Matalin Jumps In
by John F. Baker -- Publishers Weekly, 4/4/2005
Simon & Schuster's new imprint editor, Republican operative and commentator Mary Matalin, lost no time in announcing her first acquisition, and it was a big one: a memoir by Mary Cheney, the vice president's controversial lesbian daughter, whose sexual orientation became somewhat of an issue in the presidential campaign last year. The deal, reportedly for around a million dollars, was made with ace Washington agent Bob Barnett at Williams & Connolly, and the book is set for hardcover and audio next May. In it, Cheney, who has been a top aide to her father in both his campaigns and at his side as part of a political family since childhood, said she will talk about that life as well as about being a political target: "It's been uplifting, frustrating, educational and always entertaining, and I look forward to writing about it." As for Matalin, she sees the book as symbolic of where her newly named Threshold imprint is headed—"to chronicle the players and events of contemporary conservatism." And a little spice doesn't hurt.
