Canadians who want “VIP” status during Hillary Clinton’s upcoming book tour for “What Happened” will need to have deep pockets.
Mrs. Clinton’s forthcoming memoir about her failed presidential campaign is set to hit bookstore shelves on Sept. 12, but along with that will come a promotional tour through at least 15 cities. “VIP platinum” tickets for a Sept. 28 talk in Toronto will set back fans of the former secretary of state $2,375.95.
Publisher Simon & Schuster defended the decision on Thursday, but an anonymous industry insider told Fox News Channel that Mrs. Clinton’s demands are a statistical outlier for famous faces.
“It is standard for high-profile authors to do book tours that sell tickets to events, but Clinton’s tour takes it to a new level of greed,” the source said. “This pay-for-access has all the political wisdom of doing another round of private speeches for Goldman Sachs, but as her book tour makes clear, at this point in her career all she cares about is cashing in.”
Cary Goldstein, the executive director of publicity at Simon & Schuster, rejected such claims.
“Tickets typically include a book,” Mr. Goldstein said. “Such was the case with tours for recent books by Megyn Kelly, [former Secretary of Defense] Bob Gates, and any number of public personalities. Lecture venues have become a central component of book tours for public figures.”
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Fox noted that a major book event in 2014 with Mr. Gates charged $30.
Mrs. Clinton told a New York audience at April’s Women in the World Summit that “What Happened” is her attempt to “give as clear and as credible an explanation” as possible to her supporters.
“I’m letting my guard down,” she says in the book’s introduction.
Some of states featured on the “What Happened” tour include Florida, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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