Hillary Clinton today dismissed as a "work of fiction" a salacious new biography that her opponents claim could derail her putative 2008 presidential campaign.

The book, by the respected journalist and writer Edward Klein, claims to be a definitive study of the the high-flying senator, whom the author describes as "probably the most fascinating person in America, if not the world."

Mrs Clinton's Democratic supporters, however, today wrote off The Truth About Hillary: What She Knew, When She Knew It, and How Far She'll Go to Become President, as 305 pages of unsubstantiated gossip and recycled rumour by a man who writes "trash for cash".

The book, which has 30 pages of footnotes, paints Mrs Clinton as a ruthless politician who would stop at nothing to protect her husband's presidency and her future ambitions for the White House.

The work includes veiled allusions to her sexuality, studies of the Whitewater and Lewinsky affairs, and an unsubstantiated allegation that Chelsea Clinton is the product of marital rape.

In the book Bill Clinton is quoted as telling a friend, during a Bermuda getaway in 1979: "I'm going back to my cottage to rape my wife." An anonymous source says that in the morning, the couple's room: "looked like World War III...pillows and busted-up furniture all over the place".

The source then claims that Mr Clinton only learned his wife was pregnant reading about it in a newspaper.

Klein compares Mrs Clinton to President Nixon, constantly re-inventing herself, adding: "Whereas Nixon sought power in large part to overcome his low self-esteem, Hillary seeks power because she has unrealistically high self-esteem."

The biography's advertising blurb trumpets "shocking new accounts" of her private and political life giving readers a "rare opportunity to assess the true character behind the public mask."

Even her most vocal critics, however, today gave warning that the book - published by an imprint of Penguin dedicated to conservative books - may backfire and help to reinforce the former First Lady's image as a victim of political jealousy and marital infidelity.

Philippe Reines, a spokesman for the Senator, said simply: "We don't comment on works of fiction, let alone a book full of blatant and vicious fabrications contrived by someone who writes trash for cash.''

However, Dick Morris, a one-time adviser to the Clintons, wrote in his column in the New York Post today that new charges about Bill Clinton's ongoing infidelity threaten to compromise the new image of their rehabilitated marriage.

He wrote: "With its revelations of Bill’s current philandering [the book] puts Hillary in a tough spot. If she pretends not to notice, she looks like a fool at best and a conniving politician who values power more than having a good marriage at worst. But if she moves away from Bill in public she loses the stardust he sprinkles on her."

Roland Watson, The Times's Washington correspondent, said: "It doesn't help Hillary at all and it's certainly a foretaste of what will come: this is the 2008 Presidential campaign almost beginning and we're getting an idea of the mud that's going to fly.

"The question of whether any of the mud will stick... only time will tell."

Klein, whose credentials include senior editorial positions at Newsweek, Vanity Fair and The New York Times during a 50-year career in journalism, said that he had interviewed more than 100 sources including schoolfriends, White House staff, speechwriters, senators and Cabinet officials.

He said: "I did not set out to scuttle Hillary's chances of becoming president. I scrupulously checked all my sources for fairness and accuracy. I have never had an ideological axe to grind. I’m a registered independent — a reporter who goes where the truth leads me. And I intend to stay that way and let the chips fall where they may."

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