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The author of the year award goes to J.K. Bowie.
It's really funny and cool and I like the magical bits in it. I think it's one of the best bits I've ever had.
I've read all three and I think they're really good because they're so imaginative and it's out of this world.
It inspires me to do some more writing than I have been doing.
I'm so terrified. If you're all nine years old I'd feel so much more comfortable.
To say that J.K. Rowling has taken the literary world by storm would be a huge understatement.
Three books into her seven book Harry Potter series and the rookie author is a worldwide superstar.
Valerie Beerman is with the Federation of Children's Book Groups in Edinburgh, Scotland.
Valerie has followed the career of J.K. Rowling and the dramatic success of the Harry Potter book series.
She's a young woman with a young daughter living in Edinburgh and I think she's probably as surprised as anybody at the success of the books
because nobody's got anything to compare her with.
I met her first when she came to my house to be interviewed and it was absolutely extraordinary
because she's got so many ideas because I remember asking her if she ever wanted to write something completely different
and she said not. She had so many ideas for Harry she could write them ad infinitum and knowing her I'm sure she probably will.
My first and middle name is Joanne Kathleen. Kathleen is from my dad's mum, one of my grandparents,
which is really lucky because the other grandmother was called Frida.
So I think I lucked out actually getting Kathleen there somehow.
I think she was quite clever in the author of the book being J.K. Rowling rather than Joanne Rowling because it gets boys reading
and boys tend to think if you've got initials you're a man and this macho image they are much more likely to read if they think it's been written by a man.
Well first time I read The Fosterer's Storm I thought it was the best book I've ever read because it was so exciting
and I always used to get up when my mum and dad were in bed and start reading it because I had to finish it
and then the second book it was a wee bit better and it was longer as well so that was good.
My favourite character is Harry. He gets into mischief all the time and he's just like the main character so I suppose you have to get to like him really.
How many books am I planning to write? Harry Potter books. There will be seven in total.
One for each of you. Oh you look happy I'm so glad. That would be very depressing if you went oh no. Can't you give it a rest now.
He's going to be at Hogwarts for seven years. In the seventh book he'll turn 17 so he'll come in the wizarding, in my wizarding world, you come of age at 17.
Okay so in book seven he'll be allowed to use magic outside school. Ha ha. So Dudley's really going to be in trouble.
Now look at you being nasty to Dudley.
I think they like the imagination of it, they like they're scared because all children like being scared
and I know the books have stirred up quite a bit of controversy over it being too frightening and witchcraft and all this.
Children love it and they just enjoy reading a jolly good story.
I get letters from parents saying I'm mean because I make Harry be nasty to Dudley and I'm like have you read Dudley?
Do you understand what Dudley's like? I mean there's turning the other cheek and there's just being a moron.
The Federation of Children's Book Groups has given its top prize to J.K. Rowling for three straight years.
It's an award that's voted on exclusively by children. Because of that it's an award that Rowling holds close to her heart.
Well the Federation run the Children's Book Award which is the only award which is chosen entirely by children
and Harry Potter has been unique in that each book has won the Children's Book Award every year.
And she's immensely popular with the children and we've never known a phenomenon quite like it.
We're very proud of it as well because of course Harry Potter was born here in Edinburgh.
When the award started some critics were rather sniffy and said oh children can't possibly choose a book.
They've been proved wrong many times because several of the books that have won the Children's Book Award
have gone on to win awards like the Carnegie Medal which is the library association's highest award
and things like that. Children are very discerning and Harry Potter books took off immediately
and won by a huge margin because often the winner is quite close run thing
and Harry Potter not.
The proof is definitely in the pudding or in this case in the cash register.
By the time the second Potter book came out book stores had to employ crowd control officers
and the launch was delayed until after school was out.
It's been extraordinary when she launched the third one last July.
They were queuing around the shop and it's the first time that there's been this hysteria when the author wasn't even there.
And there were all these children besieging book shops and there was no author there which is unheard of.
