I was a huge Potterhead back in the day (well...I still am, just not as obsessed). I know the books are great and all, I know how addictive her writing style is, that she can create such vivid and engaging characters and places, and the stories keep you hungry for more...but IMO that still does not completely explain the insane hype that generated. I don't think there has ever been this level of mania and craze for a book -- a children's/YA book for that matter. So I am wondering, what are some of the factor that led to the hype? I've heard things like the rise in Internet (and internet fandom), JKR's rags-to-riches story, etc all contributed. So for those who have been there, what was the mania like at that point, and what factors (aside from the quality of the books themselves) that lead to it?
The first Harry Potter book got a ton of media coverage. A lot of it had to do with the surprise that literature was still capable of getting young people excited about reading. The Internet was relatively new, at that point, and cable TV was still a really big deal.
My memory may be betraying me - I was a kid when they came out - but my memory is off reading the first one shortly after it came out with no context that it was the new big thing and then a few months later it being this big sensation. My understanding is it became a big deal by word of mouth first and then the publishers caught up and magnified that
The publishers knew it was a big deal. The CEO at Scholastic had to approve the deal because the advance - which by today’s standards is modest - was considered massive at the time.
No one could have predicted what it would become though. Same with Hunger Games. Also Scholastic. She was an in house author but the building shook when that book came in.