Rowling donates 25 million pounds to help children

“Harry Potter” author JK Rowling has donated almost 25 million pounds ($40 million) of her fortune to help orphans and troubled children across Eastern Europe.

According to British media on Sunday, 18.9 million pounds from the sale of Potter spin-off book “The Tales of Beedle the Bard” went to the writer’s Lumos charity.

Unnamed private donors, believed to be Rowling, have given another 5.4 million pounds to the charity, which works to end the suffering of kids in institutions. According to the return filed last month to charity commissioners, the donations were “from a high-net-worth individual.”

Next month, the multimillionaire’s “Lumos Maxima” bracelet with gold and diamond charms is expected to raise another 20,000 pounds at auction at Sotheby’s in London.

Rowling, a 48-year-old mother of three, founded the charity in 2005.

Donations to Lumos have helped more than 7,000 children across the poorest parts of Eastern Europe. Lumos works in the Ukraine, Bulgaria, Montenegro, the Czech Republic, Serbia and Moldova, returning disable children in institutions to their families.

By Chun Sung-woo (swchun@heraldcorp.com)