And they were fighting to get the hands on copies and of course there's been a huge search for first editions
which I have to say I haven't got either. I've been checking up on all mine and none of them are first editions unfortunately
or my old age would have been secured.
It was not an easy start for Joanne Rowling but once she hit her stride there was no stopping her Cinderella story.
A recently divorced mother barely getting by on welfare,
Joanne Rowling moved to Edinburgh and took up residence in a small flat. During the day she would escape the confines of her apartment
taking refuge in cafes and restaurants.
Her favorite spot was Nicholson's. While baby Jessica slept Joanne would sip espresso and begin writing longhand
what was to become the biggest selling children's book series ever.
She said from the very start she knew what she was going to write. She did it all longhand, pen and paper at first.
I mean I imagine she's got a few high tech bits of equipment these days but it was pen and paper and scribblings out
and liquid paper and just going over it and over it.
We all knew she was writing the books but she was in quite often several times a week for a good few hours at a time.
She started drinking coffee so when you have a customer that's in for long periods of time anyway the staff do get to know them
and get to know what they're up to and why they're here so yeah she got to know quite a few of the staff quite well I think.
Meantime on the other side of town the folks over at Waterstones are trying to keep Harry Potter on the shelves
and they're bracing themselves for the next book launch.
When the second book came out we did an event actually in our shop with her which was absolutely sold out
of her kids asking questions, lots of adults there as well which was great.
But last year with the third one it was just crazy, absolutely crazy.
We ordered more of that book than we've ever done of any sort of adult book just to cope with the demand.
Never known a book so eagerly awaited, people coming in asking from book two when it came out
when's the next one, when's the next one. It's been the same, a lot of people have been asking
but I think we realise now that it's an annual thing, July is publication date and we've got to wait.
She was a teacher so I think that sort of helps, answers every single one of them, not patronising to the kids
even if she's getting asked the same questions over and over again.
She's a very nice down to earth lady, it doesn't success like that, as far as I can see, hasn't affected her that.
She's got her feet firmly on the ground.
It's very hard to choose your favourite character because even the horrible ones are fun to write about.
Obviously I would hate to meet Dudley, well actually I wouldn't mind meeting Dudley because I would torment him horribly.
But, or Snape for example, it's fun to write about Snape even though he is a deeply horrible person.
In terms of people I'd like to meet, if you put aside Harry and Ron and Hermione, Hagrid definitely.
I love Hagrid dearly. I'd love to have him as a friend and it would be so cool if you got into a bit of trouble
with someone and said perhaps you'd like to discuss that with my friend Hagrid.
It would be so useful in shops and stuff, banks would be good.
It's just such a fantastic story, you get so involved in it and you're wanting to know what's going to happen next.
It's a very involving, quite a gripping book and just the fact that there's going to be seven in the series
that you're wanting to know what's going to happen after.
And each book is a story and you can read them as a series or you can read them on their own, which is also quite nice.
You're not left hanging on, but of course you want to find out what happens in the next bit, but it is something different, which is nice.
It's fantastic because we get people coming in saying, my child, they've not been that interested in reading before,
but suddenly they've got these books and they just want to read and they ask for similar things.
There are a lot of brilliant children's books out there that just don't get the attention, they're sort of pressed.
But now it's bringing more people into bookshops, it's great. One kid's got it in the playground and then before you know it they're all reading it.
Joanne and her sister Diane were raised for the most part in the English countryside.
In Winterborne they lived on a street a few doors down from a family named the Potters.
Vicki Potter and older brother Ian Potter played dress-up with Joanne.
While Ian didn't have a lightning bolt scar, he did have all the characteristics of a future children's fantasy hero.
For Ian, Vicki and their mother Ruby, it was a trip down memory lane as they visited their old neighborhood
and remembered the witches and wizards games that led to a best seller.
That's where Christopher used to live. I don't know who's there now.
She had an imagination because it was always her who would come up with what we were going to do
or what was going to be put into the potions or that type of thing.
And always the leader, so she was forever leading us into games or instigating.
