New ebooks mark return of 'Harry Potter' world

J.K. Rowling has claimed in recent interviews that she is done with the "Harry Potter" story - but it looks as if the bestselling author has found a loophole.

Pottermore, the digital publishing site founded by Rowling, announced Wednesday that she had completed a series of short ebooks with new stories about some of her characters from the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Stories will focus on secondary characters like potions master Horace Slughorn, Hogwarts headmistress Professor Minerva McGonagall and Ministry of Magic bureaucrat Dolores Umbridge.

"J.K. Rowling's writing in these collections reveals intricate details of her characters' lives, their histories, as well as her inspiration," said Pottermore chief executive Susan Jurevics.

The upcoming works, each around 10,000 words long, will include "Power, Politics and Pesky Poltergeists," ''Short Stories from Hogwarts" and "Hogwarts: An Incomplete and Unreliable Guide." They will be available for purchase from September 6.

Busy year for Rowling

The release of the ebooks comes after the successful premiere last month of the London stage play "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child," which features a continuation of the boy wizard's story 19 years after the events of the last book.

Tickets for the show have been hard to come by, with the play sold out through December 2017. The play's script, released in book form on July 31, has achieved record sales in the US and UK.

A further spinoff of the Potter universe, the prequel film "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them," is set for worldwide release in November.

cmk/kbm (AP, Reuters)