Knopf and Bush Play the Waiting Game

After leaving the White House in 1993, George Bush waited months longer than his four immediate predecessors to cut a book deal. And he’s in no hurry to finish what had been tentatively scheduled for publication in early 1995.

More than three years since signing a contract with Alfred A. Knopf Inc., Bush is about two-thirds finished with a book on foreign policy that he’s writing with Brent Scowcroft, his former national security advisor.

“I’m hoping to see the rest of the book in late spring or early summer,” said Knopf senior editor Ashbel Green. “It’s an account of how foreign policy was handled when Bush was president. It will concentrate on four areas: the fall of the former Soviet Union, the reunification of Germany, the Persian Gulf War and the relationship with China.”

Green added: “It will not look at the Clinton years, but I’m sure that readers will be able to draw their own conclusions.”

As Green waits for a complete manuscript, Bush has hardly been out of touch. He gave an extended interview to Parade magazine, which put him on the cover of its Dec. 1 issue. In addition, the winter issue of Forbes FYI, a luxury supplement sent to Forbes subscribers, carries a piece by Bush titled “Man Oh Man, Was It Comfortable,” in which he recalls the joys of riding in Air Force One. Forbes FYI is edited by former Bush speech writer Christopher Buckley.

Knopf is not unaware that waiting has its rewards. Walter Cronkite’s autobiography, “A Reporter’s Life,” which went on sale Dec. 5, will be No. 2 Sunday on the New York Times’ bestseller list.

The book, edited by Green, was signed up by Knopf 22 years ago.

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Speaking of Books by Presidents . . . : What must it be like to have more than 400,000 copies of a 178-page hardcover lying around, unwanted and unsold?

That’s apparently the number of copies of President Clinton’s book, “Between Hope and History,” that remain in stores. Published before last summer’s Democratic National Convention by the Times Books division of Random House, the president’s collection of views and platform ideas did, in fact, make it on to the national bestseller list for a few weeks.

However, considering that only 75,000 copies of the 500,000-copy printing have been sold so far, the Clinton hardcover has to rank as one of the biggest publishing disasters this year. It has to be especially vexing for Times Books because the size of the print order supposedly came in response to orders from booksellers.

Asked during a C-SPAN interview Sunday night why the book has turned out as it has, the president said: “Because I didn’t promote it.” At the same time, many would argue that Clinton’s daily appearances in the media, including his renomination and reelection, constituted terrific promotion.

Perhaps his inauguration next month will help call attention to the title one more time--before retailers start crating the unsold copies and returning them to Random House.

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Hey, bidduh, bidduh: The auction for a memoir that George Stephanopoulos plans to write after leaving White House service next year began on Dec. 11 with a dozen publishers phoning in bids to the author’s Washington lawyer, Robert Barnett.

By last Friday, the action reached the Dick Morris level--$2.5 million (which is what Random House is paying the disgraced former strategist). By Monday afternoon, only two publishers were still going at it. By Monday evening, Little, Brown prevailed--over Doubleday, sources said--with an offer of about $3 million.

Little, Brown hopes to publish the book late next year.

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Afterwords: For the fifth time since Men’s Journal was launched by Wenner Media Inc. in 1992, the magazine is raising the circulation that it will guarantee advertisers.

Effective with the February issue, the so-called rate base will leap to 550,000, from the current 400,000. . . .

Time magazine gives its best and worst lists for 1996 in this week’s issue. Best fiction: Salman Rushdie’s “The Moor’s Last Sigh” (Pantheon). Best nonfiction: Frank McCourt’s memoir, “Angela’s Ashes” (Scribner). Both books also were among the top 10 chosen by Salon, the lit-heavy and media-savvy online magazine that Time named the best Web site of 1996 (https://www.salon1999.com). . . .

Pearson, the owner of Penguin Publishing, completed its $336-million purchase of the Putnam Berkley Group on Tuesday, creating the fourth-largest book-publishing conglomerate in the United States.

* Paul D. Colford’s column is published Thursdays. His e-mail address is paul.colford@newsday.com.