So I think from that side more, I suppose, leadership, or not leadership as such,
but just her imagination and what we would play and where the ideas originated from.
They were very close, the two sisters. They were inseparable.
But they were fun to have and they were always laughing.
In fact, all the children were happy children in those days because they didn't have things to fight about.
But Joanne and Diane were very quiet, very close. Their mum was lovely.
And they just got on well with Ian and Vicki. They had lots of fun and everyone shared.
Joanne, as you know, was very good with her books.
They used to play and sit and if they read stories, it was probably Joanne that always done the reading
because she was probably one of the older ones as well.
But you see them go off to school hand in hand on the morning and Ian and Vicki would go off.
And then Diane's and Joanne's mum, we always walked to the top of the drive to see the children come back from school.
Joanne and Diane would come from one direction and Ian and Vicki would come from the other.
But it was just lovely and knowing that she's achieved what she achieves now
makes you look back and appreciate it even more because it's something you'll never forget.
Mainly it was a dressing up and we had a little box full of clothes and we'd have witches' hats and broomsticks.
I mean, we'd all take the brooms out of the garages and stuff.
And just, you know, we'd have little black capes and they'd be painted.
And usually we would have done potato painting on there of the little, you know, the stars and stuff.
And that was it. And we used to sit, there were some trees in one of the gardens and they'd done ask me which one I can't remember.
But we'd have like our little, you know, that would be where we'd sit and, you know, do all the spells and stuff.
It was a thing that just seemed to come out nearly all the time, you know, the box.
Every time the group got together and that box was out and everyone would grab whatever they wanted, sort of thing.
And then off we'd go into the back of the houses, into the rear garden, sort of thing, to carry on playing and that.
Joanne would always sort of be the one with a book in front of her when she would be the one reading out the spells and what she was putting into here and putting into there, sort of thing.
It was a great thing.
But yeah, it's hard to remember, sort of thing.
You think, yeah, you can remember that and you remember that. You can never sort of remember the whole story of what was going on.
I mean, it was a fair few years ago, so.
I didn't realise that the name Potter meant so much to her.
And I used to think it was lovely. I used to think, why haven't I got a name like Potter instead of Rowling?
And she said she spent hours, lots and lots of time, trying to find a name for Harry.
And then she said one day it just came to me. I was sat there and it just rolled off my tongue and it was magic.
And she achieved it. So that's how I suppose it came around.
It's almost like going back, really down memory lane.
It is? Yeah.
At the age of nine, Joanne and her family left the Potters behind and moved to the village of Tutshill, just steps from the border separating England from Wales.
These children at Tutshill Primary are reading their Harry Potter books in the very school where J.K. Rowling first started to exhibit her creativity on paper.
Some have a special connection to the Rowling family, but all are big fans.
My dad and my mum used to know J.K. Rowling's parents.
And her mum gave us a doll house just before she died.
And my piano teacher used to teach J.K. Rowling.
In the first book it says to Mr Morgan, and Mr Morgan was my dad's godfather.
The characters are really strict. They're really described well.
And some of the teachers turn out to be really evil. They act really good.
It might seem weird, but I like Professor Snape.
Because he seems the big bad meanie, but it's like, especially when Harry was up in the Quidditch match, and Professor Quirrell was trying to get him down.
Snape was trying to keep him on his broom with his spell.
I've read all three and I think they're really good because they're so imaginative and it's out of this world.
I started reading the Harry Potter book at Christmas and I thought it looked very exciting.
My favourite part was when Harry managed to break out of the Dorsley's house, the metal bars.
Why is that your favourite part?
Because he managed to magic himself out of the bars when it was illegal.
I draw Ron with Scabbers sitting on his shoulder.
I like Ron because he's very loyal to Harry, especially in the Philosopher's Stone, when he gives himself up in the chess game.
It's Hagrid and the things that he's holding are chickens because in the second book, in the Chamber of Secrets, the snake thing,
they don't like the crew of chickens.
For children, the Harry Potter books are tough to put down.
The characters are colourful, the story is exciting and the suspense of what's around the next corner almost unbearable.
