Omnivoracious

Win a Weekend with J.K. Rowling's "The Tales of Beedle the Bard"

Calling all Harry Potter fans!
Want to get your (gloved) hands on J.K. Rowling's The Tales of Beedle the Bard? Amazon.com wants to send you and a friend to London, England to spend a weekend with the rare and delightful book of fairy tales (security guards included, of course), handwritten and illustrated by J.K. Rowling herself. Open to muggles ages 13 and older in 24 countries, the Beedle the Bard Ballad Writing Contest challenges you to creatively answer one of the following three questions in 100 words or less:

• What songs do wizards use to celebrate birthdays?
• What sports do wizards play besides Quidditch?
• What have you learned from the Harry Potter series that you use in everyday life?

An Amazon.com committee will select 10 semi-finalist submissions (based on creativity and writing style) from each of two age categories: 13-17 and 18-and-over. Amazon.com customers will determine the two finalists and Grand Prize winner by voting for their favorites. But hurry--submissions will be accepted through 11:59 p.m. PDT April 22, 2008. 

If you haven’t already, take a look at The Tales of Beedle the Bard:

Five Tales, Seven Copies, One Book: J.K. Rowling's Tales of Beedle the Bard

As you may have heard, J.K. Rowling has created a new book of fairy tales, but unlike her last book, which has reached print runs in the tens of millions, this one has a very limited edition: seven. Handwritten and illustrated by Rowling herself and bound in morocco leather, silver ornaments, and semi-precious stones, The Tales of Beedle the Bard is a collection of five wizarding fairy tales. (The tales played a crucial role in the plot of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows after Dumbledore left them to Hermione Granger, but only one of them, "The Tale of the Three Brothers," was included in the story.) Of the seven copies, Rowling gave six to "those most intimately involved" with the Potter books (names as yet unknown), and the last was auctioned off this morning at Sotheby's in London, with proceeds going to The Children's Voice, an organization cofounded by Rowling that campaigns for children's rights.

The book, which according to the AP was expected to sell for around $100,000, ended up selling for 1.95 million pounds (or, given the state of the U.S. dollar these days, $3.98 million). The buyer was unknown at the time of purchase, but later today was revealed to be ... Amazon.com. So needless to say, you can now read more about the book on our site, including some lovely photographs, a few of which I've added below. And there's an already-busy discussion board, where we (and our customers) are answering as many questions as we can about the book. --Tom