J.K. Rowling Wrote a Powerful Letter to a Fan She Met on Twitter

J.K. Rowling is nothing if not devoted to her fans. 

The Harry Potter author is responsible for Pottermore, an online community for Potterheads, and she keeps up an active online presence partly dedicated to preserving the legacy of the Harry Potter universe.

Occasionally, however, she'll go well beyond the call of duty for an author, like when she wrote a letter to Cassidy Stay, a teenager who lost her entire family in a mass shooting in Texas, or when she revealed top-secret plot details and dedicated a character to a little girl who had leukemia.

A recent letter Rowling sent to Twitter user @Johnnie_Rowling, real name Johnnie Blue, is the latest example of these heartfelt communications.

BuzzFeed, which first wrote about the letter, reports that Blue reached out to Rowling last June on Twitter, nudging her toward noticing him. 

She eventually did, however, and tweeted "OK, but only because of the Dobby eyes" in response. 

That July, Blue met Rowling at a book signing, and the author remembered her one-time Twitter pen-pal. "I [told her], 'I was the Dobby eyes boy you replied to on Twitter, do you remember me?'" Blue told BuzzFeed. "And she shouted, 'Ahh, it's you! Of course I remember you!'"

He also gave her a note explaining how much she had changed his life. "I told Jo, 'Thank you so much, you've really changed my life," he said, according to BuzzFeed. 

A few months later, he received a letter signed by Rowling — complete with purple tissue paper and a Chamber of Secrets stamp — touching on everything from handwriting to bullying to the Sorting Hat:

Here's the text, courtesy of BuzzFeed: 

Dear Johnny,

Blue was, unsurprisingly, touched. "J.K. Rowling, to me, is a hero," he told BuzzFeed. "She's saved so many [peoples'] lives, along with mine, something I will be eternally grateful for."

One can only hope that Rowling continues in this vein. It's a delightful reminder that some people, no matter how wealthy and famous they become, genuinely do care about others — even if it's just somebody on Twitter.

h/t BuzzFeed