Did a lot of you find that you couldn't put the book down?
Yeah.
Does anybody got a record for a number of hours sitting reading it without being able to put it down?
What do you think Tom?
Six hours.
Six hours without putting the book down. Anybody else?
I started reading it for about two hours in the most exciting part of The Prisoner of Azkaban.
Two hours. Well, you must be holding your attention. Any other reasons why you think the books are so good?
It's got so many twists. You just think something's going to happen, it's one particular person that's the bad guy and it changes completely.
There's so many twists in it, it makes it so exciting.
The main character, Harry Potter, do you think he reminds you of anyone that you actually know?
Can you think of anyone you know in your life that's anything like him? What do you think Ian?
Well, at the start he's like any other boy. But once you get into it and you get into the book and you see he's a big wizard and a big hero, then there's no one that really compares to him.
Do you think it's a good idea that they make him just an ordinary boy at the beginning?
Yeah.
Why?
Because it...
Ailey, what do you think?
Well, it's more interesting because you wouldn't expect him to be a wizard if he's like just a normal boy at the beginning.
Mm-hm. Leo?
When I didn't read the blurb at the back and I saw the front cover of the book, I had no idea he was going to be a wizard.
Who do you think your favourite character would be if you had to pick a favourite? Who's got a favourite? Christine?
Hagrid.
Hagrid. Right, you tell us a bit about Hagrid and why you like him so much.
I like him because he's friendly and he's really troubled a lot because he went through a lot of trouble and was accused when he didn't do something.
Mm-hm.
Like he was accused of.
Mm-hm.
And I just like him because he's caring and friendly.
He's caring and friendly. He looks after Harry, doesn't he?
Yeah. And he feels really responsible for him and he isn't what you think he would be at first because he's a giant and he's really big.
Mm-hm.
And you'd think he'd be really scary but he's actually friendly.
Mm-hm. Who's got a different favourite character?
Duncan.
Right, Duncan.
I like the Weasley twins because everything they do is just so... it's as if all their tricks have been organised and they've been planning them for weeks.
Mm-hm.
It's just... the things they do, they're just... they make it seem real. It's the sort of things normal mischief-makers would do and they're my favourite characters.
Are they the kind of boys you can imagine being in a school?
Mm-hm.
Yeah, but I doubt they'd be in the school for very long.
Older students are also fans. They have a different perspective, but they are still fans.
Well, I think the whole idea of her being a single mother and sort of living in child benefits and that sort of thing is very interesting that she's now what probably...
I think it's something like third richest woman in the world. I think it's just amazing that she's been able to do that in such a short amount of time.
She didn't set out to write books for other children. She set out to write books for people she knew and then she had no idea that they would get published after, like, rejections as well.
I think that she doesn't want, like, a lot of money and popularity. She just wants people to, like, be happy about the books and, like, the books she doesn't want, like, say,
Oh, I'm so good, I've written all the books. She just wants people to like them and that's it.
No, I don't know. No, I think I was reading the paper about her. There was an article on her a while ago and it said that she hasn't moved to, like, any bigger house.
She still lives in her flat that she lived even before that she became famous and got lots of money. She still lives in the same flat.
So I think she's just happy. Obviously the money would help a wee bit because she wasn't, like, very rich before or anything.
But I think the money would have helped a little bit but I don't think she's made a big deal about it, built a big mansion or anything like that.
As the sun goes down in London, England, and the neon lights shine over Piccadilly Circus, Joanne Rowling is preparing for one of the biggest honours of her career.
The author of the year award goes to J.K. Bowie.
The British Book Awards, better known as the Nibby Awards, are looked upon as the Oscars of the literary community.
As author of the year for 1999, Joanne Rowling edged out seasoned veterans including the likes of Stephen King.
I'm trying very hard not to do a Gwyneth here. This is such an honour. Thank you, thank you so much.
I have to thank Bloomsbury, as ever, in particular, Emma Mattison, my editor, and Rosamund Delahaye.
