Do spoilers really "ruin" things? Or make things more interesting?

[Shaunette Reid]

No: HPFGUIDX 168781

leslie41 wrote:

> I guess I just don't understand the hoopla over not "spoiling" 
> things.  I could read an elaborate description of the plot and the 
> book would not be spoiled for me at all.

before HP, I would have agreed that spoilers don't really "ruin" 
anything, I remember reading The Hobbit when I was little and 
skipping to the last page, just to make sure Bilbo would make it 
after all, before I could go on reading.

I suppose HP is different in that the twists are part of the fun of 
reading, it's a bit more of a mystery novel than pure fantasy. The 
shock of Dumbledore's death was very real and strong because I 
didn't know whether, when or how it would happen.

I had great fun trying to guess who would go in book 5, until a boy 
I was babysitting at the time shouted, completely 
unprovoked; "Sirius Dies!!!" ohhhh how I glowered at him...

Incidentally, my boyfriend works in a shop that sells HP when it 
comes out, he brought home an early copy of HPB from the back room 
when it arrived (about two weeks prior to release). He read it in a 
day, and was thus threatened in as many ways as I could imagine NOT 
to tell me ANYTHING. We were out at a restaurant that week and he 
whispered what happened to the hostess...the look on her face...I 
kept my fingers in my ears all the way home, just to be sure.