Holy Master Moley! It's the new blockbuster cartoon starring everyone from Charles Dance to Julie Walters... and it's set to give Peppa Pig a run for her money. But as JANE FRYER discovers, nothing can beat the heart-warming story behind it

Here is a story about love, despair, redemption, recovery, a small velvety mole with a penchant for juicy invertebrates, and an astonishing global TV deal that is set to lift spirits, make us laugh and probably break an awful lot of records.

It starts in 1997 and involves a chap called James Reatchlous, who was struggling after a difficult divorce and years of overdoing things, and his young daughters, Hettie and Tattie — who came to stay with him each week — and a lovable, optimistic, and bumbling — if rather impatient — mole.

Called Master Moley, he lives in a burrow under Windsor Castle, loves magic, inventing, eating worms and — just like James — is a stickler for punctuality.

Moley is not, of course, real. He was the central character in a series of bedtime stories that James dreamed up in a desperate bid to make his girls laugh and, at the same time, cheer himself up as he tucked them into bed.

Those stories are now set to appear around the world in animated form, with an all-star cast of voice-over artists, including Gemma Arterton, Warwick Davis, Stanley Tucci, Julie Walters, Charles Dance and Richard E. Grant.

Master Moley is a story about love, despair, redemption, recovery, a small velvety mole with a penchant for juicy invertebrates

James Reatchious, with his two daughters, L-R: Tatty, pictured aged three and Hetty pictured aged five (date of photo 1995) who has created a television series of the adventures of Master Moley, from stories he used to make up for his two daughters when they were little

Some nights, Moley's misadventures would see him popping out from under the Taj Mahal. Other times, he'd be roaming the White House or conquering the Great Wall of China.

'It was a way of taking them around the world, of teaching them, and all made up on the hoof,' says James. 'It became a ritual.'

All of which, of course, is very touching, but hardly remarkable. Lots of parents make up stories for their children.

But very few then take the trouble to head downstairs afterwards, write them up every evening in their daily journal and file them on a shelf where they are forgotten for nearly two decades.

Until four years ago, when James, now 71, was diagnosed with cancer — a grade four lymphoma — and was hovering between life and death at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in London.

'It was a terrible time, just awful,' he says. 'I was on my death bed — out of it, flat on my back, totally white. Doing loads of chemotherapy, but told I might not make it.'

It starts in 1997 and involves a chap called James Reatchlous, who was struggling after a difficult divorce and years of overdoing things, and his young daughters, Hettie and Tattie — who came to stay with him each week — and a lovable, optimistic, and bumbling — if rather impatient — mole

And then, on one of their many visits, his girls — now in their 20s — arrived clutching his old journals.

Suddenly it all came flooding back. 'I remember what happy times we'd had. We started reading them together again. It was very, very emotional.'

Within three weeks, he insists, he was 'full of the joys of spring' and convinced, not only that good old Master Moley had saved his life, but that his furry friend and his mystical manual of magic might help other people, too.

'I wanted children all around the world to meet Moley,' he says.

But not, to be fair, in a modest book. Oh no! James's ambitions for Moley and friends were far more ambitious.

'I wanted worldwide coverage. I was thinking big. Global! Because I knew the joy he could bring.'

Called Master Moley, he lives in a burrow under Windsor Castle, loves magic, inventing, eating worms and — just like James — is a stickler for punctuality

Which, to some, could have sounded a teeny bit like the mad ramblings of a very unwell man.

But a month later, he found himself sitting on a park bench in the Chelsea Physic Garden, writing a business plan to turn Master Moley into a global TV sensation.

'I was knackered, I was white as a sheet, I had no hair and I was in a terrible place financially, but I knew I was onto something.'

That was just four years ago. This summer Warner Bros' Boomerang cartoon channel snapped up both a 30-minute Christmas Special set in Buckingham Palace and a 52-episode series. And Saturday marked the launch of Moley's Misadventures in 119 countries.

(To put events into context, Peppa Pig — which was recently sold to Hasbro for £3.3 billion — took nine years to gain traction.) 'I still have to pinch myself. I can't believe it. I feel like I'm living in a dream,' says James.

Creative writing was never really on his trajectory. Even as a child — growing up first in India, where his father was an architect and civil engineer, and then Kent — he was not a great reader. He dabbled in Enid Blyton, Beatrix Potter and Lewis Carroll, but particularly loved his mother's bedtime stories.

'The mother in the stories, played by Julie Walters, is based on my mum — who was a really, really lovely woman.'

Those stories are now set to appear around the world in animated form, with an all-star cast of voice-over artists, including Gemma Arterton, Warwick Davis, Stanley Tucci, Julie Walters, Charles Dance and Richard E. Grant

Meanwhile, Charles Dance's character, he says, is more like his father — who was often 'exasperated and critical'.

Both parents were strongly opposed to James's dreams of going to RADA — 'such a risky profession!'

So he went to business college and then into advertising and marketing — for Pepsi Cola in North America. Eventually, he struck out on his own as an entrepreneur.

'Which meant there were some highs, but a lot of very low lows, too,' he says.

He had hit rock bottom at the time of his diagnosis.

But with Moley, things suddenly fell into place.

Within a month of finishing the business plan he'd raised £150,000 from pals. And not just any old pals. People like ex-M&S chairman Stuart Rose, the former Olympic rower James Cracknell and the late adman Lord Bell, who were all initially a bit bewildered to be asked to fund a project about a mole, but were soon charmed.

The TV special Master Moley By Royal Invitation is available to stream on BT Player and Sky Go

With the resulting capital, he set up a Master Moley Ltd, issued shares and hired illustrators.

It took thousands upon thousands of attempts to arrive at a version of Master Moley that satisfied James, Hettie and Tattie.

'That's not how we really imagined him, Dad', they'd say, but it had to be the Moley that was in our minds.'

After that, and thanks to another £5.55 million investment — again mostly from old friends — they managed to attract expert Hollywood talent, including Bonnie Arnold, the executive producer from Toy Story and the How To Train Your Dragon series and a stupendous cast.

The global nature of Master Moley's adventures means he will appeal all around the world (with the possible exception of Ireland which, in real life, is completely mole-free). And, naturally, among the furry characters are vegan moles, moles wearing Gay Pride rainbow badges, and moles of every nationality and religion, all of whom are obsessive recyclers. A video game and soft toys are also in production, with the aim of creating a 'long-term brand' aimed at children aged four to eight.

But James insists: 'It wasn't made up for money, it was made up for love. For teaching and coaching my children how to be kind, truthful, moral and punctual, without being boring or preachy.'

Even so, it seems highly likely to make him a very rich man. (Or perhaps not him — he is currently in remission, but has put the company shares in his daughters' names 'because you never know'.)

'I've been given a second chance in life,' he says. 'I was a dead man. Then the old journals arrived, everything changed and now I feel like the luckiest man in the world.'