J.K. Rowling
Joanne Rowling stood on the cobbled street of Rua Duque de Saldanha, desperately gasping for breath. It was 5am in a dingy quarter of Porto, Portugal, and the 28-year-old was alone in a foreign city, kicked out of home after a heated row with her husband. Her four-month-old baby was sleeping inside with the man she feared, and all she had were the clothes on her back and a few of her nearest possessions – including the first three chapters of a story she’d been writing, scribbled on note paper and stored in a shoebox.
In that moment, as first light hit the hand-painted Portuguese tiles, she wouldn’t dare to dream that the box of notes would one day change her fate. That her story about a boy wizard, Harry Potter, would become the highest-selling book series in history; and that somewhere in the world, someone would start reading a copy every 30 seconds. The introverted redhead would be named the world’s first self-made billionaire author and add Hollywood films, musicals, theme parks and other spin-offs
