As I've mentioned before, I'm illogically crazy about the Harry Potter books, so it's no surprise that I'm excited about the arrival of book 7, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, this Saturday. I plan to do what I did with book 6 and pick up my copy at midnight from the local QFC grocery store (since they won't have a line for the book there) and binge read it immediately through the night.

I also enjoy reading the speculation about what will happen in the book. As usual, the theories are all over the place, but there seem to be a few twists this time. One guy claims to have broken into Bloomsbury's computers and stolen the manuscript. (Bloomsbury is the UK publisher of HP; I worked with them on Bookshelf and Encarta, incidentally.) The spoilers seemed reasonable, but the most credible leak I've seen is here. The text in the beginning has a bunch of random ideas, but there are a set of digital photos at the end that look like photos of each page of the last chapter of the book. It looks real and, having read it now, it seems legit to me. I won't give away what it says; follow it if you want.

Anyway, I can't wait. I'll be a wreck for most of Saturday, but it'll be worth it. It's been a fun ride reading all the books; the journey ends on Saturday.

[Update: Looks like the leak site I pointed to pulled down the photos of the pages of the book. Oh well.]