My teenage son and I are taking a 3-week trip to the UK, and we will be in Edinburgh on June 21, when the latest Harry Potter book is released.

Can anyone recommend a good large bookstore that is in a central location with easy access where we can get the book on the day of release? Perhaps one where we can reserve the book ahead of time?

(This is a rather critical issue for my son!)

Thanks for your help.

Ottakars, 57 George Street and Waterstones, 128 Princes Street

Waterstone's is the bookstore I always check out when I am in Edinburgh. I love to browse the history books. I used to ship back boxes of books from the UK every time I went. The postage is now a killer and most of them can be bought on amazon.com for less. It is, however, still fun to browze and pick up that occasional book to read while on vacation.

Where are you staying? Some of the shops will be doing all nighters for the new release.

The demand is stupendous.

A further bonus of buying the book in Edinburgh is that you will be getting the British edition, which I believe has a different cover and binding to the American one.

Thanks for the tips. I will look up the recommended bookstores. We are looking forward to purchasing the British edition. We were in Vancouver BC when the last one was released, and now we have American and British editions of all the Harry Potter books.

Sheila - Is the demand so high that we will HAVE to stand in line all night if we want to get the book the first day? That's what happened here (California) when the third book was released. We didn't encounter the same problem in Vancouver.

LGW, I asked my sister, who lives in Edinburgh and has a 12yr old daughter, about this. She said there's nothing like we have in California, with bookstores opening at midnight with Harry Potter parties, etc. She did say, scathingly, that they may do that in London!

To ensure that you have no problem getting a book on the first day, why not phone one of the central Waterstone branches and reserve one. They may be able to do it with a credit card number over the phone.

The douce people of Edinburgh are clearly not up to the excitement, Barb. They're definitely doing a midnight shift in Aberdeen.

As I far as I can see Ottakars in George Street is having a Harry Potter day. Go for it. But I would reserve a copy of the book in advvance to be sure of getting it.

Sheila, I've often wondered if my sister's really up with what's going on so maybe now I have proof that she's not. In her defense, she's so busy bragging about her garden party invite that she's not noticing much else!

She may well be right. I looked online for some time and this was all I could find.

Maybe you can get a copy in Gaelic.

I do hope that you did go to the Edinburgh Waterstones bookshop for your Harry Potter book at Midnight, as I believe J K Rowling was there to autograph it for you.