Knopf Announces Clinton Tour Schedule

Former President Bill Clinton, adored by many, reviled by some, is the booksellers' new best friend this season. His ability to create an enormous demand for his 957-page memoir, My Life, to be released by Knopf on June 22, is nothing short of magical. Only boy wizard Harry Potter has generated a similar anticipatory frenzy.

Clinton's publicity tour for the book began with a keynote speech at the opening of Book Expo America in Chicago (for a related story, click here). And this week Knopf unveiled a book-tour schedule for Clinton that includes 19 events, more than half of which will be at independent bookstores:

Also included on the tour are stops at Barnes & Noble stores in New York and California, Borders Books in New York, a Costco in Washington State, and a Wal-Mart in Arkansas. (For the complete tour schedule, go to www.randomhouse.com/knopf/home.html.)

Former President Bill Clinton will sign books on June 22 -- the laydown date -- at the Hue-Man Bookstore, New York City (above).

Clara Villarosa of Hue-Man told BTW that the store is "really thrilled that we got him on June 22 -- the laydown date." Clinton will arrive at the store at 6:30 p.m. and sign books for approximately an hour and a half. Over 2,000 copies have been preordered, according to Villarosa.

Politics & Prose, which will be hosting Clinton on July 6, will be holding a party from 10:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. on Monday evening, June 21, but instead of potions, wise owls, and wands, the Midsummer's Night Event will feature coffee, a panel of political authorities, and a saxophone player. The panel will include Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA); Anne Shields, deputy solicitor and chief of staff at the Department of the Interior during the Clinton administration, and Washington Post political reporter John Harris. Preordered books will be distributed at the stroke of midnight, store co-owner Carla Cohen told BTW.

The excitement surrounding the release of the book is so great that Clinton has canceled his planned book signing at the Democratic National Convention to be held in Boston in July; he will not appear at any book signings during the convention. According to an article in the Boston Globe, Clinton and spouse, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, were concerned that attention to the Clintons and to the book, might draw too much attention from the nomination of the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, John F. Kerry. --Nomi Schwartz