With the latest (and last) installment of the Harry Potter series setting records in movie theaters now, I got to thinking about a different Harry altogether. Never before has popular culture starred so many witches, wizards, vampires, werewolves and other shape-shifters, and fairies -- both old-world Grimm fae and pretty Disney-type fairies.  Not even her publisher can claim that J.K. Rowling's hugely popular Harry Potter books started this trend, but it certainly brought fantasy to a wider audience and likely encouraged the urban fantasy boom. If you're looking for a good read in this genre, I strongly suggest Jim Butcher's Dresden Files series.

Harry Dresden is first introduced in Storm Front. Modern-day Chicago's only professional wizard/detective finds himself struggling to pay the rent, trying to live by his code of ethics, risking his life to save innocents, and being eyed with constant suspicion by police and his fellow wizards. Did I mention Harry's involvement in the vampire war? Oh, or that his faerie godmother is trying to trap him in the Summerlands? Harry makes powerful friends and enemies, and in each book I wondered how on earth he was going to get out of this mess. In each, of course, Jim Butcher works a little magic of his own, and Harry manages to come up with a brilliant plan to win the day. In the twelfth book of the series, Changes, the author ends with the best (most awful?) cliffhanger ever. Now, I can't wait for book number thirteen, due out in late July.

Add your name to the waiting list for the latest in the Dresden Files, Ghost Story, and join the fans eagerly waiting the publisher's release date of July 26, 2011. Then, take your time enjoying the rest of the Harry Dresden series while you wait for your turn. Start with Storm Front and follow it up with Fool Moon and the other ten titles. The Library offers most of them in both "real book" and e-book formats. Some titles are available on CD.