LONDON, July 20: Excitement mounted among Harry Potter fans worldwide on Friday as the clock ticked down to the release of the last instalment of his adventures, though a tide of leaks threatened to spoil the event.

Queues built up outside bookstores, bracing for a record demand for the seventh and final adventure called “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”.

Even author J. K. Rowling joined in the buzz, telling fans that the final Potter tome was her favourite as aficionados faced a nail-biting wait to find out whether the hero and his chums survive.

“Within hours, you will know what happens to Harry, Ron, Hermione and the rest in their final adventure,” Rowling wrote on her website.

“All the secrets I have been carrying around for so long will be yours, too, and those who guessed correctly will be vindicated, and those who guessed wrongly will not, I hope, be too disappointed!

“As for me, I feel a heady mixture of excitement, nerves and relief.

“‘Deathly Hallows’ remains my favourite of the series, even after several re-reads; I cannot wait to share it with the readers who have stuck with me through six previous books.”

The excitement surrounding the launch triggered a last-minute price-war as booksellers sought to get a bigger slice of the massive market for the book which will finally reveal whether or not Potter dies.

The book's initial release time is a minute past midnight in Britain, the home of boy wizard Potter and the setting for his adventures.

In Asia, all-night parties and Hogwarts Express-style train trips were among the hundreds of events planned.

In Muslim Bangladesh, where Friday is a holiday, customs offices stayed open specially to ensure fans got their books on time, while in Thailand the British ambassador was planning an early start to hand over the first copy.

In Malaysia there was also a price-war, leading four major bookstores to boycott its sale. In Britain the lowest price was 4.99 pounds (around 10 dollars), after Morrisons supermarket trumped rival ASDA's five pounds offer by one penny.

Publisher Bloomsbury's recommended retail price in comparison was 17.99 pounds.

Despite anticipated high sales, the worldwide release was marred for some by plot leaks, despite the months of tight security surrounding the book.

A US distributor and a retailer sent hundreds of copies to readers in advance of the release — which in the United States, Canada and Mexico is later than the rest of the world, at midnight local time.

A New York Times review, written from a copy bought in the city on Thursday, revealed that at least six characters die in the book, although it did not say which ones, amid fevered speculation that Potter himself could be among them.

The review describes the final pages of the book as “a big-screen, heart-racing, bone-chilling confrontation” and says it contains “an epilogue that clearly lays out people's fates”.

Leaks appeared in a number of other countries on Friday, with papers in France, Italy, Austria and the Czech Republic revealing the fate of key characters by printing a summary of the epilogue -- some of them upside-down so that unwary readers could avoid the spoiler.

The six Potter books so far released have sold 325 million copies internationally and have been translated into 64 languages, though the final tome is set to out-sell each of its predecessors.

Rowling is hosting a reading and signing with fans at London’s Natural History Museum in west London overnight on Friday, while hundreds of British bookshops are hosting after-hours parties to which fans are likely to flock.

British charity ChildLine said it was bracing for a surge in calls from distraught children after the final book is released, warning that the expected death of a key character would spark feelings of loss and bereavement.—AFP