Publishers rush out Trump and Brexit books to traumatised readers

Publishers are rushing out a raft of titles to meet demand among readers traumatised by the election of Donald Trump and the aftermath of the Brexit referendum. Titles range from humour to protest packs aimed at reinvigorating the left as it faces four years of the former TV star in the White House.

The books are being turned around in time for Trump’s inauguration as US president on 20 January. American writer Gene Stone will publish The Trump Survival Guide on both sides of the Atlantic 10 days before the inauguration. Billed as “everything you need to know about living through what you hoped would never happen”, the book will be a serious call to action for Trump dissenters across the political spectrum, said publisher Dey Street Press, a division of HarperCollins. The author’s earlier books include a satirical guide to surviving George W Bush’s presidency.

Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Gloria Steinem are among political activists, writers and prominent journalists who will mark Inauguration Day with a collection of essays entitled What We Do Now: Standing Up for Your Values in Trump’s America. The collection comes from activist publisher Melville House, which was founded to oppose George W Bush.

Describing the book as a blueprint for moving forward, Melville House co-publisher Valerie Merians said: “We know that his vision of the country is not shared by a majority of Americans. Our hope is that this book will galvanise, and provide a road map to, the millions of Americans who want to fight back by standing up for their values.”

In the UK, publishers’ first responses to Trump’s accession to high office have been to send him up. Orion has released two Christmas books, Trump Cats by Hugh Janus and Where’s Trump? by Anastasia Catris, a Where’s Wally? spoof that offers readers the chance to hunt the president-elect among among crowds building a wall in Mexico and at a Tea Party rally.

More considered responses are due to appear in spring. Protest!, edited by Ra Page, is to be published by Manchester-based Comma Press. The book pairs authors with historians and witnesses of the great protest events of the recent past to create “factually informed” short stories that Page hopes will rebalance the tendency to blame political upsets on those at the bottom of the social spectrum rather than challenging those at the top.

As with the post-Trump US publications, Page’s collection is aimed at re-energising and re-enthusing the left in the aftermath of a national vote that has left it winded. “The idea of Protest! was to rejuvenate and resuscitate the tradition of blaming upwards and speaking truth unto power,” Page said of the book, due out in early March. Contributors include the historian David Constantine and authors Sara Maitland, Maggie Gee and Frank Cottrell-Boyce.

Profile Books, meanwhile, are publishing The Fate of the West by former Economist editor Bill Emmott, which takes a serious look at the decline of the liberal democracy in the West. “We were originally planning to publish in March but it’s moved to late April in order to consider and analyse Trump’s win,” said a spokesperson.

Also out in April, from Macmillan int he UK and Riverhead Books in the US, is The Knowledge Illusion by cognitive scientists Steven Sloman and Phillip Fernbach. Their book looks at how the “hive mind” is vital for a functioning society, arguing that better decisions are made when individuals recognise their limits of understanding and that, by calling upon the expertise or experience of others, we can improve our approach to most complex problems and avoid financial meltdown or bad decisions at the polling booth.

A handful of books have been revised and rushed out in the runup to Christmas, to meet demand for information in the wake of the Brexit vote. Oneworld, which was behind this year’s Man Booker winner, The Sellout, has reissued Colin Brown’s Glory and B*llocks: The Truth Behind XI Defining Events in British History, with a new chapter, Brexit: The Legacy of a Nation Divided.

It is not expected that any of the books will sell as well as the first book off the printing presses following Brexit. Five on Brexit Island, a spoof Enid Blyton from Quercus, has already sold more than 40,000 copies.