Major is often underrated as PM. No coinicidence that Blair inherited the healthiest economy of any post war PM--contrast that with when Labour left power and Liam Byrne left his amusing little "There's no money left" note.

 

[Lonemagpie]

They are Tories.

It's not really baffling at all.

It's baffling because the people who got it right in 93/94 were also Tories, and you'd think that the party (any party, in non-consecutive terms) would have kept records or something: "in recession, do *this* to get out of it."

 

[Argus Skyhawk]

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/abc-blo...elebrities.html;_ylt=A2KJNTu_TWRQFlMA7a_QtDMD

This is a news article about how Rowling's daughter helped her out with writing modern teenage slang. It includes this quote:

"I remember the first time I heard a teenager say 'LOL.' Just what? But it means 'laugh.' Why don't you just laugh? What are you doing?" Rowling says.

To which I want to say: Wait, are kids nowadays actually saying things like "LOL" out loud? Has texting and Twitter influenced them to the point that they are actually speaking internet abbreviations? Huh.

 

[FPAlpha]

Just read a short review of it.. it was good but kinda lukewarm.

It's a social commentary and as far from Potter as possible. Don't plan to read it but i guess her name alone will let it sell well no matter the quality (and as someone here said earlier i think quite a few critics are just itching to bury her alive.. something they couldn't do during Potter as it would sunk them rather than Rowling).

Good for her to branch out and refuse to be cornered by the Potter universe.. she could churn out books set in the universe until her dying days and they would all be successes financially but she's not a struggling writer anymore so money is not an issue.

I hope she succeeds and provides good stories in the future.. the current book is not appealing to me from the sound of it but maybe there will be others i'd like to read.

 

[trekkiebaggio]

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/abc-blo...elebrities.html;_ylt=A2KJNTu_TWRQFlMA7a_QtDMD

This is a news article about how Rowling's daughter helped her out with writing modern teenage slang. It includes this quote:

"I remember the first time I heard a teenager say 'LOL.' Just what? But it means 'laugh.' Why don't you just laugh? What are you doing?" Rowling says.

To which I want to say: Wait, are kids nowadays actually saying things like "LOL" out loud? Has texting and Twitter influenced them to the point that they are actually speaking internet abbreviations? Huh.

Sadly, yes. One of my housemates at uni used to use internet abbreviations offline including "OMG, STFU (which he pronounced stufoo) and LOL".

 

[CaptainCanada]

I've got my copy, though I've only just started it.

 

[scnj]

It sounds like kind of a hodgepodge of themes, all adult in nature, as if she's jumping up and down shouting "look, I can write for adults too!"

 

[Hound of UIster]

Well she isn't a very good writer. I think trying to put adult themes in her work would be an attempt at seeking validation.

 

[the G-man]

Wegman's, the local northeastern super-grocery, has copies of her new book displayed all over the store. I wonder how many casual shoppers will see her name and think "oh, a new Harry Potter book...I should pick that up for the kids."

 

[Sci]

Wegman's, the local northeastern super-grocery, has copies of her new book displayed all over the store. I wonder how many casual shoppers will see her name and think "oh, a new Harry Potter book...I should pick that up for the kids."

They'd have to be pretty damn stupid to do so, what with the words "Harry Potter and the..." not being in the title.