Brother Cream's 'Cream Chicken Soup' a bestseller at Book Fair

Hundreds of readers lined up at the Hong Kong Book Fair yesterday to grab a "paw-tograph" from the most famous cat in town.

Brother Cream attended a book-signing event for his second photo book Cream Chicken Soup, which has become one of the fair's bestsellers, with more than 5,000 copies walking out the door, according to its publisher.

"The book's first edition sold out in just a few days. We're selling the second edition now," said Carol Lam Ming-lai, assistant sales and marketing manager of Kam Pui Enterprises, whose subsidiary Ichiban Publishing released the book about the eight-year-old cream and ginger British Shorthair.

Unlike the photo albums published by scantily-clad female pseudo-models or muscle-flexing male pop stars, Lam said Brother Cream's photo books seemed to be to everyone's taste and attracted a huge group of fans of different ages.

Many people brought copies of the book for the cat to "sign" using paw prints scanned and made into stamps.

"We hope publishing Brother Cream's second book will relieve readers from some of the city's negative energy and help stressed Hongkongers relax when they read it," Lam said. She added the idea for the book's title came from the Chicken Soup for the Soul series of books, which feature collections of short inspirational and motivational stories and essays.