J.K. ROWLING is the author of the enduringly popular, era-defining Harry Potter seven-book series, which have sold over 600 million copies in 85 languages, been listened to as audiobooks for over one billion hours and made into eight smash hit movies. To accompany the series, she wrote three short companion volumes for charity, including Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, which went on to inspire a new series of films featuring Magizoologist Newt Scamander. Harry’s story as a grown-up was continued in a stage play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, which J.K. Rowling wrote with playwright Jack Thorne and director John Tiffany.
In 2020, she returned to publishing for younger children with the fairy tale The Ickabog, the royalties for which she donated to her charitable trust, Volant, to help charities working to alleviate the social effects of the Covid 19 pandemic. Her latest children’s novel, The Christmas Pig, was published in 2021.
J.K. Rowling has received many awards and honours for her writing, including for her detective series written under the name Robert Galbraith. She supports a wide number of humanitarian causes through Volant, and is the founder of the international children’s care reform charity Lumos. J.K. Rowling lives in Scotland with her family.
Olivia Lomenech Gill has a first class degree in Theatre from the University of Hull and an MA in Printmaking from Camberwell College of Arts. She has built her career as a professional fine artist and has been exhibited at all the major London art fairs. Olivia's first professional illustration commission,
Where My Wellies Take Me, written by Clare and Michael Morpurgo, was shortlisted for the Kate Greenaway Medal and won the English Association Picture Book Award. Olivia lives and works in north Northumberland in a timber studio she built by hand with her husband, a paper conservator. They also have a workshop in a nearby village, which houses Olivia's three-ton printing press.
Newt Scamander was awarded the Order of Merlin, Second Class, in 1979 in recognition of his services to the study of magical beasts, Magizoology. Now retired, he lives in Dorset with his wife, Porpentina, and their pet Kneazles: Hoppy, Milly, and Mauler.