I'm so terrified. If you're all nine years old I'd feel so much more comfortable.
Maximum strength Lemsip as well, I would like to thank.
I'm completely overwhelmed, as you can tell. I'd like to congratulate Jacqueline Wilson, because that is a great book.
I'd just like to say to her, the great thing about winning this is neither of us have to be photographed next to Jerry Hall.
Alison Ellis and Andrew Fell Gordon are very plugged in when it comes to children's literature.
What a very pretty one, yes.
Alison and Andrew maintain a children's literary online magazine for parents looking for guidance and advice on appropriate reading material.
For them, the appeal of Harry Potter is straightforward.
I think it is this thing of good and evil, and that you've got the good guys and the bad guys, and I think that the children are responding to the fact that, to me, they're very moral stories, that she's saying,
if you do something wrong, you are going to have to pay for it, somewhere down the line, and I think they're responding to that.
I was saying to Andrew, one of my favourite bits was in the Chamber of Secrets, where Harry is very upset because he thinks that he should have been part of the Slytherin House,
and Dumbledore is saying to him, but no, you told the sorting hat that sorts them out into the houses you didn't want to, and it's not our abilities in life, it's the choices we make, and I think that is so important,
and she's getting that across to kids today, that's brilliant.
You can imagine someone being turned into a frog, and back again when they're being obnoxious, and there's lots of small children you see around, because I do work with education a lot,
you think, you're a good candidate for a howl, are you little?
I think it's too soon to tell that, I think the committed children that read will go on reading and reading and reading, but I think it's down the line, we'll see that that was the book that hooked the kid that couldn't be bothered to read, that's when you'll see the payoff on other things.
It's certainly not a marketing fad, I don't think, because it started almost, despite the marketing industry, it was a success before it got publicised,
but whether it is, it would be very difficult to think of too many other books in the same genre, so I can't see it spawning a style of literature, so it's whether the reading habit that it generates then is transferred onto other books.
She seemed very much as an underdog, sort of coming from this humble beginnings and striking out first time, but I think that people are behind her and say, good on you.
Oh yes, definitely, and Rowling being a very private person and coming across always as a very private person, again I think people here respond to that, they get a bit wary of authors who play these sort of media celebrity.
I think the chapters are quite hard to read, some of them like that one, when you first see it's quite hard to read, but some of them are quite easy and some of the words are quite hard to slam.
Yeah, I mean like some of the words like Dumbledore and stuff, I was like, what's that? Spells, the spell names. Yeah, and they're like, what's that word? I know when they're chanting the spells it's quite weird to follow.
The toughest challenge facing these young readers is the wait for the next Harry Potter book. There's plenty of speculation as to what's going to happen, but at this point even the title of the next edition is a heavily guarded secret.
I'm very superstitious about giving the titles of my books before they're published, it's just a thing I've got, I don't like telling the title, but if you've been on the internet lately and you've read the fourth book called Harry Potter and the Quidditch World Cup, that is a lie.
It is not called that. It is true that you see the Quidditch World Cup in book four, which some of you have read book three will know because Ron says, right, at the end of book three that he's going to invite Harry to come and see the Quidditch World Cup.
Well you do see it, it's Ireland versus Bulgaria. That amuses me too. I just wanted countries that don't normally do great stuff sports wise.
Although Ireland did pretty good in the soccer two World Cups ago, but they're not the most sporting nation in the world and nor are Bulgaria as far as I'm aware, although there were some good Bulgarian gymnasts. So anyway, I won't tell you who wins. It's Ireland.
Joanne Rowling has definitely touched a nerve when it comes to children's books. In the age of internet access, computer games and videos, girls and boys are reading again and they can't wait to turn the page. They are literally spellbound.
I didn't read at all, basically, at all until I read like books. I'd read them and then I'd just stop after about like halfway through and I wouldn't read the rest. It was just, I couldn't get into books, but after that it was like, I loved Harry Potter. It was the best book I'd ever read.
And I've been reading other books since then and I seem to enjoy them more. It is appealing to young boys, which from the research they've been doing here is very, very important because boys are seeing reading as a feminine activity.
