Can you remember what it was like the first time you discovered the magic of Harry Potter? In honor of the Lily and Stag Inn reading groups' return to our first love, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, we'd like to invite you to "rediscover the magic" with us!

Your mission, should you choose to accept it: write a "vignette" describing the sights, sounds, smells and feelings Harry encounters as he enters Diagon Alley for the first time.

What's a vignette? A vignette is like a literary "snapshot" -- it's a quick glimpse of a scene that doesn't necessarily tell the full story. Vignettes tend to be rich in descriptive details.

The 411:

• Your vignette should be no fewer than 300 and no longer than 650 words long and does not have to be strictly canon (e.g. can include smells, stores, items, etc that are not specifically mentioned in the book).
• There is a limit of one entry per person.
• All entries MUST be of an exemplary quality; they must be creative, organized, focused, coherent and not contain net speak. Spelling, grammar, and punctuation will be taken into consideration when judging.
• There is a strict PG-13 limit for all entries.
• All decisions by the judges are final.
• Anyone over the age of 13 can enter the contest, including staff members who are not involved in the judging process.
• Please e-mail your submissions to lilyandstaginn@gmail.com by 11:59 pm ET on May 21, 2008 and place in the e-mail header "Rediscover the magic." Please copy-paste the vignettes into the body of the e-mail and include a name to be used for authorship (real name or Leaky Lounge).
• Please refer to the Contest's FAQ if you are not sure of something.
• If you have any questions not answered on the FAQ, or would like to discuss this Contest, please come to the Contest Corner forum of The Leaky Lounge.

Just wanted to drop a quick note to remind everyone that the entry time on this contest is now closed and we've moved into the judging phase! Thanks for all the great entries! And stay tuned... we'll have a winner for you soon.

And the winner is... Gwynog's Rabbit!

Thanks to everyone who participated in this contest and you can read the winning entry by Gwynog's Rabbit below.

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I was sleeping when the Boy Who Lived came through the archway. All I remember from that moment is a blaze of sunlight and the doorbell tinkling. The owl lady was being dragged out to the street by a lady with a pipe in her mouth, who was pointing towards the brick wall, closing behind my friend Hagrid. I was immediately alert and gazed at the boy walking up the cobblestones next to Hagrid. My heart started racing as it recognized, as only an owl's heart can, the person who was meant for me. I started hooting to him, but he was too distracted by everything else around him, and barely glanced my way. He seemed much more interested in such mundane things as the cauldrons sparkling at him from next door, the lunchtime aromas drifting out of the bakery, and even the barrel of beetle eyes roasting in the sun, than he was in his own destined owl. I knew I'd lost any hope of capturing his attention when he noticed the new broomstick in the window just across from me. The boy suddenly veered away from my direction, tripping over a loose cobblestone and pulling Hagrid's hand in the direction of the other boys who had been at that window all morning. Hagrid, though, had heard my hooting, and nodded to let me know he understood. This was the most wonderful moment of my life, so much so that I hooted and flapped with joy and received reproving looks from the other owls. So what? I was about to leave them.

I waited patiently for the rest of the afternoon, while wizards and witches walked by in the sunshine, eating dripping ice creams, picking up their children from where they'd left them at the broomstick window, and heading back to the Leaky Cauldron; one boy with white hair whined to his father in front of the broomstick shop until he was dragged off by his ear. In short, none of the humans did anything I cared about. My eyes were anchored on the far end of the street, where I knew Hagrid would reappear with the Boy Who Lived.

The Boy Who Lived! I couldn't remember if I had ever heard his name before! All I had ever heard in the conversations around me from the day I had hatched was "the Boy Who Lived" - never a name. My heart started to race again, but this time I managed to hide it from the other owls. For the rest of the afternoon I watched, and tried to remember.

