Although she writes under the pen name J.K. Rowling, pronounced like rolling, her name when her first Harry Potter book was published was simply Joanne Rowling. Anticipating that the target audience of young boys might not want to read a book written by a woman, her publishers demanded that she use two initials, rather than her full name. As she had no middle name, she chose K as the second initial of her pen name, from her paternal grandmother Kathleen Ada Bulgen Rowling. She calls herself Jo and has said, "No one ever called me 'Joanne' when I was young, unless they were angry." Following her marriage, she has sometimes used the name Joanne Murray when conducting personal business. During the Leveson Inquiry she gave evidence under the name of Joanne Kathleen Rowling. In a 2012 interview, Rowling noted that she no longer cared that people pronounced her name incorrectly.

So it was very normal when in this year, 1996, when Joanne, a 31 years old lady from England , handed the manuscript of her first novel to 12 publishing houses, all of them rejected it... Quidditch and chess - not really my thing although this opened up a brilliant line of merchandising for the author. The funny thing that there's a reference in this novel that Harry Potter is 'the Second Most Selling Book in History after the Bible ', a speculation that happens to be true in less than 5 years after that. How Hermione is treated. When Ron and Harry are in trouble, Ron screams at her, "Have you gone mad? Are you a witch or not?" Um Ron, if you treat me like, you can save yourself. At the end of the book, Hermione is never fully rewarded for her portion in saving Ron and Harry, just figuring out the riddle. Even after she was a better person than I. But what version should you read? With the profusion of editions now available it can be difficult to know which books you might want to buy or gift unless you have already spent some time shopping around. Below, our Children’s Editor surveys the options and makes a personal selection of the most beautiful editions.

The Knight Bus – Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Just kidding. This is a work of fiction and I am not too old to appreciate it. I was just kidding. To be frank, I tried hard not to like this. I thought that giving this a 1 or 2 will freak out my friends and somehow get votes from those who are, up to now, ignoring this book. I told you so! Why waste your time? . However, unless you are a grumpy old man/woman, there is nothing not to like about this book. I maybe too old for it but hey, talent is talent and J. K. Rowling has it! When my oldest angel told me she wanted to start reading the Harry Potter books, I couldn’t have been happier. As I was collecting all seven volumes off the shelf to bring up to her room, I started feeling nostalgic for the whole Hogwarts gang, and I realized that I’d never done more than a perfunctory review of this first volume. I figured it was high time to rectify that oversight. And here comes another character I’ll never forgive. Snape is a horrible teacher and an even worse human being. There I said it. Nothing that happens over the course of the following books will change anything about the fact that he’s unfair and mean to his students! His past doesn’t excuse his actions. Still, I gotta give Rowling kudos for all the foreboding! Boy, alone the comment with the bezoar. XD And Dumbledore explaining the relationship between Snape and Harry’s father. Well done! ;-)

Why do I tell you this story on this review, you ask? Well, at the time, young adult/teen literature consisted mainly of RL Stein, Christopher Pike, Beverly Cleary, Judy Blume, and a few other classic Newberry Award winners, but certainly we did not have a YA section to the extent you see it today. Because I got hate in the comments for OMG swearing in a children's book review (which I get, I guess...), DON'T READ THIS IF YOU ARE UNDER 18. Happy now, everyone?*** But the significant advice was to change her pen name cause young boys might not want to read a book written by a woman.. Ron is honestly the cutest. I don't understand how anyone could be mean to him. He may be weak, but he has his own strengths. He's so adorable and small and I hated how Draco treated him. There were some times unnecessary and I hated Draco for it, but I'll probably end up loving Draco some time throughout the series and probably regret it because I know he's still gonna be really mean throughout the series. I'm sure. I haven't spoiled myself, so I have no idea how his or anyone else's life goes, but I do know that he changes in some way. Hermione is a small and cute nerd as well, but sometimes I hated how sassy she was and bossy. She hated losing points for her house and because she, Ron, and Harry were in the same house, they had to work together and find a way to become friends to find out other truths and earn points for Gryffindor. She took everything very serious and showed off at times because of her perfect test grades and assignments, but I was glad she was able to put up with Ron and Harry while they put up with her. The 3 books takeover the Top Spot in all charts of Best Selling Books for weeks & months, and it's even still in hardcover editions.Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone is a fantasy novel written by British author J. K. Rowling. Everything was fun to read. I laughed at some parts and found the story to be more affective to me as Harry was figuring out his new and changed life. He was confused, but he found out a lot more. There's still more, but I know that as he grows, I will be able to follow along the late ass journey and see where he grows to and how. I'll see how strong he gets and find out some strengths and weakness'. I'll be able to join an invisible magic carpet and fly through the series because I just want to know what happens next and how everything goes. I want to see Harry become a better person and be able to prove Draco and his stupid friends wrong about what they think. I want his friendship with Ron to grow and become stronger. I want Hermione to stop being so talkative and take a little break of being so bossy. But more importantly, I want to have a fun journey reading this and feeling like I'm on an adventure. Reading it for the first time feels like one. I've never watched the films. I've watched parts, but skipped them. Now, I won't skip anything. It's like an adventure where I'm dived in and can't seem to leave because I'm so alive and intrigued. It'd be limited for religious or educating books, classics, small novels. Even those could be just electronic too, and the Books be just like Good Ol' Video Tapes.

This conquer of the Top Spots made some literary magazines & newspapers separate the 'Harry Potter books' selling records from the rest of the top selling books, splitting the lists into 'Children Books' and 'Adult Books' sections, under pressure from other publishers who were eager to see their books given higher ranking.

Harry and the Mirror of Erised – Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone

When the book came out in 1998, I was not yet a bookworm so I brushed this aside. I read only those books that my brother told me to read. He was the bookworm but he would not be caught reading any book being pushed by media hype. However, when Warner Bros. released the film adaptation in 2001, my daughter was 6 years old and I thought that, since there was too much hype, the movie must be good and we would have a memorable time with our first ever father-daughter movie date. I was wrong. She not only got scared because of the darkness inside the movie house but she trembled with fear during the life-size human chess game, in that scene when Ron was sacrificed. We left the movie in that scene with my daughter crying and me cursing it: I will never read Harry Potter. And Thanks to Harry Potter, now Every young readers worldwide know much more about Philosopher's Stone's legend. For a special gift you might go for a box set, in red for Gryffindor, blue for Ravenclaw, green for Slytherin or yellow for Hufflepuff. Pay attention if you are buying the box set online as some sets don’t include all seven books.