excellent book is as good a read for adults as it is for kids, and a whole heap better than Harry Potter

Maybe this topic is deserving of another thread? Oddly enough, and quite in spite of myself, I fell for the Harry Potter books after going to see the first film which overcame my usual cynicism on such things, nicely tying in with the season too. I despair when the films come out in summer as it misses the whole new term-time autumn-into-winter thing that is such a feature of the English year, academic or otherwise. That said, I'm only too aware there are far better books / films / TV adaptations / series than Harry Potter, which failed to deliver anything worthy by way of a conclusion - not for me anyway. If only real-life could be so black & white!

My wife is a huge fan of Diana Wynne Jones, whose Fire and Hemlock (based around Tam Lin and True Thomas) is one of the most effective books on the supernatural I've ever read. I don't think DWJ's been troubled too much by the film industry; there was a TV adaptation of Archer's Goon, which I didn't see, and the brilliant Howl's Moving Castle was made into an equally brilliant feature length anime by Studio Ghibli back in 2004. Definitely a must-see - especially in original Japanese with English subtitles!