Spoilers?

The publishing world is in a bit of an uproar just hours before the latest Harry Potter novel is at last made available to millions of fans around the world. It seems that the venerable New York Times and the Baltimore Sun have already published reviews of the book. Horror of horrors!

Author J.K. Rowling said she was "staggered" that papers including The New York Times had printed reviews ahead of the novel's publication on 21 July. The author said the information was in "complete disregard of the wishes of literally millions of readers".

So, how did the strictly guarded story leak out? Well, as it turns out, the book's American publisher, Scholastic, has now sued online retailer DeepDiscount.com for breaking the strict embargo by dispatching a number of copies. The novel has also appeared on auction site eBay, while pictures of what appeared to be pages from the new book have appeared on the internet.

Isn't it amazing? Who'd have ever that that leaks of a children's book would make international news?