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Pottermore: More Potter books don't mean more Harry Potter, got it?

Author J.K. Rowling's Pottermore venture is correcting media outlets that assume the three new e-books will continue Harry's story.

Gael Cooper
CNET editor Gael Fashingbauer Cooper, a journalist and pop-culture junkie, is co-author of "Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops? The Lost Toys, Tastes and Trends of the '70s and '80s," as well as "The Totally Sweet '90s." She's been a journalist since 1989, working at Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, Twin Cities Sidewalk, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and NBC News Digital. She's Gen X in birthdate, word and deed. If Marathon candy bars ever come back, she'll be first in line.
Expertise Breaking news, entertainment, lifestyle, travel, food, shopping and deals, product reviews, money and finance, video games, pets, history, books, technology history, generational studies. Credentials
  • Co-author of two Gen X pop-culture encyclopedia for Penguin Books. Won "Headline Writer of the Year"​ award for 2017, 2014 and 2013 from the American Copy Editors Society. Won first place in headline writing from the 2013 Society for Features Journalism.
Gael Cooper
2 min read
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Three new books about life in Harry Potter's wizarding world are on the way, but don't expect Harry to make appearances.

Pottermore

More Harry Potter books don't mean more Harry Potter. Wut? No no, it makes sense.

Author J.K. Rowling's Pottermore Twitter account spent much of Thursday emailing media outlets that used "Harry Potter books" in their headlines (guilty!), and reminding them Harry's not present in the new e-books announced Wednesday.

Many of them probably used "Harry Potter books" as shorthand for "set in the universe where magic and wizards are real, and into which Harry and Hermione will eventually be born," but it's tough to make that fit in a headline.

The books, as explained on Pottermore, will dig into the history and rich backstory of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, unrolling stories of professors, house ghosts and more. They'll delve into the wizarding world that surrounded Harry, even with some tales from terrifying Azkaban prison.

What won't they do? Bring back Harry and Hermione and the gang.

After the release of the script for "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child" last month, Rowling said "Harry is done now." Harry's also not present in "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them," another Potter universe film, hitting theaters November 17 in Australia and November 18 in the US and UK. (The events of that film take place in the 1920s, long before Harry or his parents are even born.)

Potter fans are having a pretty good year, what with the "Cursed Child" play and script, "Fantastic Beasts" film, and now the new e-books. And they're pretty smart, too, so they seem unlikely to download a book with a title proclaiming it's about Hogwarts' history and be upset to find no Harry playing Quidditch.

Still, if you're a fan looking for more Harry, the "Cursed Child" script is your best bet, as it features him as a middle-aged dad struggling with a kid who won't listen. Fatherhood, apparently, can test even a master wizard.