The New York Times has an interesting piece on Sen. Barack Obama’s impressive literary career. Apparently, we were part of it. According to Janny Scott:
“[I]n March 2004, Mr. Obama’s political and literary fortunes abruptly shifted. His victory in a tightly contested United States Senate primary in Illinois made him an overnight Democratic Party sensation. In New York City, Rachel Klayman, an editor at Crown Books, read a Salon.com article on Mr. Obama by the author Scott Turow, an Obama friend, titled ‘The New Face of the Democratic Party — and America.’ Ms. Klayman looked up Mr. Obama’s memoir on Amazon.com and found that the rights were controlled by Crown, which now had the Times Books list. She sent an e-mail message to her boss, suggesting that Crown reissue the book.” Crown did, and then gave Obama a deal for “The Audacity of Hope.”
The Turow piece is here. It’s still worth reading. Ironically, Hillary Clinton supporter Sidney Blumenthal commissioned the Turow piece.
