Kamala Harris’s memoir, 107 Days, has been out for a week. Her book tour has involved national and local interviews and private, ticketed events (which have all sold out). While the Beltway media has gleefully mocked and rolled their eyes at the book, it turns out that Americans actually wanted to hear Kamala’s story. It turns out that half the country – the same half who voted for Kamala – still thinks she was a great candidate who would have been an amazing president, and her loss said more about America than it said about Kamala. 107 Days is on track to become the bestselling memoir of the year:

Simon & Schuster announced today that 107 DAYS by former Vice President Kamala Harris has sold 350,000 copies across all formats through the first week on sale in the U.S. The combined sales figure includes pre-orders, sales of print books, ebooks, and e-audiobooks. The publisher has ordered a 5th printing of the book that when complete will bring the number of hardcover copies in print to 500,000. These sales put 107 DAYS on a trajectory to be the best-selling memoir published in 2025.

Jonathan Karp, President and Chief Executive Officer of Simon & Schuster, said, “In addition to being one of the most interesting books ever written about the experience of running for President of the United States, the success of 107 DAYS proves what a galvanizing and inspiring cultural figure Kamala Harris is. The only memoirs that have had a better first week of sales since 2023 were by Britney Spears, Taylor Swift, and Prince Harry.”

[From Simon & Schuster]

This is amazing for Kamala, but it’s also a reminder that Prince Harry’s Spare was a unicorn in the publishing world. Spare sold 400K copies in ONE DAY. It sold 3.5 million copies in its first week. Still, I’m glad that Kamala is once again able to get her message out without it being filtered through an aggressively hateful political media, the same media which will forever hold her to a different standard than MAGA Republicans. Beyond that, what she’s doing is important for the future of the Democratic Party – as I said before, I think this is necessary political triage. Kamala addressed this in an interview with CNN:

She shrugs off the Democrats snapping back at her book. “We’ve got to get out of our own head. And we got to get out of our own bubble thinking we’re the only ones involved in the conversation,” Harris said. “Because actually, we’re just having a conversation with each other, and there’s a whole country out there that wants to be seen and wants to be heard in a way that is not transactional and in a way that is actually about accurately and truly listening.”

She struggled over what to say, particularly about Biden. Only after the initial draft was sent back by the publisher as too bland did she work in some of the lines that have been stirring up most of the agitation.

“I knew when I was writing it that it would invite attacks or criticism, which I don’t want, but that versus candor – for the sake of hopefully inviting difficult, though they may be honest, conversations,” she said. “That’s the choice I made.”

She talked to Biden about writing that he showed his age and that he shouldn’t have been left to decide on seeking re-election, suggesting that she was guilty of “recklessness” for not pushing him to reconsider. She says their relationship is in fine shape.

[From CNN]

While her book is critical of President Biden – and even more critical of Biden’s staffers and party elders – I believe that she still has a good relationship with the Bidens, and both camps recognize that they could have handled things differently and better, but they all felt under siege. Hunter Biden basically said that the Bidens all love Kamala and there are no grudges there. The truth is, I genuinely don’t believe that any Democrat is going to win nationally by throwing Biden or Harris under the bus. And that’s the larger message of Kamala’s book sales.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Cover Images.