[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/images/08/13/art.mc.cnn.jpg caption="A book based on Edwards' mistress is soaring in book sales."](CNN) - Author Jay McInerney may have John Edwards to thank for a likely influx of book royalties.
His twenty-year old novel, based on the life of Edwards' mistress when she was a young adult, is soaring in sales rankings - so much so that the book's publisher has commissioned an additional 2,500 copies for print on Monday.
McInerney has said the book's main character, described as an "ostensibly jaded, cocaine-addled, sexually voracious 20-year old," was inspired by Rielle Hunter - the film producer who Edwards recently acknowledged having an affair with in 2006.
The book, about the New York singles scene amidst the excess of the 1980s, is now 299 on Amazon.com and 393 on Barnes&Noble.com - moves of a couple hundred places in only a handful of days. Before news of the affair broke, the book was thousands of spots lower.
Edwards, the former presidential candidate and 2004 vice presidential candidate, said he had a brief affair with Rielle Hunter in 2006 when she was employed by his political action committee to make "webisodes" about his campaign.
Despite breathing new life into one of his novels, McInerney said earlier this week he is no fan of the former North Carolina senator.
"To say that he slept with her but he wasn't in love with her - that's not very chivalrous," the author told the New York Daily News. "He's trying to distance himself from her."
"I don't feel my questions have been answered with regard to Edwards," he also said. "It was a half-assed confession."
[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/images/08/13/art.mccainbook.cnn.jpg caption="Reporters got a sneak peek at the new McCain children’s book Wednesday."] DETROIT, Michigan (CNN) - Reporters on board John McCain’s campaign plane Wednesday got an early look at Meghan McCain’s soon-to-be-published “picture book biography” of her father, titled: “My Dad, John McCain.”
The Simon & Schuster hardback, set to hit stores on September 2, is a brief, sentimental look at the familiar elements of McCain’s legendary biography, including his time in a Vietnamese prison and his run for the White House in 2000.
Several pages are devoted to McCain’s military background and his imprisonment in Vietnam, with relatively little attention paid to his youth (he “broke a lot of rules” in high school, the book says) and to his time in Congress.
Cindy McCain, along with Meghan's siblings Jack, Jimmy and Bridget, are described fondly in the book - but the children from McCain’s first marriage are left unmentioned.
Illustrated by Dan Andreasen, the pictures in the book are gauzy sketches of famous McCain iconography: there’s a drawing of his cadet head shot from the Naval Academy, as well as a rendition of a still-recuperating McCain’s meeting with Richard Nixon following his return from Vietnam. McCain is also depicted sitting forlornly in his Hanoi prison cell.
(CNN) – Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili on Wednesday called for John McCain and other American leaders to do more for Georgia in their response to the conflict in his country.
“Yesterday, I heard Sen. McCain say, ‘We are all Georgians now,’” Saakashvili said on CNN’s American Morning. “Well, very nice, you know, very cheering for us to hear that, but OK, it’s time to pass from this. From words to deeds.”
McCain told a crowd in Pennsylvania yesterday that he had called Saakashvili to express solidarity with the people of Georgia, saying: “Today, we are all Georgians.”
McCain’s foreign policy adviser Randy Scheunemann told reporters on the campaign plane Tuesday that McCain’s remark “obviously meant a lot to Saakashvili personally, but more importantly the message it conveyed to the Georgian people in this really, time of unprecedented national emergency.” Scheunemann said McCain and Saakashvili are friends who have speaking daily throughout the crisis.
[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/images/08/11/art.mccain.8.12.jpg caption="McCain's adviser said the GOP candidate has 15 years of experience on Russia policy."]NEWARK, New Jersey (CNN) - John McCain's top foreign policy adviser briefed reporters Tuesday on his candidate's policy towards Russia and Georgia, noting that McCain and Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili are friends that have been speaking throughout the conflict "to exchange daily updates about what's going on."
The adviser, Randy Scheunemann, also confirmed a report that McCain and Saakashvili enjoyed a day of water sports in the summer of 2006.
"I can confirm that Sen. McCain and President Saakashvili were jet-skiing on the Black Sea together," he said.
Reporters spent several minutes asking Scheunemann, a former lobbyist for the government of Georgia, to firm up details on McCain's comments regarding the crisis that has unfolded in recent days.
Asked about Barack Obama's statements on the Georgia situation, Scheunemann accused the Democrat of lacking experience on the matter, saying his record consists only of a handful of paper statements, most of which related to matters of loose nuclear material. But McCain's record on Georgia and Russia, he argued, runs deep.
"There's a depth of knowledge, a breadth of knowledge, and an extent of historical experience that doesn't compare between the two on Russia policy," Scheunemann said. "You can't compare a 15-year historical record to three or four statements over the course of 15 months."
Recent Comments