New J.K. Rowling Pottermore Series Takes Fans Through America's Magic History

This year, Oscar-winning actor Eddie Redmayne will star in the first Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them planned movie trilogy, a spinoff to J.K. Rowling's world of Harry Potter, and for this, the author is trying to build some background for fans months ahead. In a new series on Pottermore, Rowling will at least partly explain America's magic history -- including the Salem witch hunts!

This Monday morning a new press release came out of Pottermore, a website developed by Rowling and Sony and dedicated to giving new details on the Harry Potter world. On it, it was announced that four new pieces written by the author will be released in the following days, giving fans a glimpse into U.S. magical history.

Starting next Tuesday, the small new fantasy history anthology, History of Magic in North America, will be released through the website; the other three will follow from Wednesday through Friday.

According to Entertainment Weekly, the new short story series will cover a wide variety of subjects in the continent's history, but there are at least four core ones: the history of North America's main wizarding school, Ilvermorny; the Native American legend of the skin-walkers; the Salem witch trials ("a formative event for the country's magical identity," the outlet quotes) and the U.S. magical government, in the form of the Magical Congress of the United States of America.

While Rowling often posts new information about the Potterverse and even updates regarding some of the franchise's most iconic characters, in 2016 fans can probably expect a lot of further information because of Fantastic Beasts, and perhaps also for Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, the first story set in the present day since the book series ended.

Last January, Rowling revealed there were at least four other major wizarding schools besides Hogwarts, Durmstrang and Beauxbatons, spread across the rest of the continents.