Loved by millions of readers worldwide, the first Harry Potter book is now an HBO Original Series exclusively on HBO Max. The magic starts here!

Harry Potter has never even heard of Hogwarts when the letters start dropping on the doormat at number four, Privet Drive. Addressed in green ink on yellowish parchment with a purple seal, they are swiftly confiscated by his grisly aunt and uncle. Then, on Harry's eleventh birthday, a great beetle-­eyed giant of a man called Rubeus Hagrid bursts in with some astonishing news: Harry Potter is a wizard, and he has a place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. An incredible journey is about to begin.

Hogwarts is an ancient, turreted castle filled with moving staircases, enchanted ceilings and silvery ghosts. Harry has joined an extraordinary world of Potions classes, Quidditch matches and friends who will stand, through everything, by his side. But when the first-year hears of a stone with great powers, he learns that his school has some dark secrets of its own …

Read the novel behind the HBO Original Series, and discover the story that inspired a global phenomenon.

About the Author

J.K. Rowling is the author of the enduringly popular Harry Potter books. After the idea for Harry Potter came to her on a delayed train journey in 1990, she plotted out and started writing the series of seven books and the first, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, was published in the UK in 1997.

The series took another ten years to complete, concluding in 2007 with the publication of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. The Harry Potter books have now sold over 600 million copies in 85 languages, been listened to as audiobooks for over one billion hours and made into eight smash hit movies.

To accompany the series, J.K. Rowling wrote three short companion volumes for charity: Quidditch Through the Ages, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and The Tales of Beedle the Bard, in aid of her international children’s foundation Lumos.

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them went on to inspire a new series of films featuring Magizoologist Newt Scamander. Harry’s story as a grown-up was continued in a stage play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, which J.K. Rowling wrote with playwright Jack Thorne and director John Tiffany, and which is now playing in locations around the world.

She is also the author of a bestselling crime fiction series written under the pen name Robert Galbraith, and two stand-alone children’s novels, The Ickabog and The Christmas Pig. J.K. Rowling has received many awards and honours for her writing, including the OBE and Companion of Honour, and a Blue Peter Gold Badge. She supports a wide number of humanitarian causes through her charitable trust Volant and is the founder of the international children’s care reform charity Lumos. To find out more about J.K. Rowling visit jkrowling.com.