Today JK Rowling embarks on an exciting new career as a proper serious grown up writer with the release of The Casual Vacancy.
Details of the book - reviewed across the land today - were kept a closely-guarded secret for months, and the notoriously reclusive author only gave a tiny handful of interviews.
All of which adds to the sense that, for all millions of us know and love her words, we don't know an awful lot about her.
To go a small way to addressing this problem, we present you with ten little-known facts about Rowling that might just surprise you...