Hillary Rodham Clinton Bookmania

Hell To Pay For Hillary Clinton 

Hillary Books Fill the Shelves

WASHINGTON (AP) - While Hillary Rodham Clinton may need to work on her appeal to New York voters, her popularity is soaring among book publishers. Already there are about two dozen books on the shelves about the first lady and U.S. Senate candidate, ranging from the juicy tell-all to the conservative hatchet job.

If that isn't enough, the new millennium will usher in a whole new crop. Books are in the works by former Ronald Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan, MSNBC conservative pundit Laura Ingraham and former Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein of Watergate fame.New York magazine political columnist Michael Tomasky is writing a book about the Senate race shaping up between Mrs. Clinton and New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. The first lady even has a book of her own coming out, although it's far from the expose publishers are pining for. ``An Invitation to the White House,'' is a coffee table tome looking at the history of entertaining at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

``People are fascinated with her,'' said Judy Quinn, book editor at Publishers Weekly. ``She has a higher profile now than ever before because of the Senate race and yet there's still some mystery about her.... Publishers eat it up.''

The two most recent entries have made respectable - if not blockbuster - showings on the bestseller lists.

``Hillary's Choice,'' Gail Sheehy's much-dissected dissection of Mrs. Clinton, was No. 12 on The New York Times bestseller list before falling off this week. Sheehy, author of the best-selling ``Passages,'' paints a psychological portrait of Mrs. Clinton, who she surmises has come into her own in her ``flaming fifties.'' But the much-anticipated book has come under attack for factual inaccuracies. Sheehy has defended the book.

``Hell to Pay: The Unfolding Story of Hillary Rodham Clinton,'' written by former federal prosecutor Barbara Olson, a founder of the conservative Independent Women's Forum, debuted on The Times list this week at No. 12. Olson was a chief congressional investigator during Republican probes of the Clinton administration's travel office firings and its gathering of FBI background files on hundreds of GOP political appointees. She pens a bruising bio of the first lady. The unflattering photo of Mrs. Clinton on the front cover - her eyes squinting and her lips pursed - sets the tone.``This is a woman with a very serious political agenda,'' Olson said in an interview. ``And no one seemed to be looking at that.''

Historian Carl Sferrazza Anthony, who has written extensively on United States first ladies, said the interest in Mrs. Clinton might be topped only by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, whose life also became book fodder. ``Hillary Clinton is active in so many different spheres and has played so many different roles that it seems that no one book except the one that she writes herself is really going to be able to capture all that she has done,'' Anthony said.

Will Mrs. Clinton, who has yet to cooperate with a biographer, ever put her own side in print? ``She would be the best person to write about her own life,'' said her spokeswoman, Marsha Berry. But with the demands of a Senate campaign in New York, it seems unlikely to happen anytime soon, Berry said. Mrs. Clinton already has two books to her name. ``It Takes a Village'' outlined her views on children's and family issues, and ``Dear Buddy, Dear Socks'' was a collection of letters written to the first pets.

Berry said Mrs. Clinton was unfazed by all the unauthorized accounts of her life lining the bookshelves. ``With all the books out there they kind of dilute each other,'' Berry said. ``People take them for what they are.''

Books From Amazon.com

Hillary wrote these two herself Dear Socks Dear Buddy It Takes  A Village

Hell For Governers, New York Or Not Hillary's Choice Bill & Hillary : The Marraige Partners In Power

The Clinton Record The Seduction The First Partner The Inside Story The First Lady

More Books More Hillary Clinton

"If you want something good to read...read the U.S. Constitution".

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