J.K. Rowling

Joanne Rowling, born in 1965, came up with the idea for Harry Potter in 1990. The seven years before the first book appeared took in her mother's death, the birth of her first child, a divorce and a stretch of relative poverty. Bloomsbury published Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone in 1997, and its staff suggested she use initials, believing boys would be less likely to pick up a book by a woman. Scholastic bought the American rights and released it in September 1998 as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, a title Rowling proposed as a compromise. Six sequels followed, ending with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in 2007; the series has sold more than 600 million copies and been translated into 85 languages.

Her first novel for adults, The Casual Vacancy (2012), is a black comedy about a parish council election in a West Country town. In April 2013 Little, Brown published The Cuckoo's Calling as the debut of an unknown author named Robert Galbraith; sales climbed once Rowling was revealed as the writer. It opened the Cormoran Strike series, about a private detective who lost part of a leg serving in Afghanistan and Robin Ellacott, who starts as his temporary secretary and becomes his business partner. She has also written the children's books The Ickabog (2020) and The Christmas Pig (2021).

Start with Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and read the seven books in order. BookList4u's Harry Potter list follows publication order, which is also story order, and the plot carries from book to book as Harry, Ron and Hermione move through Hogwarts. Skipping ahead to a film-famous later volume costs you the setup the last books pay off.

For Rowling's adult fiction, go to the Cormoran Strike novels before The Casual Vacancy if you want a continuing series, and begin with The Cuckoo's Calling (2013). Each book has a self-contained case, but Strike and Robin's working partnership develops across the series, so read them in order.