Moz in our publishing relationship, you’re the cat, and we’re going to hug you so hard you go into a love coma. We’re serious.

Dear Morrissey (Moz),

Stop me if you’ve read this one before. But after the news broke that you had cancelled your book deal with Penguin, I wanted you to know Moz, there is a light that never goes out, and it goes by the name of The House of Melville. Come to Melville House Moz. Yes, many authors have thought it wise to publish with Penguin, some of them are even quite good, but heaven knows they’re miserable now.

This is the house that Melville built. And Fallada and Graeber, heck, even Joyce and Woolf, Hardy and Tolstoy. Flaubert and Proust will be on your side, Moz, while Wilde is on… well actually we don’t publish any Wilde, but what difference does it make? I know you wanted to go straight into Penguin Classic, because any memoir by you would of course be ‘a classic in the making’. Well you’re in luck. We do a classics line too! It would have to be a novella though. Is that OK? We can cut out some of the boring bits, go straight into the animal rights stuff.

We love whales.

Moz, I grew up on those Manchester streets, and I was a vegetarian too. I strongly believe you belong here at Melville House and I want to sew a whale tail into your spine. Or into your life. Or into the spine of your Life, yes, that’s it. Sorry, that joke isn’t funny anymore.

You’d fit with us like a hand in a glove, and if the people stare, then the people stare, but in a really good way. Moz, I know the luck you’ve had with publishers, so please please please let me help you get what you want this time.

Just sign with us, you handsome devil.

Best wishes,

Zeljka