J.K. Rowling is publishing a new story called "The Ickabog," which will be free to read online to help entertain children and families stuck at home.
The "Harry Potter" author said Tuesday she wrote the fairy tale for her children as a bedtime story more than a decade ago. Set in an imaginary land, it is a stand-alone story "about truth and the abuse of power" for children from 7 to 9 and is unrelated to Rowling's other books.
Rowling said the story draft had stayed in her attic while she focused on writing books for adults. She said her children, now teenagers, were "touchingly enthusiastic" when she recently suggested retrieving the story and publishing it for free.
"For the last few weeks I've been immersed in a fictional world I thought I'd never enter again. As I worked to finish the book, I started reading chapters nightly to the family again," she said. "'The Ickabog's first two readers told me what they remember from when they were tiny, and demanded the reinstatement of bits they'd particularly liked (I obeyed)."
The first two chapters were posted online Tuesday, with daily installments to follow until July 10.
The book will be published in print later this year, and Rowling said she will pledge royalties from its sales to projects helping those particularly affected by the pandemic.
Jazz drummer Jimmy Cobb dies
Jimmy Cobb, a percussionist and the last surviving member of Miles Davis' 1959 "Kind of Blue" groundbreaking jazz album, which transformed the genre and sparked several careers, died Sunday of lung cancer at his New York home. He was 91. Born in Washington, D.C., Cobb told the Associated Press in 2019 that he listened to jazz albums and stayed up late to hear disc jockey Symphony Sid playing jazz in New York City before launching his professional career. He said it was saxophonist Cannonball Adderley who recommended him to Davis, and he ended up playing on several Davis recordings. But Cobb's role as a drummer on the "Kind of Blue" jam session headed by Davis would forever change his career. That album also featured Adderley and John Coltrane. The album, released on Aug. 17, 1959, captured a moment when jazz was transforming from bebop to something less structured. Davis died in 1991.
new date: The Doobie Brothers are rescheduling their 50th anniversary tour because of the pandemic. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame nominees announced Tuesday that the tour, which was to begin in June, will now kick off in July 2021. The Doobie Brothers are joining with singer and songwriter Michael McDonald, who sang with the band starting in 1975.
