Barack and Michelle Obama have signed book deals that may be the most lucrative ever for White House memoirs.
While the financial terms have not been officially disclosed, published reports have put the dollar figure Penguin Random House paid anywhere from $30 million to $65 million for both books. Even the low figure would blow the doors off the $15 million that Knopf, a division of PRH, paid Bill Clinton for his 2004 tome, My Life, and the $10 million George W. Bush was paid by Crown for his 2010 memoir Decision Points.
“We are absolutely thrilled to continue our publishing partnership with President and Mrs. Obama,” Penguin Random House CEO Markus Dohle said in a statement announcing the deal. “With their words and their leadership, they changed the world, and every day, with the books we publish at Penguin Random House, we strive to do the same.” Dohle vowed their book launches will be “global publishing events of unprecedented scope and significance.”
