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Welcome to Today in Books, our daily round-up of literary headlines at the intersection of politics, culture, media, and more.
A Lot of People Are Buying 107 Days
Simon & Schuster announced today that Kamala Harris’ 107 Days has sold 350,000 copies across all formats in the seven days since it was published. This puts it on track to be the best-selling memoir of 2025 (though it is a relatively low bar. I cannot summon what the second best-selling memoir of the year is). I wondered what the appetite for this book would be, but clearly there were a bunch of people ready to hear from Harris on her unprecedented presidential run. If I might double down on my curiosity: might sales be front-loaded to very enthusiastic Harris supporters? How many that wouldn’t fit that definition will be picking this up over the course of the fall?
The First Trailer for People We Meet on Vacation, Which Itself is the First Trailer to a Emily Henry Novel. Though It Will Not Be The Last.
The first trailer for People We Meet on Vacation dropped today, and it looks like sorta any other Netflix rom-com starring people that I, a 47-year old fella, have never heard of, though that is probably a positive sign for the project’s success. The big question to me is this: do the legions of Emily Henry fans change how many viewers a movie like this will get on Netflix? Netflix itself is so enormous that even a giant best-selling book can get washed out in the onslaught of streaming content available.
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‘Doomscroll,’ ‘rizz,’ ‘dad bod’: Gen Z Lingo is Entering the Meriam-Webster Dictionary
Counterpoint to the above re: this particular 47-year old fella: these words entering the Meriam-Webster Dictionary feel a little….stale? I guess the idea is that a word has to have been around long enough to suggest it will stick around. Internet language moves fast enough that whatever is going on right now on TikTok will vanish in few weeks (days?), no cap.
What a profound pleasure it was to get into Toni Morrison’s stunning, revolutionary debut novel, The Bluest Eye, for Zero to Well-Read. I hope you will consider giving it a listen.