Harry Potter comes early to Cary

Kevin Jones has read all of the Harry Potter books, but he isn't fanatical enough to wait in line at 12:01 a.m. Saturday for the release of the seventh and final book in the J.K. Rowling series.

Then again, he doesn't have to. He already has it.

Jones' $18 copy of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" was delivered to his Cary doorstep Tuesday -- days before it was supposed to be released -- by an online company that now faces a lawsuit by the book's U.S. publisher.

"I didn't expect to get it before the people who are waiting in line at midnight," said Jones, 50.

He didn't think much of the book's arrival until the online bookseller DeepDiscount.com called his home Wednesday.

"They asked me not to share the book with anybody," said Jones, who works for Quintiles Transnational, a pharmaceutical services company, in Durham. "They said they would be sending a gift certificate for being a good customer and not divulging the book to anybody else."

Scholastic Inc., the U.S. publisher, has sued the online retailer and distributor Levy Home Entertainment, accusing them of "complete and flagrant violations" of agreements regarding the release.

According to a Scholastic news release, "around one one-hundredth of one percent of the total U.S. copies" going on sale early Saturday morning were shipped prematurely. With an announced first printing of 12 million, that would mean about 1,200 copies.

"We are also making a direct appeal to the Harry Potter fans who bought their books from DeepDiscount.com and may receive copies early requesting that they keep the packages hidden until midnight on July 21st," the Scholastic news release states.

The tightly guarded secrets in the 784-page tome are safe with Jones -- he had not started reading it yet.

"We're trying to decide who'll read it first," Jones said of himself and his wife, Charlene.