Bob Minzesheimer wraps a lip lock on Bubba in Clinton is eager to tell his story Says writing memoirs is a way to 'come to terms' :
Bill Clinton, who's getting nearly $12 million for his memoirs, says everyone eventually should write his or her life story.Hot dang! I can hardly wait. The gossip is that while Bubba did have two ghostwriters to help him get started, he is generating this load of blather by himself, although it will be refined by prominent book editor Robert Gottlieb. From the same source, it is believed highly unlikely that that sales will pay back the $12 million advance - a hopeful sign for the Republic despite a few Kool Aid drinkers who are hot to read it. In the normal course of events that means that Bubba would have to return some of the dough. We'll see if they actually get it out of him.
''Everybody talks about how terrible this book-writing is. I've enjoyed it,'' the former president tells C-SPAN in an interview to be shown Sunday (6:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. ET/ 3:30 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. PT).
''Everyone who is fortunate enough to have lived to be 50 should sit down at some point and write the story of his or her life, even if it is just for yourself, your children, your family.''
It's important, Clinton says, ''to try to come to terms with the life you lived and think about how you wish to spend whatever years are remaining.''
Clinton, who says he's working without a ghostwriter, aims to submit a ''publishable draft'' by August. That's two months after the tentative publication date for the memoir of his wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. (She got $8 million.)
As for the Village Idiot,
This time, Mrs. Clinton has started out with a team approach for her book. She retained Lissa Muscatine, a former White House aide who has worked as a reporter for The Washington Post, to co-ordinate the efforts of another professional writer, Maryanne Vollers, a journalist and author whose book experience includes helping Dr. Jerri Nielsen write the best-selling memoir "Ice Bound." In addition, Ruby Shamir, another former White House aide, is working as a research assistant.Frivolous. Well, that's one way of putting it.
The senator's squad has worked well so far, according to people involved with the writing of the book for Simon & Schuster, a unit of Viacom. After hundreds of interviews scheduled around her Senate work, Mrs. Clinton has practically finished the research for her memoir, and Vollers has begun writing full time. Mrs. Clinton plans to pitch in further over the coming congressional recess, and Vollers expects to complete the manuscript by the end of the year.
Some booksellers, though, said they suspected that interest in the Clintons may be waning amid the country's new concerns. "Time has marched on, hasn't it?" said Roxanne J. Coady, owner of R.J. Julia Booksellers in Madison, Conn. "I think there is something about thinking about them that almost seems frivolous."
