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What's Your Story?
Taken from Waterstone's Exclusive Postcard Book: To celebrate the National Year of Reading Waterstone's asked 13 world-class authors to tell us their story. We extended this invitation to our customers, in the form of a nationwide competition to win the opportunity to be published in this limited edition postcard book, alongside the original works from JK Rowling, Doris Lessing, Neil Gaiman, Michael Rosen, Nick Hornby, Sebastian Faulks, Lauren Child, Tom Stoppard, Irvine Welsh, Axel Scheffler, Margaret Atwood, Richard Ford and Lisa Appignanesi. This collection consists of 13 story cards from the authors listed above plus story cards from the three winners of the national competition. Due to the exclusive nature of this product, we are limiting orders to two (2) per customer while stocks last. All profits from the sale of this collection will go to Dyslexia Action and English PEN. Please note that because the postcard book contains a mixture of authors, some stories are not suitable for children.
20 pages, Postcard book
First published July 8, 2008
1 person is currently reading
708 people want to read
About the author
J.K. Rowling
675 books234k followersSee also: Robert Galbraith
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.
Rowling was born to Peter James Rowling, a Rolls-Royce aircraft engineer, and Anne Rowling (née Volant), on 31 July 1965 in Yate, Gloucestershire, England, 10 miles (16 km) northeast of Bristol. Her mother Anne was half-French and half-Scottish. Her parents first met on a train departing from King's Cross Station bound for Arbroath in 1964. They married on 14 March 1965. Her mother's maternal grandfather, Dugald Campbell, was born in Lamlash on the Isle of Arran. Her mother's paternal grandfather, Louis Volant, was awarded the Croix de Guerre for exceptional bravery in defending the village of Courcelles-le-Comte during the First World War.
Rowling's sister Dianne was born at their home when Rowling was 23 months old. The family moved to the nearby village Winterbourne when Rowling was four. She attended St Michael's Primary School, a school founded by abolitionist William Wilberforce and education reformer Hannah More. Her headmaster at St Michael's, Alfred Dunn, has been suggested as the inspiration for the Harry Potter headmaster Albus Dumbledore.
As a child, Rowling often wrote fantasy stories, which she would usually then read to her sister. She recalls that: "I can still remember me telling her a story in which she fell down a rabbit hole and was fed strawberries by the rabbit family inside it. Certainly the first story I ever wrote down (when I was five or six) was about a rabbit called Rabbit. He got the measles and was visited by his friends, including a giant bee called Miss Bee." At the age of nine, Rowling moved to Church Cottage in the Gloucestershire village of Tutshill, close to Chepstow, Wales. When she was a young teenager, her great aunt, who Rowling said "taught classics and approved of a thirst for knowledge, even of a questionable kind," gave her a very old copy of Jessica Mitford's autobiography, Hons and Rebels. Mitford became Rowling's heroine, and Rowling subsequently read all of her books.
Rowling has said of her teenage years, in an interview with The New Yorker, "I wasn’t particularly happy. I think it’s a dreadful time of life." She had a difficult homelife; her mother was ill and she had a difficult relationship with her father (she is no longer on speaking terms with him). She attended secondary school at Wyedean School and College, where her mother had worked as a technician in the science department. Rowling said of her adolescence, "Hermione [a bookish, know-it-all Harry Potter character] is loosely based on me. She's a caricature of me when I was eleven, which I'm not particularly proud of." Steve Eddy, who taught Rowling English when she first arrived, remembers her as "not exceptional" but "one of a group of girls who were bright, and quite good at English." Sean Harris, her best friend in the Upper Sixth owned a turquoise Ford Anglia, which she says inspired the one in her books.
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.
Rowling was born to Peter James Rowling, a Rolls-Royce aircraft engineer, and Anne Rowling (née Volant), on 31 July 1965 in Yate, Gloucestershire, England, 10 miles (16 km) northeast of Bristol. Her mother Anne was half-French and half-Scottish. Her parents first met on a train departing from King's Cross Station bound for Arbroath in 1964. They married on 14 March 1965. Her mother's maternal grandfather, Dugald Campbell, was born in Lamlash on the Isle of Arran. Her mother's paternal grandfather, Louis Volant, was awarded the Croix de Guerre for exceptional bravery in defending the village of Courcelles-le-Comte during the First World War.
Rowling's sister Dianne was born at their home when Rowling was 23 months old. The family moved to the nearby village Winterbourne when Rowling was four. She attended St Michael's Primary School, a school founded by abolitionist William Wilberforce and education reformer Hannah More. Her headmaster at St Michael's, Alfred Dunn, has been suggested as the inspiration for the Harry Potter headmaster Albus Dumbledore.
