JK Rowling conjures up post-'Potter' novel - Boston Herald

Can J.K. Rowling cast a literary spell without Harry Potter [website]'s wand? The world will find out Sept. 27 when Rowling releases her first post-"Potter" book.

Announced yesterday, the book "The Casual Vacancy" is set in an English town called Pagford. It will be "blackly comic," said publisher Little, Brown & Co. What it won't be is a continuation of the wizard world she created in the wildly successful "Potter" series.

For better or worse, local "Potter" aficionados are ready to go where Rowling takes them.

"I'm certainly going to read it," said Norwood native Paul DeGeorge, 32, half of the musical duo Harry and the Potters. "She could have gone her whole career having just released that series and been one of the greatest writers in history. She could have taken the J.D. Salinger route and disappeared. I love that she's trying something different."

DeGeorge knows the power of the Potter cult. As the originator of the "wizard rock" genre, he's propelled his band to success on magic broomsticks and clever power pop — currently on tour in the Midwest, Harry and the Potters play Beverly's Endicott College on April 21.

But there's a difference between Potter's fame and Rowling's.

"I don't see the kind of frenzy around Rowling the author as I do around Harry the character," said Flourish Klink, 25, a Harry Potter expert and lecturer in comparative media studies at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "Is it going to be a success in terms of the number of people who buy it? Yes.

"But the eyes of the world are on her, and if she doesn't make the book perfect some people will regard her as a one-hit wonder," Klink added. "Not that she'll care sitting on a pile of money from here to the moon."

Rowling's seven-book Potter series was a literary phenomenon. Selling more than 450 million copies and translated into more than 70 languages, the books gave rise to an empire — movies, merchandise, a theme park. They also made Rowling the richest author in the world.

"The Casual Vacancy" is sure to be a blockbuster just based on pre-sales. But booksellers are conservative in their expectations.

"I'd called it a measured buzz," Harvard Book Store manager Mark Lamphier said. "There's prebuilt interest, but when I talk to my colleagues, nobody expects this to be on a 'Harry Potter' scale."

The furor (and sales) may be smaller, but it's just as intense for many.

"Every time I look at my Gmail, a new person has written our group about this," said Somerville resident and Harry Potter Alliance executive director Andrew Slack, 32. "We have 70 volunteers emailing back and forth right now about this announcement. People are flipping out right now."