In May of 2007, hundreds of fans of literature came to New Orleans. They came to celebrate a city that had been struck with tragedy, weighed down by destruction, burdened with an uphill battle to rebuild what many said should just die a graceless death. They came to celebrate the written word, specifically a story about a boy struck with tragedy, weighed down by the mission to save the world, burdened with a lightning-shaped scar.

That’s why we came, but what we found once we were there was a much better story. We saw a city that was rising from the ashes to be reborn into something new, something awe-inspiring, something truly worth telling about. We found a group of fans who surprised us with their enthusiasm, their devotion, and their truly immense talents.

Although most of the participants didn’t venture to the parts of New Orleans still recovering from Hurricane Katrina, we did get to see the devastation of one of the things most of us hold most dear: their libraries. Author Rachel Caine, who had taken up the cause of Rebuilding New Orleans Public Library project during the conference by raising awareness and money, showed us what had been lost and what we could do to help.

But giving money wasn’t enough. We wanted to do more.

In times like these when all the stories coming out of New Orleans sound the same, we wanted to tell a different story. We want to tell the story that the librarians of New Orleans wanted. Not about tragedy or loss; but about action, adventure, romance, comedy, fantasy and triumph. Poems, short stories and flash fiction all inspired and requested by the librarians of New Orleans that either are struggling to put their libraries back together or are trying to put their lives back together after losing their jobs along with their libraries.

How are we going to do this? Simple. We are compiling an anthology of original fiction inspired by the librarians of New Orleans as written by members of the Harry Potter fandom. We’re asking the talented fanfiction writers, artists and musicians to put their Harry Potter-inspired pens, paints and lyrics down for a brief time and pickup the worlds, characters and settings inspired by people who might never get a story told about them, or for them.

Why are we doing this? There are many reasons behind this project, but the most important is to give something back to the city and the fandom that has given us so much. But more importantly, to donate all profits generated by this project to the libraries in New Orleans that need all the help they can get in order to rebuild and restock.

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