J.K. Rowling’s New Children’s Book ‘The Ickabog’ To Be Released For Free Online
J.K. Rowlinghas already been lettingHarry Potterfans live out their Hogwarts dreams from home with herHarry Potter at Homeseries, which gave young readers and teachers an online hub to enjoy and share their favorite Wizarding World books and content. Now the author is bringing a new children’s book to young readers starving for something to do while stuck at home. Rowling is releasing her children’s book, a non-Harry Potterfairy tale calledThe Ickabog,online for free for coronavirus relief causes, posting new chapters each weekday through July 10. The complete story will be published in book form, and in e-book form, in November.
Rowling has published a few successful books unrelated to theHarry Potterseries, but children’s fairy tales seem to be her strength. The author is giving young fans a new fantasy story withThe Ickabog, a standalone fairy tale that will be released in chapters online for free, in “so children on lockdown, or even those back at school during these strange, unsettling times, can read it or have it read to them,” Rowling wrote onTwitter, announcing the online release. Rowling also said she will donate royalties from the book project to COVID-19 relief causes.
Rowling is offering the chapters as a source of comfort for children stuck in quarantine and as more content for readers who have maybe burned through all sevenHarry Potterbooks already.The Ickabogwill be Rowling’s first children’s book sinceHarry Potter and the Deathly Hallowswas published in 2007, but the idea came to her soon after she finished thePotterseries. “Until very recently, the only people who’d heard the story of The Ickabog were my two younger children,” Rowling wrote, saying she kept the story close to her heart and didn’t revisit it until the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic hit and she began to rewrite it.
“The Ickabogis a story about truth and the abuse of power,” Rowling wrote. “To forestall one obvious question: The idea came to me well over a decade ago, so it isn’t intended to be read as a response to anything that’s happening in the world right now. The themes are timeless and could apply to any era or any country.”
Rowling also invited children to submit illustrations for the book, which will be published in full in November. The winners of the contest for the “best illustrations in each global territory” will be included in the books in each publishing territory, Rowling wrote.
The best pictures in each publishing territory will be included in the books we intend to publish in November 2020.
As individual publishers will know best which illustrations work in their editions, I won’t be personally judging this competition.
However…
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling)July 04, 2025
