Quill and Quire

Book news

« Back to
Quillblog

Former Palin aide accuses rival author of sabotage, jealousy

Sarah Palin, the former Alaska governor and self-described “Mama grizzly,” is at the centre of a dispute between two authors of competing books about her. Frank Bailey, a former Palin aide, is accusing Joe McGinniss, the bestselling author of Fatal Vision, of leaking material from his upcoming Palin biography to the media. According to the Anchorage Daily News, Bailey’s manuscript includes allegations that Palin broke the law in her 2006 gubernatorial campaign by accepting money from the Republican Governors Association in contravention of state election rules. The ADN claims that the leaked pages came from “multiple sources,” including McGinniss, whose own book on Palin, The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin, is due out this September.

According to James Oliphant in the Los Angeles Times, Bailey says McGinniss leaked the manuscript in an attempt to sabotage a competing author:

Posting on the anti-Palin blog Mudflats … Bailey, along with his co-authors, Ken Morris and Jeanne Devon, issued what they termed was a “cease-and-desist order” against McGinniss, which read, in part, that the three “believe [McGinniss’] actions were done with the single intent of destroying the marketability of the work. It is no secret that you are writing your own ‘tell-all’ book about Sarah Palin.”

The post called McGinniss “a jealous author sabotaging a competitor via unlawful and unscrupulous means” and said his actions had “impaired” their ability to market the book.

The allegations, if true, would not mark the first time McGinniss has gone rogue in his pursuit of his latest subject. Last year, he famously moved into the house next door to Palin, prompting her husband to build a 14-foot wall around their property.

By

February 28th, 2011

12:37 pm

Category: Book news

Tagged with: Joe McGinniss, Sarah Palin, The Rogue