The long-awaited fifth installment hit Shanghai Book Traders and Shanghai Book City last Saturday simultaneously with its worldwide debut, and Harry Potter weaved his magic again.

The two book stores saw record-high daily sales volume for any original English novels they sold, with more than 100 copies lapped up on the first day in each store.

"In a market dominated by Chinese language reading and where English literature only lives on the fringe of society, it is amazing," said Wu Xinhua, president of Shanghai Book Traders, which sold out its stock on the first day. "With many orders still pending, another batch of 300 copies is on its way."

The China National Publications Import & Export Corp's Shanghai branch also jumped on the bandwagon and began selling the book in CITIC Square yesterday.

To attract more Potter fans, the stores are selling the fifth installment at a lower price than the previous four issues.

The book is going for 168 yuan (US$20) at Book Traders and for 178 yuan at Book City and China National. The price for the first installment of the series, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, was sold for 240 yuan at Book Traders, double the rate on Amazon.com.

Xu Zhengfeng, account manager of J Walter Thompson, was delighted to acquire the latest Harry Potter adventure for a cheaper price at local stores instead of ordering online, which is his usual choice when buying foreign books.

"I wanted to read the book immediately. Now, I don't have to wait for two weeks for shipment," said the 27-year-old. "Most importantly, it's much cheaper than what I can get on Amazon."

The Amazon price is US$17.99. After the weight-based shipment fee, the cost of the book can rise to about US$30.

As with her previous four books, author J K Rowling's new adventure is proving to be a money spinner.

Wu said they had sold 1,000 copies of each of the previous four installments.

Salespersons from the three stores said Harry Potter patrons were mostly aged between 20 to 30 years, with Chinese buyers outnumbering expatriates in the city.

The Chinese translation of Harry Potter V will be out in October. The People's Literature Publishing House beat more than a dozen competitors to clinch the copyright of the Chinese version. The sales record of the previous four Chinese versions of Harry Potter reached 6 million copies.

Sun Shunlin, marketing director of the publishing house, said the first print run of the Chinese translation is 800,000 copies.

However, both writers and Potter fans think the translations are not as good as the originals.

"I've read the first and second books. Something got lost in the translation and rendered them stiff," said Qin Wenjun, a well-known writer of children's books. "It's a tough job to translate. You have to be loyal to the original text while catering to children's reading habits."

Sun said the previous four books were translated by different people.

"Two of them are well-known translators but they are old. Maybe that's the problem. They're capable of making the language elegant but children's literature needs more."

The publishing house has commissioned 29-year-old Ma Aixin to do the translation this time round.

(Eastday.com June 25, 2003)