“Peggle make phone calls” has become shorthand for “fuck it, whatever” for me but no one ever knows what im talkingabout and it’s also longer (longhand?)
Look, here’s the sad truth about trying to recommend different books to “replace” Harry Potter- You can’t.
Don’t get me wrong- everyone should read new books. There’s so many incredible pieces of fiction in the world, and I’ll recommend my favorites day and night.
But Percy Jackson and Discworld and Earthsea and Broken Earth and Singing Hills and Murderbot and Teixcalaan and Wayfarers simply will not make you feel the way Harry Potter made you feel when you were 13.
Because you aren’t 13 any more.
You will not find the Fandom community that wraps around you and helps mold you into the person you will become like Harry Potter did when you were 13.
Because you aren’t 13 any more, and you never will be again.
And it sucks that Harry Potter is irreparably tainted. It sucks that all the things Harry Potter meant to you has been taken from you, and you cannot get them back. It sucks. Be angry about it. Be sad. Be disappointed and betrayed.
And, honestly if you really go back to HP, you’ll find it isn’t actually all that good. Youll find that it carries a lot of assumed bias and mean spirited callousness and British classism. Plot holes and lazy status quo reinforcement and haphazard world building.
Not even Harry Potter NOW can be to you what Harry Potter was to you THEN.
And if you spend the rest of your life reading new books because you want to find the book that will be what Harry Potter was to you when you were 13, you will spend your life being disappointed.
So.
Read new books. Read new books to find new experiences, new thoughts, new feelings. You won’t find a replacement. You won’t find a book to be what Harry Potter used to be to you.
But you could find Discworld, and Murderbot, and Singing Hills, and Wayfarers , and Broken Earth, and Teixcalaan, and Earthsea *right now.*