AMONG the great literary figures of our time, few have made as much money as fast as Dewey, the Iowa library cat. To the astonishment of the US literary fraternity, a New York publisher has paid $1.25m for a book about the life of a fluffy orange cat who lived for 19 years in a library.

The happy recipient of what is believed to be a record advance for a book about a pet is Vicki Myron, the librarian who looked after Dewey in Spencer, Iowa.

Publishing executives calculate that the book will need to sell at least 250,000 hardback copies to cover the cost of the advance, but editors at Grand Central Publishing are convinced that Dewey will become a runaway bestseller. “You can’t underestimate the market out there for people who love animals,” said Karen Kosztolnyik, who will edit the book.

America’s appetite for cute pet stories was confirmed by the success last year of Marley & Me, about the so-called “worst dog in the world”. Despite groans from critics about its extravagant soppiness, it has so far sold almost 2m copies in hardback.

The Dewey deal was all the more remarkable because the book has not been written yet. Myron earned her advance on the basis of a 45-page proposal that included 10 photographs of Dewey lounging around the library. Grand Central has commissioned a ghostwriter to do the actual writing.

The cat was adopted by staff at the Spencer library after he was found as a kitten shivering in a bin of returned books in January 1988. The city council approved a decision to allow the cat to remain at the library. He was named after the Dewey decimal system used to catalogue books and lived at the library until his death last November.

The only question is how Dewey’s seemingly uneventful daily routine can be spun into a full-length book. According to Dewey’s home page on the Spencer library’s website, his activities involved “reducing stress” and “generally being cute”.

A hint of Myron’s million-dollar literary style may be evident in an “article” that Dewey is said to have written with the librarian’s help. It is called “Basic rules for cats who have a library to run”. One section reads: “Wait until 10 minutes before closing time to get up from your nap. Just as the staff is getting ready to turn out the lights and close the door, do all your cutest tricks.”

Myron insisted last week that Dewey’s life was “amazing all the way through”. It may not sound the stuff of literary brilliance, but Dewey’s editors are convinced readers will lap it up.

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