From: Nancy Werlin <nwerlin>
Date: Tue, 1 Jul 2003 08:40:06 -0400

cannot possibly know.<<

This made me smile, Norma Jean. C'mon. It's pure human. On all levels and topics, we love to speculate about stuff that we'll never know. And yeah, I'd say we *need* to do it... we may never find out the truth when we speculate, but we find out other things... about ourselves, mostly.

I often speculate about what happened behind the scenes between author and editor when I read a book that piques my interest. And yes, usually it's the flaws, the little things I perceive as missteps that make me wonder what happened, if anything. Every time I think about these issues in a book, and discuss them with fellow readers and writers, I learn something about how I write and read myself; what I want from a book, what I don't. I turn into an editor myself, trying to devise solutions for the problems I perceive. It's interesting. It helps me. And it's enjoyable... part of the enjoyment of reading.

As to HP5, I have to agree with those who said that a big part of the pleasure of the book is simply gettng to hang out with Harry and the gang. I'm happy to do that even in those stretches where nothing much happens. That's one of the big appeals of any series for a reader. A taut, economical book from Rowling wouldn't please me at all.

-Nancy
-Nancy Werlin Email: nancy at nancywerlin.com Web: www.nancywerlin.com
Received on Tue 01 Jul 2003 07:40:06 AM CDT