As a child, Rowling often wrote fantasy stories, which she would usually then read to her sister. She recalls that: "I can still remember me telling her a story in which she fell down a rabbit hole and was fed strawberries by the rabbit family inside it. Certainly the first story I ever wrote down (when I was five or six) was about a rabbit called Rabbit. He got the measles and was visited by his friends, including a giant bee called Miss Bee." At the age of nine, Rowling moved to Church Cottage in the Gloucestershire village of Tutshill, close to Chepstow, Wales. When she was a young teenager, her great aunt, who Rowling said "taught classics and approved of a thirst for knowledge, even of a questionable kind," gave her a very old copy of Jessica Mitford's autobiography, Hons and Rebels. Mitford became Rowling's heroine, and Rowling subsequently read all of her books.
Rowling has said of her teenage years, in an interview with The New Yorker, "I wasn’t particularly happy. I think it’s a dreadful time of life." She had a difficult homelife; her mother was ill and she had a difficult relationship with her father (she is no longer on speaking terms with him). She attended secondary school at Wyedean School and College, where her mother had worked as a technician in the science department. Rowling said of her adolescence, "Hermione [a bookish, know-it-all Harry Potter character] is loosely based on me. She's a caricature of me when I was eleven, which I'm not particularly proud of." Steve Eddy, who taught Rowling English when she first arrived, remembers her as "not exceptional" but "one of a group of girls who were bright, and quite good at English." Sean Harris, her best friend in the Upper Sixth owned a turquoise Ford Anglia, which she says inspired the one in her books.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
May 30, 2009
While the What's Your Story? collection is a great collection of stories, I doubt many people actually used the stories as postcards. I would imagine most bought their copies for the same reason I did--J.K. Rowling's little HP-Prequel-That-Isn't. While I enjoyed the stories, I have to say, my enjoyment was severely limited by some of the authors' atrocious handwriting (YES, JKR, I am looking at you!). If you're going to write a widely-hyped story, make it legible, won't you? I was highly surprised by some of the other stories. Rowling's was great, but so was say, Lauren Child's. I'm not familiar with any of her other work, but her mini "story" was adorable, and a postcard that one could easily see themselves sending. Most amazing of all, dare I say more amazing than Rowling's Marauderlicious tale, were the Waterstone's employee/customer submitted ones. While the others were good stories, these were the ones that really had me laughing and crying and rolling madly on the floor.
Rating: 4/5
Rating: 4/5
October 6, 2008
As most other people who bought this postcard book, I bought it simply because J.K. Rowling is in it. The two postcards that she wrote tells an episode in the life of young James Potter and Sirius Black from "the prequel I was not working on"! While it's too short to be anything amazing, it's such a sweet little treat for Harry Potter fans still craving for more, and it is for that reason alone that I'm giving this a three star.
The other stories are pretty good as well, assuming that you can squint through most of the authors' illegible handwriting. There are also some good short pieces from Waterstones booksellers and customers, definitely worthy of being published alongside the likes of JK Rowling, Neil Gaiman, Nick Hornby, and Margaret Atwood.
The other stories are pretty good as well, assuming that you can squint through most of the authors' illegible handwriting. There are also some good short pieces from Waterstones booksellers and customers, definitely worthy of being published alongside the likes of JK Rowling, Neil Gaiman, Nick Hornby, and Margaret Atwood.
April 24, 2017
This is the ultimate collectors‘ item, a set of limited edition postcards from Waterstones to raise money for Dyslexia Action. It’s given me an idea for a certain postcard poetry project…
April 3, 2011
I ordered this book from Waterstone's in England. It's a collection of extremely short stories & I bought it because J.K Rowling wrote a small piece on a young James Potter & young Sirius Black. Plus, all proceeds went to charity, the Dyslexia Act. I was pleasantly surprised to see other works from other favorite authors of mine like Nick Hornby & Neil Gaiman. My only gripe is that the writings are in postcard form & some are so hard to read, the penmanship was worse than a doctor's! Cute book though, cute idea, & great charity.
Read
August 8, 2011This is a good quick read. I managed to read this entire thing in a lunch time. I was slightly disappointed though as the stories are shown in the authors own hand which result in some being illegible and other very difficult to read. It may have been a better idea to show the stories in this original form but also show a typed version that is clearer to read and understand. However it was an enjoyable read and although I only bought it for the Rowling contribution, there were many interesting and witty stories which made this a great little book. Would recommend it as a quick, fun read.
December 5, 2017
I probably would have enjoyed this more if many of the authors had taken care to write legibly.
Want to read
June 23, 2023This book gives you a lot of oportunities to write and get you into the harry potter world
Read
June 12, 2014Well, I actually only read JK Rowling's story.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews