Don't buy books from crooks
Should that be extended to not buying books from the crook-adjacent?
We have as the latest of Chronicler Of All Things Trumpian Stephanie Grisham, the former press secretary who in eight months on the job never held regular press conferences. In her book, which has been described as chatty, snarky, and breezy, she admits now that she lied, that her former boss has a terrible temper, and here she is writing in the Washington Post that her former boss and his wife showed a marked lack of empathy after Grisham’s relationship with a fellow White House staffer turned abusive.
Remember that phrase, don’t buy books from crooks? It was born of a reluctance to strengthen Richard Nixon’s coffers after he resigned from office ahead of what was most assuredly an impeachment.
I may be on record as having read more Trump books than any one I know. I originally started reading because I hoped to make sense of things. That didn’t work, and being so familiar with the Trump oeuvre is not something of which I am proud. Still, I have managed to mostly avoid reading books written by members of the former Trump administration, and I am a happier person for that. I do not begrudge others who are still seeking to make sense of things. I have, instead, given up and moved on to other pursuits.
I avoid books like this for a lot of reasons, in a nutshell: the subject matter, the author, and (probably, although I can't say for sure about this example) the quality of the writing. I resent that people in situations like this get a book deal and bump a better book off the publishing schedule, because someone like this has a "better" (i.e., presumably more lucrative) story to tell. The writer is self serving, and the publisher is cynical. Reading this book would be a waste of time that could be spent reading one of the wonderful, beautifully written (by actually talented writers) books out there. I have a stack of those books waiting for me.
I’m totally with you on this. The only book I ever bought was the one by Mary Trump in an early effort to try to “understand” why Trump was the way he was. I was a sociology/psychology major. Trying to understand criminals and psychos has always been a part of my mind.