J.K Rowling introducing "The Ickabog" !!

26 MAY 2020

About The Ickabog

The idea for The Ickabog came to her while she was still writing Harry Potter. She wrote most of a first draft in fits and starts between Potter books, intending to publish it after Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

However, after the last Potter book she wanted to take a break from publishing, which ended up lasting five years. In that time I wrote The Casual Vacancy and Robert Galbraith wrote The Cuckoo’s Calling. After some dithering (and also after my long-suffering agent had trademarked The Ickabog.

J.K. Rowling’s fairy tale The Ickabog is published today as a hardback, e-book and audiobook. The beautiful new gift hardback edition is brought to life with full-color illustrations by the young winners of The Ickabog illustration competitions around the world, which will also be available to purchasers of the audiobook as a full-color PDF. The audiobook is performed by Stephen Fry and published by Audible.

The book is now available in English, Italian, German, Spanish. Brazilian Portuguese, Bulgarian, Dutch, Simplified Chinese and Russian with more translations to follow.

J.K. Rowling is donating her net royalties from The Ickabog to help support vulnerable groups who’ve been particularly impacted by Covid-19, in the UK and internationally. She is making an initial donation to her charitable Trust, The Volant Charitable Trust, to help medical and frontline charities make a meaningful impact in the short term.

She said...

"Having decided to publish, I thought how wonderful it would be if children in lockdown, or otherwise needing distraction during the difficult time we’re passing through, illustrated the story for me. There will be suggestions about the illustrations we might need for each chapter on The Ickabog website which will be under this website, but nobody should feel constrained by these ideas. I want to see imaginations run wild! Creativity, inventiveness and effort are the most important things: we aren’t necessarily looking for the most technical skill!

In November 2020, The Ickabog will be published in English in print, eBook and audiobook formats, shortly followed by other languages. The best drawings in each territory will be included in the finished books. As publishers in each territory will need to decide which pictures work best for their own editions, I won’t be personally judging the entries. However, if parents and guardians post their children’s drawing on Twitter using the hashtag #TheIckabog , I’ll be able to share and comment! To find out more about the Illustration Competition, go to The Ickabog website ".