Rowling Joanne. The Tales of Beedle the Bard (2008)

The book was originally produced in a limited edition of only seven copies, each handwritten and illustrated by J. K. Rowling. One of them was offered for auction in late 2007 and was expected to sell for £50,000 ($103,000); ultimately it was bought for £1.95 million ($3.98 million) by Amazon.com, making the selling price the highest achieved at auction for a modern literary manuscript. The money earned at the auction of the book was donated to The Children's Voice charity campaign.The book was published for the general public on 4 December 2008, with the proceeds going to the Children's High Level Group.The Tales of Beetle Bard, a Wizarding classic, first came to Muggie readers' attention in the book Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows. Now thanks to Hermoine Granger's new translation from the ancient runes, we present this stunning edition with an introduction, notes, and illustrations by J.K. Rowling, and extensive commentary by Albus Dumbledore. Never before have Muggies been privey to reach these richly imaginative tales: "The Wizard and the Hopping Pot, " "The Fountain of Fair Fortune, "The Warlock's Hairy Heart, " "Babbitry Rabbitry and her Cackling Stump, " and of course, "The Tale of the Three Brothers. " But not only are they the equal of Fairy Tales we know and love, reading them gives new insight into the world of Harry Potter.This purchase also represents another very important form of giving: for every sale of this book, Scholastic will give its net proceeds to the Children's High Level Group, a charity founded in 2005 by J.K. Rowling and Emma Nicholson MEP to make life better for vulnerable children. CHLP helps around a quarter of a million children each year through its education activities, outreach work in institutions, among other beneficial practices.