The sun was getting low, reflecting off the white marble building at the end of the street and blinding my night-eyes to any details of the faces that I hoped was my new boy. Then a huge form came into my sight, haloed by the red glare, and I hooted in spite of myself. Hagrid pushed through the crowds with his bulky packages and led the Boy Who Lived into the owl shop, with a wink at me as he passed. A few moments later, the owl lady came out and coaxed me into a cage. Hagrid put an arm around the Boy Who Lived and said, "Happy Birthday, Harry!" Harry! My Harry.

My heart stopped racing, and I tucked my beak back under my wing, knowing I was with the wizard I would be with for the rest of my life.

CONGRATULATIONS GWYNOG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yay Gwynog!! You deserved it!

So were there 2nd and 3rd place winners? And why wasn't it announced on the main Leaky new board? I've been waiting AGES and it never came up!

Yeah, please can we read some other entries? I think the winning entry is far superior to my effort, but none-the-less, a lot of time and effort went into my writing, so I'm sure others did the same, and it would be great to read some of the other entries even if they weren't good enough to win they deserve to be read!

I also was waiting for an announcement on the main news page!

Ax

Awww thanks guys for the congratulations!!!

And thanks, Leaky judges!

I really would like to read more entries too - and was surprised that there weren't second and third place winners! Plus, there must have been a lot of entries that would be fun to read whether they won or not - could we read them?

That's a really great entry, and it really deserved to win. Well done Gwenog'srabbit

Ok, Well, it doesn't look like any other entries are going to be posted by staff and I'd really like to read more, so I'm posting mine in hopes that others will do the same so we can share. We all spent a lot of time working on our entries and they deserve to be read! So get posting people!

Stepping into Diagon alley for the first time felt like being immersed in a large bowl of jello. Everything seemed to move slowly, as if inhibited by an invisible jiggly substance. Harry wondered if anyone else could feel it, but seeing no reaction from the other people, he decided they could not and this feeling was perhaps just because there was so much to see and he was so enthralled by everything that he viewed it in slow motion. The air was thick with excitement and though Harry felt as if his feet were rooted to the spot, he longed to plunge into the sea of people. The warm sun glowed overhead while a cool breeze felt fresh on Harry’s face. Harry could no longer smell the yeasty scent from the tavern, but that was immediately replaced with a mix of fresh air, a sugary smell Harry was sure came from the ice cream parlor, and what he could only describe as opportunity. Harry breathed in deeply, savoring its sweetness. Ahead, a stark white building glistened in the sunshine with its sparkling bronze doors. Its imposing structure shadowed the surrounding shops, towering high above, its top kissing the sun above it. He didn’t know where to look first, but tried to take it all in as his gaze fell on window after window stuffed with inviting displays of books, cauldrons, potions ingredients, robes, and silvery instruments that he didn’t recognize. His eyes finally rested on the large window with a group of boys in front of it talking animatedly about the broomstick hanging there, clearly the envy of every boy standing there. He listened carefully and caught just a few words of what the boys were saying. “Fastest ever…” The boys’ voices trailed off as the rustling of cloaks and the shuffling of shoes on the cobblestone street reached his ears. Hundreds of witches and wizards entered shops all along the way, bells tinkling as the doors opened and then closed behind the shoppers. Harry grinned up at Hagrid (noticing Hagrid had a bit of peppermint humbug stuck to the tight curls of his unkempt beard) and had to force himself not to dive into the crowd of shoppers in all his excitement of seeing a new world before him. If only he had a “record” button so he could remember it all! Maybe it wasn’t necessary…he doubted that he would ever forget it.

I profusely apologize. I thought I had posted here and I didn't!

We were going to see about posting more entries, but I like this better. If you care to post the entry you wrote for the contest, please feel free to post it here for others to read.

While posting your entry is okay, please remember your entry must adhere to the Contest's rules and Forum's rules. Thanks!

Oh yay!!!!! I was hoping we'd get to read other entries!!!

