Potter Fans Are NOT Happy About The New Books

It seems 2016 has been the year for new Harry Potter material, though not everybody has been thrilled with what's on offer. Some fans were disappointed to find that The Cursed Child wasn't a new novel — and J.K. Rowling has defended the new Harry Potter ebooks after fans complained that they'd seen all the material before. The new Pottermore Presents series was advertised as a collection of "never-seen-before" writing from J.K. Rowling, as well as an anthology of writing previously published on the Pottermore website. Once the books were launched on Tuesday, it seemed that the ratio of original writing wasn't quite what the fans were hoping for.

If you were on Twitter on Tuesday, you may have noticed the trending hashtag #JKRowlingIsOverParty. (I know right, blasphemy!) A large part of this was coming from disgruntled fans who felt they had wasted their money on reused material. When one user suggested that the books were a quick money-making device, J.K. Rowling spoke up in their defense, explaining that they had received "many, many requests to make the extra writing available in this format."

While there is a lot of recycled material in the ebooks, Pottermore did make good on their promise to include some brand new writing as well. The history of Professor Slughorn, for example, which appears in Short Stories from Hogwarts of Power, Politics and Pesky Poltergeists, has never been seen on the site before. And hey, these new ebooks mean you can read Pottermore material even without a wifi connection — and I certainly can't complain about that.

But this isn't the only thing J.K. Rowling was forced to defend. The #JKRowlingIsOverParty hashtag was also being used by upset fans who had hoped J.K. Rowling would confirm that Sirius Black was gay, and were irritated to see that Rowling's Twitter bio (which has since been changed) seemed to allude to this being incorrect. Rowling had jokily filled her Twitter bio with answers to frequently asked questions — including "5) No, he isn't 6) No, he really isn't 7) Yes, I'm sure." She has since denied that these answers referred to Sirius's sexuality at all.

Between that and the complaints about the Pottermore Presents ebooks, it wasn't a great day for J.K. Rowling on Twitter. Fortunately, her devoted fans leapt to her defense — and Rowling responded individually to many of them to thank them for their support.