Doonesbury "leaks" excerpts from Sarah Palin bio
In the world of juicy book leaks, this one takes the cake.
Fox News reporter and Doonesbury cartoon character Roland Hedley (fictional) leaked details about Joe McGinniss鈥檚 unauthorized biography of Sarah Palin (real) in comic strip in papers Tuesday by cartoonist Garry Trudeau.
A promotions genius, author McGinniss first made headlines when he appointed himself Ms. Palin鈥檚 biographer, moved to Wasilla, Alaska, and rented the house next to Palin鈥檚, the better to observe her comings and goings (and prompted an angry Facebook response from the former governor). This time, McGinniss gave out several copies of his unreleased biography of Palin, including one to Doonesbury cartoonist Trudeau, who previewed the book in Tuesday鈥檚 Doonesbury comic strip.
It started last week, when Fox News reporter Roland Hedley accidentally . Hedley鈥檚 boss, a character based on real-life Fox exec Roger Ailes, asked him to send complimentary tweets on the book, stressing that . That proves to be a hard task for Hedley. As he reads the book in the comic strip, we the reader, are treated to actual excerpts from McGinniss鈥檚 actual book.
In : "She didn鈥檛 want anybody to follow her to Nordstrom鈥檚 when she went shopping every day鈥he didn't want anybody to know she wasn't coming in until ten a.m. and then leaving by three... You know what she was? A housewife who happened to be governor. I'd fly cross country with her many times and she'd spend the whole trip looking at People magazine." Nonetheless, ever the loyal spinmaster, Hedley manages to put a positive spin on the revelations. In the comic strip, he tweets, "New book explodes myth of Sarah not reading."
It鈥檚 a brilliant promotions plan by McGinniss and not surprisingly, it鈥檚 gotten plenty of media attention.
McGinniss sent Trudeau an advance edition of his book last spring. the 300-plus page book contained 鈥渁n embarrassment of riches鈥� And, of course, there were revelations that didn鈥檛 make the cut because I couldn鈥檛 figure out how to make them work as comedy.鈥�
It's "the beginning of a beautiful relationship," .
Not everyone was so amused. The Chicago Tribune decided not to run the Doonesbury comic strip Tuesday and any other day the strip dealt with the book.
鈥淭he subject matter does not meet our standards of fairness [because] the strips include excerpts from a book that is not yet on the market and therefore unavailable for review or verification by the Tribune," .
Perhaps. But we can鈥檛 resist the controversy and clever marketing that is boosting both McGinniss鈥檚 forthcoming book and Trudeau鈥檚 comic strip. Real book previews lodged in the funny, fictional world of a comic strip? We鈥檙e hooked.
Husna Haq is a Monitor correspondent.
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