By  tabitha messick
Updated: 2007-07-25 17:16

Harry Potter fans wait in front of Beijing's Xidan Bookstore July 21 to get their copy of the last book in the series.

Harry Potter is overrated.

For weeks, book lovers have been anticipating the arrival of the final installment of J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. Internet articles, chat rooms and dedicated Potter fans have been in near hysteria - will Harry live or die? How will the story end?

And now the world knows.

And somehow through it all J.K Rowling has managed to make everyone happy.

I was sucked into the Harry Potter mania as well. I had pre-ordered the book from Wangfujing Foreign Language Bookstore soon after I arrived in China. I had been anxiously awaiting the book for two years.

Before the book was in my hands, I had been cautiously reading articles about the Harry Potter phenomenon, hoping not to run across spoilers.

When I got up at 5:30 a.m. on July 21, I was excited but also anxious as I rode a cab to Wangfujing where I stood in a weaving line along with about 300 others, more than half of who were Chinese. I waited for over an hour before the doors opened, and then even longer as they only allowed about 10 people in at a time inside the store to receive their pre-ordered book.

But this did not deter the frenzied crowd. Inside, the whole process was still quite chaotic.

The store had games, gadgets, and posters adorned on the walls. A Harry Potter movie was showing on a big screen and cameras were flashing continuously. Everyone wanted to remember this momentous occasion.

I immediately went back to my apartment and read the book in sitting. After all, it is impossible to put down.

Though I still personally think that J.K. Rowling is a literary genius, her epilogue was ridiculous. I feel sorry for anyone who flipped to the back page and read it first. It was cheesy and predictable.

However, the book, all in all, was brilliant. But I have come to expect this near perfection in the Potter series.

I honestly laughed out loud in many parts. And tears were shed more than a couple of times. But it is my frustration that I remember the most.

I was pleased to see that all the loose strings were tied- but the pretty bows they tied disappointed me.

There are answers to all the puzzling questions we had for 10 years since the first book came out in 1997. Is Snape good or evil? Will Hogwarts reopen? Will Voldermort be defeated? What are the Deathly Hallows? Who will live? Who will die?

Harry Potter fans

There is not a lot of misleading plot lines that make the other Potter books so dramatic. Even from the first page, there is non-stop action.

Living the Harry Potter experience in China was rewarding and not just because I got the satisfaction of reading the book 12 hours before the United States.

Though the final book didn't live up to the hype in my mind, it was still excellent. This is a credit to Rowling.

Harry Potter is not just a book -- it's a movement. Harry Potter will do more than promote literacy and ignite passions. It will continue to be a story for all ages.