A new book out this week about Melania Trump reveals that early in her husband’s presidency, the first lady remained in New York as she renegotiated their prenuptial agreement. John Bolton’s forthcoming memoir contains devastating details about how the president regards the rule of law, which Mr. Bolton summarizes as “obstruction of justice as a way of life.” Another upcoming book, this one by President Trump’s niece, Mary L. Trump, is being pitched as a revelatory work that “shines a bright light on the dark history of their family in order to explain how her uncle became the man who now threatens the world’s health, economic security, and social fabric.”
All three authors paint negative portraits of the president, and all three books are published by Simon & Schuster.
The confluence of these explosive books, in the months leading up to the 2020 election, has made Simon & Schuster the current front-runner in an ongoing race among publishers to produce news-making titles about the Trump administration.
It’s a lucrative business to be in right now. On Wednesday, Mr. Bolton’s book held the No. 1 spot on Amazon’s best-seller list, while Mary Trump’s was No. 3, even though neither has come out. Simon & Schuster has increased the print runs for both titles after booksellers raised their orders.
[In his new book, Bolton describes episodes where the president sought to halt criminal inquiries. He also says President Trump’s loyalists mocked him behind his back.]
Not surprisingly, Simon & Schuster has found itself in the administration’s cross hairs. This week, the Department of Justice sued Mr. Bolton, a former national security adviser, in an effort to delay the release of his book, claiming that the book contains classified information. While Simon & Schuster was not named in the lawsuit, the Justice Department asked a judge to order Mr. Bolton to compel the publisher to pull the book until the government’s review is completed.
Simon & Schuster, which plans to release the book next week, dismissed the suit as “nothing more than the latest in a long-running series of efforts by the administration to quash publication of a book it deems unflattering to the president.” By Wednesday, the dam appeared to have broken, as the book’s contents leaked out in reviews and news coverage, undoing the administration’s effort to keep its contents under wraps. Simon & Schuster, in a statement responding to another government effort Wednesday to stop the book’s release, called it “a frivolous, politically motivated exercise in futility” and said that hundreds of thousands of copies of the book had already been distributed around the United States and world.
Jonathan Karp, the chief executive of Simon & Schuster, said the company isn’t aiming to push an anti-Trump agenda but is publishing books that feel urgent in the run-up to the election. It has acquired and published pro-Trump titles as well, including the president’s own campaign book, “Great Again,” and a forthcoming title by the Fox News host Sean Hannity.
“We’re not coming from this in a partisan way. We want to give voters the information and the context that they need to make an informed decision in 2020,” Mr. Karp said in an interview. “We do have a lot of Trump books for that reason.”
There are more in the pipeline. Later this summer, Simon & Schuster will release “You’re Fired: The Perfect Guide to Beating Donald Trump,” by the political strategist Paul Begala, and “Make Russia Great Again,” a satirical novel by Christopher Buckley that is written as a memoir by the fictional Herb Nutterman, Trump’s seventh chief of staff. In September, the company is publishing Bob Woodward’s sequel to his 2018 best seller, “Fear,” which produced wall-to-wall cable news coverage of its contents and sold around 2 million copies.
[“The Room Where It Happened,” Times critic Jennifer Szalai writes, “toggles between two discordant registers: exceedingly tedious and slightly unhinged.”]
As a publisher who has worked with both conservative and liberal public figures, Mr. Karp has developed a reputation for knowing which political books will work commercially and how to market them.
“Jon is a really hands-on publisher who understands how to reach different audiences across the political spectrum, which is what you have to do in this very polarized day and age,” said Matt Latimer, a co-founder of the Javelin Agency, which represents Mr. Bolton. “You can’t just throw Trump on the cover and assume the book will succeed.”
In a presidential election year, it’s not unusual to have a bumper crop of books dissecting the persona and performance of the incumbent. But even before 2020, the sheer volume of White House memoirs, tell-alls and book-length investigative journalism has been unusual for a sitting president in his first term.
The high turnover in the administration might have accelerated the cycle. Many of the books are by administration officials and aides who were fired or resigned, including Mr. Bolton, James B. Comey, Andrew G. McCabe, Cliff Sims and Omarosa Manigault Newman.
“The books certainly seem to be coming earlier,” said Robert Barnett, a Washington lawyer who represents Mr. Woodward and Mary Jordan, the author of the Melania Trump book published this week. “It’s no secret that this administration has been highly controversial, and that engenders a bigger and better market for books exploring it.”
Mr. Trump has often heightened the interest in such titles by attacking their authors and publishers — a now-familiar cycle that generates more news coverage and drives sales higher. When his lawyer tried to block publication of Michael Wolff’s “Fire and Fury,” Mr. Wolff’s publisher, Henry Holt, responded by moving up the on-sale date. The book went on to sell several million copies.
For awhile, Macmillan, Henry Holt’s parent company, acquired many of the most headline-grabbing Trump tell-alls, including books by Mr. Comey, Mr. McCabe and Stephanie Clifford, better known as the pornographic film actress Stormy Daniels. Lately, Simon & Schuster, considered a publisher of serious nonfiction, has been claiming some of the most sought-after insider accounts and paying substantial sums for them. (Mr. Bolton received a seven-figure advance).
The cluster of Trump books is arriving at a challenging moment for Simon & Schuster. Mr. Karp took the helm of the company last month, following the death of Simon & Schuster’s longtime and beloved C.E.O. Carolyn Reidy. In March, the company’s owner, ViacomCBS, said that it was putting the publishing house up for sale, and no buyer has been announced.
It’s also a difficult time for publishing in general, and for publishing topical nonfiction in particular. Adult nonfiction sales have fallen by more than seven percent this year compared with the same period in 2019, according to NPD BookScan, a drop caused by bookstore closures and diminished media opportunities for nonfiction authors during the coronavirus pandemic.
The early commercial success of both Mr. Bolton’s book and Mary Trump’s suggests that it’s still possible to break through the crowded news ecosystem.
“The Trump presidency is a phenomenon unlike any in American history, so we’re chronicling it,” Mr. Karp said. “We want to have the best first rough draft of history.”
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Source: Elections - nytimes.com
