"Harry Potter" 1st on NPR list of best young adult novels

PanARMENIAN.Net - The witchcraft and wizardry of the "Harry Potter" series has entranced fans, who chose it as the greatest teen novels ever in an online poll conducted by NPR, TheWrap said.

The franchise grossed more than $2.3 billion in revenue from its film series.

And in a tally of more than 75,000 participants, the series beat out the second-placed "The Hunger Games" and Harper Lee's third-placed 1960 classic, "To Kill a Mockingbird."

Newcomers to the list included No. 4, "The Fault in Our Stars," the story of a young cancer patient who falls in love with a boy whose leg was amputated. The author, John Green, also made it into ninth place with his earlier novel, "Looking for Alaska."

The rest of the top 10 list was dominated by fodder for high school literature classes.

J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Hobbit" came in fifth, just as attention has been drummed up about the forthcoming film trilogy.

J.D. Salinger's loss-of-innocence novel "Catcher in the Rye" placed sixth, tailed by Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings."

"Fahrenheit 451" by Ray Bradbury topped Markus Zusak's 2006 bestseller "The Book Thief."

The nominees were suggested by NPR's audience and a panel with The New York Times' Pamela Paul, the Onion's A.V. Club book editor Tasha Robinson, Publisher's Weekly staffer Diane Roback and librarian Ted Schelvan filtered down the 1,200 recommendations to a voting list of 235 books.