Songbird, oh man - your vignette really smacks of a person's frist experience leaving the Muggle world - that MUST be how any normal person would feel being taken into Diagon Alley for the first time - like being overwelmed and almost have that thing your mind does when it's too much to take in - like the air is as thick as Jello! It's so weird - Harry seems so SANE, especially now that we know that he had that bit of Voldy in him, but that first introduction to the magical world would have to do something odd to the mind at first. Maybe being eleven let him feel overwelmed but in a good way, like you said, knowing he'd never forget it. I wonder how Hermione's parents felt.

And that bit of the candy in Hagrid's beard that's SO Hagrid!!!!!!!

Ok, so it's not as creative as the winning entry, but I like it...

"Harry stood transfixed with his eyes wide and his mouth hanging open. He felt like Charlie Bucket entering Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Room for the first time, and indulged in the orgy of sights and sounds and aromas saturating his senses, feasting on the wonder of the experience.

After the oppressive dreariness of muggle London, Harry suddenly felt delightfully alive and free, as if he had absorbed some of the magic that infused Diagon Alley. At first he couldn’t quite define what was so different, what had caused this dramatic alteration in his mood and created the simultaneous feelings of optimism and peace.

Apart from the obvious differences in muggle and wizarding attire, and the types of stores and goods on sale, there were many similarities: the same mix of traditional and contemporary, of wealth and poverty, and the same busyness of traders and customers, however, Harry gradually became aware that everything was somehow augmented, somehow extraordinary.

Nothing seemed worn or tatty or grimy. The cobbles beneath Harry’s feet were deep indigo, almost black, and still glossy despite possibly hundreds of years worth of trampling by the magical community, and as he began to walk he could hear his footstep resonating musically, deep within the stones as if made of flawless crystal. The walls of the buildings flanking the street were a rainbow of vibrant colours, and all looked as though they had been freshly painted that morning. The glass windows, and all the metal fixtures and fittings, glistened and gleamed as if highly polished. There was no graffiti, no litter, and the air was fresh, and full of the tantalising scents and sounds emitting from the various stores.
The overall effect was a subtle but powerful assault on Harry’s mind, body and spirit.

Harry began to examine his surroundings in more detail. Stretching away into the distance on either side of him was a collection of shops and boutiques stranger than anything he could ever have imagined in his wildest dreams. Again, there were similarities between the muggle and wizarding worlds; there was a garden centre, a pet store, several clothing and jewellery stores, a newsagents, an off-licence, a supermarket, an entertainment store, a hairdressers, an employment agency, and various pubs, cafes and restaurants, but the adverts and displays in the windows, and the presence of some speciality stores: a quidditch supply shop, and a wandmakers, betrayed this superficial illusion of familiarity.

Amazing bewitched posters offering great deals at bargain prices to tempt the customers flashed and sparkled. From Flora’s garden centre, Harry could smell the pungent mustiness of fresh soil, and was attracted by the bizarre and fascinating shapes and colours of the plants on sale. Approaching the window to get a clearer look, Harry jumped back startled when from one apparently innocuous, vivid scarlet cactus fired lime green spines in his direction.

Hurrying after Hagrid, Harry experienced an extreme unexpected thirst as he passed Sozzled’s Liquor Store, and completely forgetting that he had no wizarding money, felt compelled to pop in to buy several of the delicious sounding cinnamon sodas to quench his parched throat. He had one foot over the threshold when he felt Hagrid’s large hand on his shoulder guiding him gently away, and heard him chuckle when Harry exclaimed moments later that his desperate yearning for liquid had mysteriously vanished.

Appreciating that he had almost fallen victim to some sort of clever enchantment, Harry felt both terrified and exhilarated at the power of magic, and was overwhelmed by the sudden realisation that his future had changed beyond all recognition. Yet despite his apprehension, Harry finally understood those initial feelings of hope and serenity – he had come home, finally he had found somewhere he belonged."

Come on others, let's hear yours

Ax

I really like your "orgy of sights and sounds" bit. That is so true! I think that's exactly how it would be...I'm sure anyone who goes to the themepark will experience the same. I also really liked the enchantment from the liquor store! That is so clever!