The Potter Generation

They’re 15 to 23 years old, hail from the four corners of the globe and belong to the “Potter Generation.”

Whether they be in Tokyo, Sydney or Washington, they’ve all grown up with boy wizard Harry Potter and can’t wait to thumb the final volume in the series, which was released yesterday.

“I’m a Harry Potter fan, and there’re almost as many of us in Moscow as in London,” said Timur Bessidski, a bilingual 15-year-old.

But Timur will have to wait for the Russian version of J.K. Rowling’s

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the seventh and allegedly last volume in the saga, before being able to talk about it with his friends.

“We’ve already read all the Harry Potter books that exist, and we have nothing to discuss any more,” he said.

Agonising over the fates of the main characters with friends is part and parcel of the Potter charm.

“I realized straight off I wasn’t the only one obsessed with Harry Potter,” said Johann Hauswald, 16, in Washington. “I could share my thoughts and feelings with most of my classmates.”

“Harry Potter is universal,” said 17-year-old Anna Rossi, who lives in the Paris suburb of Drancy and was seven when the first Potter book was published in 1997. “It’s a different universe with words that don’t exist in the dictionary, but it’s also easy to read.”

Friend, role-model, hero, the apprentice magician has cast a spell over young readers worldwide. The six books in the saga have sold 325 million copies and been translated into 64 languages.

Days before the release of book seven, Amazon says there are more than a million pre-orders for the book online.

“I’ve been following Harry Potter from the very beginning and so I feel like I’ve grown up with him,” said Kanako Kishigami, a 26-year-old Japanese office worker from Tokyo. “He’s become good looking,” referring to his screen persona, actor Daniel Radcliffe.

Sydney-sider Jessica Dempsey, 21, admits to reading all the Potter books “many, many times” since first discovering them almost a decade ago. “I’m not going to pretend they’re the best books ever, but it really sucks you in,” adding, “I just really hope Harry doesn’t die. I would be devastated.”

Rowling has revealed that two of the characters die in the last installment and her young fans are on tenterhooks as to who might meet an untimely end.

In Japan, Akiko Oishi, 22, and her co-worker Tomoko Natsume, 31, both became Potter fans after watching a Potter film, and even registered in Dumbledore’s Army, a Japanese fan club.

“I watch the movies first and see what they’re like before reading the books,” said Natsume.

Oishi said she liked the mischievous twins Fred and George best out of the all characters, adding, “I wish I could use magic like them.”

How the saga will end puzzles all of Harry Potter’s fans. But Anna of Drancy does not believe Harry will be killed off.

“She cannot allow him to die,” she said of Rowling. “It’s impossible. She loves him too much. And if that happens, can you imagine the number of girls who’ll end up crying?”