And so it's really good to see them hooking into these and far better than them playing these computer games and stuff. So, well, I think it's really good books and that she should write more of them and how I got interested in them.
Well, my friend Stephen, he did a book document, so I kind of came interested in them then. So I just thought I'd like to read one, so I read one and wanted the other one because I heard that that was good as well.
My favourite character is Harry because he has quite a lot of courage and he's quite smart. And he's, it's just sort of, he feels quite realistic. Not in like the magic and all that, but it's just like how he feels and everything.
I like the falafel so far as stone because it's like introducing everything and like so you get into it really quickly and everything.
It's really, really, really good idea for the story. It's like totally different from any other book. It's like he's just in a new world and it's really interesting to read about.
Most books are adventurous, but this is like a special book. It's got, it's like the characters are real in life and the characters are so good that the author really put it like a mystery and it's adventurous.
It's really, really fun. My favourite book is Prison Rascal Ban. I like how he goes to wizardry school and things like that.
He's good at Quidditch and it must be fun when you can be a muggle and a wizard at the same time and you can do lots of things with your wand and you don't need to get up and get something, you can just use your wand and all that.
The next step for Harry and his pals is the silver screen and not everyone is happy about it.
I don't want to go and see it because it would just ruin it all because it wouldn't really be imaginative. It wouldn't be Harry in your mind. It would be someone else's Harry.
I certainly wouldn't want to see the film because if you go to see a film that's somebody else's interpretation of the characters and if you love a book particularly you don't want to see somebody else's interpretation of it.
I don't know, well you probably wouldn't want me to mention names but I will. Mrs Doubtfire which was written in Edinburgh as well, when that was made into the film from the book Madame Doubtfire it was a completely different book.
A huge disappointment to the people that liked the book and I would hate that to happen to Harry Potter.
I'm both excited and nervous about the film to be totally honest with you. I'm excited because if they do it right it will be amazing for me to see. I'll be more excited than anyone to see it.
The thing I really want to see is Quidditch because yes I am nasty aren't I? See I can see Quidditch really really clearly inside my own head.
To actually be able to see people doing it will be wonderful to me. This thing that I've seen in my imagination for so long so that's why I'm excited.
I am of course nervous that they're going to do stuff I don't want my characters to do but that is a risk you always take when you sell film rights.
They just seem to me, I think I've gone with the right company because they're giving me quite a lot of control.
Actually they're not really giving me control I have to say they're giving you control because the only reason they really want to listen to me is they're about a million of you standing behind me wanting to see my version.
That's why they're giving me power so I'm under no illusions that it's really about me.
And there's no shortage of other questions for J.K. Rowling.
What would you do after Harry Potter the seventh book?
I would ask her are you going to write any more books after you've finished the Harry Potter series?
Where did you get the idea for a three-headed dog?
How did she get her excellent ideas for the books?
Why did you decide to become a writer?
I'd ask her where did she get all her ideas?
I'd ask her that if she for the next four books that are coming out for the seventh I would ask her if she could write a special copy just for me.
Meanwhile back at her home in Winterborne Ruby Potter is out giving the ducks their afternoon snack and thinking back to the quiet redhead who grew up to be a best-selling author.
Ruby had a chance recently to reconnect with Joanne Rowling and she shares a letter she received in the mail.
This here is a letter I received back from Joanne and on the paper it's got by Owl Post which is obviously connected to her story books.
If you've read them and it reads, Dear all, thanks so much for writing.
It was great to hear from you.
You will probably be relieved to know that Harry is not in fact based on Ian.
It is true, however, that I stole your surname.
I always liked it as much as I hated Rowling and I gave Harry several different surnames before remembering you.
Diana remembers you too, especially your caravan of which we were immensely jealous.
With best wishes, Jo.
And I thought it was lovely that she even sat down and hand wrote it rather than put it through a computer which is so easy to do nowadays.
So I wish you all the best, Jo and Jessica and I hope all goes well with you with your books.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.