Nine-year-old Miranda may look like a normal everyday girl but she is actually one of the 30 greatest wizard minds in the country! She beat 1,200 children from across the UK to win a truly wizard prize after entering a Harry Potter Wizard Quest competition at Ottakar's bookshop in Cheltenham. After answering five qualifying questions about JK Rowling's books and other magical things correctly, the county schoolgirl beat 14 other wannabe wizards in the the local heat of the Wizard Quest. Miranda said: "Some of the questions were quite hard to work out but once you worked out what to do the answers were easy." Then she won through to the final 30 in the national competition with her answer to the question: "What would you ask JK Rowling if you met her?" Miranda said: "I asked did you base Hogwarts on any castle you've seen and did you base any characters on anyone you know?"  | | The prize is a day at Alnwick Castle - Hogwarts in two Harry Potter films |
On Friday, the day before the launch of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the fifth book in the Harry Potter series, Miranda and her mother Victoria will travel to the magical medieval surroundings of a Alnwick Castle in Northumberland for the Grand Wizard Quest Final. After a tour of the castle - which became Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets - the finalists will take The Wizard Quest Challenge, a 30-minute exam followed by secret interactive tasks. The four ultimate winners will get tickets to a world-exclusive Harry Potter event at The Royal Albert Hall on June 26 - JK Rowling's only public appearance in support of the launch of the book. The Albert Hall event features a live audience with the creator of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, in conversation with Stephen Fry, narrator of the Harry Potter UK audiobooks. Miranda's mum Victoria said: "She reads a lot and it is a fantastic reward for a child who reads a lot. "So often children's competitions don't have great prizes - but this has just got the most amazing prize before you've even won it. Miranda is only in the final round." Whether or not she wins the final on Friday, Miranda and all her fellow examinees will tuck into a wizard feast of Headless Nick's Cheesy Chips, Malfoy's BBQ sausages and Ron's Runny Pasta, followed by Moaning Myrtle's Jittering Jelly, all washed down by flagons of Polyjuice Potion. After that the wizards will be entertained until the stroke of midnight, when they will all be presented with a copy of the fifth Harry Potter novel, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. >>Find out more about fun in county bookstores to mark the book launch this weekend and Gloucestershire's Harry Potter connections | 
