LOS ANGELES: A Californian woman who gave birth to octuplets has been showered with book and TV offers, the woman's newly-hired publicist said.

The mother, Nadya Suleman, wants to tell her story and is weighing up the offers, said publicist Joann Killeen.

Reports that the babies were conceived through in vitro fertilisation has sparked a debate over the ethics of such treatments.

News that Suleman already has six children has sparked further criticism.

The eight babies were delivered nine weeks early by caesarean section in a hospital near Los Angeles on 26 January.

The facility, the Kaiser Permanente Medical Centre in Bellflower, California, has said it was not involved in the octuplets' conception.

Killeen said she was contacted by Suleman to represent her and that hundreds of offers had been received. Many were for interviews but some have been to host TV shows or be a baby expert.

"She's the most sought-after mom in the world right now".

Killeen said they were looking at all the opportunities, but that Suleman was still in hospital recovering from the births and wanted to focus on her children.

"Suleman, 33, does want to tell her story at some point, however.

"She's looking forward to telling the story and setting the record straight," she added.

But Killeen later told NBC's Today show that financial gain "was not her intention" and that her client "always wanted to be a mom."

Suleman has not yet commented on how the octuplets were conceived or which clinic was used.

Her mother said "she is obsessed with children" and underwent in vitro fertilisation to have "just one more girl".

The births have touched off a debate over the ethics of using fertility treatments to have that number of children.

Doctors usually use from two to four embryos in fertility treatments, not as many as eight.

Doctors at Kaiser say Ms Suleman's eight babies are so far making good progress.

They are the second set of octuplets born in the US, and now they are the longest surviving.

The last octuplets known to have survived birth in the US were born in Houston in 1998. One of the babies died one week later.

Although Suleman may have been showered with offers for her story, it is not known whether she has been approached by corporate sponsors, as happened with some other multiple-birth cases in the US.

The parents of the McCaughey septuplets born in Iowa in 1997 were given a large house, a big van, baby food and a lifetime supply of nappies.