Universal Studios Florida will add a new section inspired by J.K. Rowling‘s Harry Potter book series.

Opening in 2014, Diagon Alley is named after the magical shopping district in the fantasy series. The new cover for Harry Potter & the Sorcerer’s Stone (created by artist Kazu Kibuishi) shows Harry exploring the magical shopping district.

Perhaps the architects will use this illustration as inspiration for designing the new section?

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While the entire country tuned into the Super Bowl last night, a number of Harry Potter characters followed the action on Twitter.

We’ve embedded a complete collection of these Harry Potter-themed posts below. If you thought that the evil Lord Voldemort caused the power outage at the New Orleans football game or rooted for the Voldemort Raisins, you should read these tweets.

Harry Potter tweets still rule the Internet. Last February, the Professor Snape Twitter feed (a parody account dedicated to the famous Harry Potter character) published the most popular tweet of the Academy Awards.

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From The Hobbit to Harry Potter, Hollywood loves dividing popular novels into two separate films.

With the second adaptation of Stephenie Meyer‘s Breaking Dawn coming to theaters this weekend, we caught up with screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg to find out what it was like to break the novel into two pieces.

She explained in an email interview: “There was a very natural place at which to break the two books.  The second movie needed a little filling out, but the book itself offered many possibilities for that.  Because the book is all told from Bella’s point of view, things sometimes happen off the page and are related by Bella after the fact — for instance, when Jacob tells her father she’s a werewolf.  In the book, Bella finds out about this conversation after it happened, but in adapting the movie, I got to write the conversation itself.”

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Author J.K. Rowling revealed that her next book would likely be for young readers, chatting with fans in a webcast hosted by Scholastic.

During the virtual event, which drew more than a million Harry Potter fans, Rowling discussed her next writing project. She said, “The next thing I publish is likely to be a book for children. The reason, I’m not committing myself wholeheartedly, is because after fifteen years of being a writer for Harry Potter, where you would say something and someone would seize on it and say, ‘You are definitely doing that now.’ And you kind of thought you weren’t allowed to change your mind. And it got a little intense, so I try not to commit myself with my plan. So I’m not 100 percent sure about doing it, but I think it will be a book slightly more for children.” Read more

In a long profile of J.K. Rowling at The New Yorker, journalist Ian Parker shared some juicy tidbits about The Casual Vacancy–a novel for adults by the Harry Potter author that has been guarded by nondisclosure agreements and a strict embargo.

If you want to find out more about the top secret novel before it comes out on September 27th, you should read the whole “Mugglemarch” profile.

SPOILER ALERT: If you don’t want to know more about the book, you should stop reading now. Below, we’ve collected five spoilers from the article that show us more about the book.

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The “Isles of Wonder” opening ceremony for the London 2012 Olympics (directed by Oscar-winner Danny Boyle) made a nod to British literature.

Actor Kenneth Branagh (who plays Professor Gilderoy Lockhart in the Harry Potter films) recited a passage from William Shakespeare‘s The Tempest. A parade of nurses, doctors and child patients with books followed in rolling beds.

Author J.K. Rowling read a selection from J.M. Barrie‘s Peter Pan. After Rowling’s reading, a giant-sized Lord Voldemort popped up. A crew of women dressed as Mary Poppins wielded umbrellas and banished the Harry Potter villain.

Click here to find out when you can watch the opening ceremony in your neighborhood. Follow this link to view photos from the ceremony. What do you think?

What if Harry Potter ended up with a boring desk job as an adult, entering spreadsheet figures and staring at social networks all day on his computer?

The new parody series “Harry Potter and the Ten Years Later” imagines a pretty miserable adult life for J. K. Rowling‘s boy wizard, including wine, adult conversations and a little bit of NSFW language. We’ve embedded the video above–what do you think?

io9 has more about the show: “Yes, Harry married Ginny and got that job as an auror, but it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. After the demise of He-Whose-Name-I-Can’t-Quite-Remember, there hasn’t been much call for dark wizard hunters, and all Ginny can think about is making little Potter babies. Throw in a departmental downsize and Ron leaving Hermione, and it’s more than Harry can handle. But someone may be looking to pull him back into the battle of good vs. evil.”

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Did a book ever help you cope with bullies? Reader Sacia Flowers once wrote a long letter to J. K. Rowling explaining how the Harry Potter series helped her cope with bullying and a difficult family life.

The novelist responded with a warm and encouraging letter, sharing some advice that all you people can use during the rough times. Letters of Note has reprinted both letters, sharing them with a wider audience. Here is an excerpt rom Rowling’s letter.

I know what it is like to be picked on, as it happened to me, too, throughout my adolescence. I can only wish that you have the same experience that I did, and become happier and more secure the older you get. Being a teenager can be completely horrible, and many of the most successful people I know felt the same way … You’re now standing on the threshold of a very different phase in your life, one where you are much more likely to find kindred spirits, and much less likely to be subject to the pressures of your teenage years.

J.K. Rowling has written new Harry Potter content for Sony’s Book of Spells, a video game for the Sony PlayStation Wonderbook.

The game will include “backstories to the famous spells, valuable lessons and brand new creatures” written by Rowling. In the video embedded above, you can see a simulation of the video game–an interactive book-like object that will bring Harry Potter spells to digital life.  What do you think? Here’s more from the release:

Written by Miranda Goshawk over two hundred years ago, the Book of Spells can be found in the Restricted Section of the Hogwarts library. This advanced textbook will assist students on their journey to becoming an accomplished witch or wizard. Read, discover, learn and practice spells such as Incendio, Wingardium Leviosa and Expelliarmus, as well as discover mischievous notes, spells and humorous anecdotal facts scribbled into the margins by previous Hogwarts students. J.K. Rowling has written a conundrum that leads you through the experience, providing insight into the values a witch or wizard has to learn, and inviting you to journey through the book to unlock new content, rewarding successful students along the way.

J.K. Rowling will publish a hardcover Hogwarts Library Box Set with Bloomsbury later this year. The publisher mentioned the boxed set in its financial results for the year, an extra bonus for Harry Potter fans. 

The publisher shared these photos on Twitter: “THE HOGWARTS LIBRARY BOXED SET will contain beautiful hardback editions of the 3 Harry Potter school books!”

As you can see by the picture, the set will include Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find them and Quidditch Through the Ages (both published as a set in 2001). The set will also include a copy of The Tales of Beedle the Bard, a book first published in 2007.

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