Cat Person short story writer inundated with publishing offers

A UK publisher has scooped the Kristen Roupenian's debut novel

(Getty Images/iStockphoto)

Kristen Roupenian set the Internet alight last week after the New Yorker published her short story ‘Cat Person’ about a turbulent brief sexual relationship between two characters.

Since then, UK publisher Jonathan Cape has already scooped up the author’s debut novel, a collection of short stories titled You Know You Want This, for a ‘high five-figure sum’.

Roupenian has reportedly been inundated with offers from US publishers, eleven bidders have driven the price tag over the $1m (£748,000) mark.

Speaking to The Guardian, Michal Shavit at Jonathan Cape said: “I was submitted the collection on Tuesday. By Wednesday, I had bought the book. She’s the real deal.

“Cat Person captured the public imagination to become a phenomenon. You see that so rarely in literary fiction.”

According to Shavit, the collection of short stories are “treading boundaries”, each one being very different from the last: “They’re occupying a similar space in the imagination, but they’re not all about the relationships between men and women… I genuinely think she’s a brilliant writer.”

‘Cat Person’ was Roupenian’s first piece for the New Yorker and has quickly become the magazine’s most-read short story of the year.