Based on exhaustive research, interviews with those who know her and a penetrating evaluation of the novels, this is the first full-length biography of one of the most important writers in the world today. She is the creator of probably the best-known and certainly the best-loved character in contemporary fiction; she is also the author of her own escape from an existance on the brink of poverty, with no job and few prospects. On the one hand there is J.K. Rowling, who wrote and continues to write, the Harry Potter novels, a literary phenomenon of both the last millenium, and the new one. On the other, there is Joanne Rowling, a quiet, dreamy, rather shy woman whose brilliance in translating her dreams into prose transformed her own life. The author examines the experiences that not only helped to shape J.K. Rowling, but that led in the end, as in all the best fairy tales, to fame and fortune.