Niema Ash is to risk imprisonment by publishing a new version of her "kiss and tell" book about Canadian singer-songwriter Loreena McKennitt, which prompted a landmark privacy case, MediaGuardian.co.uk can reveal.

Ms Ash could go to jail if publication breaches a court injunction banning her original book.

Last week the House of Lords refused Ms Ash's last-ditch request to appeal a decision that halted the publication of her unauthorised self-published book called Travels with Loreena McKennitt: My Life as a Friend.

The House of Lords' judgment in the landmark privacy case, which has implications for "kiss and tell" stories common in gossip and tabloid magazines, upheld McKennitt's right to "the human dignity of privacy".

Ms Ash said she was republishing the book in accordance with the court judgment that banned tracts invading McKennitt's privacy - and would include a new chapter about the trial process.

"I have republished the book, it will be out by the end of the week," said Ms Ash in an email to MediaGuardian.co.uk. "I have tried to comply with the judgment but in some cases it is unclear and ambiguous and I can only hope I have succeeded.

"McKennitt's solicitors have informed me that if I am in breach of the judgment, the penalty is prison.

"I have also added some new material and a chapter about the trial, which was held in private and which I feel was grossly unfair, and the judgment itself, which I feel is seriously flawed."

She also aims to take the case to the Court of Human Rights.

"I feel so strongly about my right to freedom of expression, and the right to a fair trial that I want to take the case to the Court of Human Rights," she said in the email.

"I feel a great injustice has been done, not only to me, but to authors and journalists in general."

Ms Ash had tried to get permission to appeal a landmark decision passed in December by the court of appeal that dismissed her efforts to overturn an injunction against her unauthorised book about the Canadian singer.

The ruling upheld a major shift in media law protecting the privacy of famous people, with the case described as one of the most significant ever relating to the British press.

The House of Lords said that the petition for appeal "did not raise an arguable point of law of general public importance".

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