Born: July 31, 1965 - Chipping Sodbury, United Kingdom.

Like that of her own character, Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling's life has the luster of a fairy tale. Divorced, living on public assistance in a tiny Edinburgh flat with her infant daughter, Rowling wrote Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone at a table in a cafe during her daughter's naps — and it was Harry Potter that rescued her. First, the Scottish Arts Council gave her a grant to finish the book. After its sale to Bloomsbury (UK) and Scholastic Books, the accolades began to pile up. Harry Potter won The British Book Awards Children's Book of the Year, and the Smarties Prize, and rave reviews on both sides of the Atlantic. In America, there are over 103 million books in print, and each title has been #1 on The New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestseller lists. The sixth title, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, set a new world record for a first printing, with 10.8 million copies hitting stores on July 16, 2005.

A graduate of Exeter University, a teacher, and then an unemployed single parent, Rowling wrote Harry Potter when “I was very low, and I had to achieve something. Without the challenge, I would have gone stark raving mad.” But Rowling has always written; her first book was called “Rabbit.” “I was about six, and I haven't stopped scribbling since.”

For Rowling, the change in her fortunes has been slightly bewildering. But her daughter has no doubt about her mother's new career: when asked what mommies do, she replies without hesitation, “Mommies write!”

Other books from the Harry Potter series include: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince, and the final faceoff between good and evil, Harry Potter and the Deathdly Hollows.