If you follow your passion with dedication and work hard enough, you can live your dream. Jo had always wanted to be a writer and write children’s stories.

She had to go through hard times, living on government assistance to support herself and her daughter while she laboriously wrote and rewrote a story that came to her head during a train ride.

She had a harder time selling the story to a publishing agent who would consider it print-worthy, but one finally did and J.K. Rowling was born.

Who is J.K. Rowling? by Pam Pollack and Meg Belviso is an easy-to-read biography for children about the most famous children’s writer today.

Most Harry Potter series fans would already be knowing a lot about this British lady who created a magic world that has cast a spell over both kids and adults the world over. What I found interesting and inspiring was reading about her humble beginning in a boring secretarial job, how she kept dreaming up plots and characters, writing them down and never letting the hardships of making ends meet make her cast aside her writing aspirations.

Interestingly, J.K. Rowling’s first name is Joanne, although she’s been called Jo always. So when it was time to get the first HP book printed, the publishers suggested that she use two initials instead of her full name because young boys, who were her target audience, might not be interested in reading a book written by a woman. Having no middle name, she chose K, for Kathleen, as the second initial of her pen name, as it was her grandmother’s name. Thus J.K. Rowling was born.

Every now and then there are sections to give greater details of things that are mentioned in the book, such as a note about Chepstow Castle, a castle near Jo’s childhood house; Jane Austen; Character names; Amnesty International; and Herbs.

As the book has just simple pen-sketches, younger kids may not find it visually attractive but the text is simple enough to be understood and read by kids eight years and older.

Available at Paramount Books

Published in Dawn, Young World, November 25th, 2017