A Tale of Two Books

What's going on with forthcoming books by Jared Kushner and Prince Harry?

I had promised you that, in addition to my deep-dives, I’d occasionally pass on snippets of things I’m hearing and seeing.

This week’s snippet is about two books—both of which there are questions about.

First, Jared Kushner.

Kushner’s forthcoming memoir—due to be published on August 9th by Broadside Books, the conservative imprint of Harper Collins—now appears to have an unfortunate double entendre in its title “Breaking History.”

He is indeed “breaking history”—just not in the way he intended, given the news that Congress is now investigating him, as I discussed yesterday with former White House ethics czar Richard Painter. Kushner had business dealings with the Saudi Arabia Public Investment fund shortly after he managed a pro-Saudi foreign policy—sometimes, seemingly at the risk of America’s national security. (See my 2019 book Kushner, Inc. for the whole story on that.) The investigation is meant to find out what really happened (they want both financial documentation and personal correspondence between Kushner and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman during and after Kushner’s time in the White House) and to see if laws regarding the ethics of government officials conducting business with their counterparts after leaving office should be tightened.

I reached out to the publisher to see if there was thought of changing the publishing date, but no word back yet.

Then there’s Prince Harry.

It’s been reported that the publishing date of Prince Harry’s memoir has mysteriously been moved from November to… well, no date at all, with no reason given by publisher Random House.

Earlier this week, royal chronicler, author of the best-selling The Palace Papers and my mentor Tina Brown told me that it’s believed there is a possibility a “deal” is underway in the British royal family as the celebrations for the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee rage.

Could this be why, against all expectations, Megan Markle has appeared consistently beaming and at ease in a country where she knows she is persona non grata with a lot of the public, who blame her for causing Megxit?

Meghan Markle beams consistently at St. Paul's Cathedral during the Platinum Jubilee celebrations in London on June 3, 2022. (Photo by Wiktor Szymanowicz/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

Here’s the speculative bare bones of what could be cooking per Tina:

Prince Harry kills his book, which no one in the British royal family wants out there. In return, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex return to the UK, get their security paid for, and figure out a way to return to the royal fold doing “something useful.”

Why would they do this?

Well, the U.S. experiment hasn’t turned out the way they envisioned. Netflix recently cancelled Markle’s series “Pearl,” and other deals with the streamer and Spotify haven’t borne any visible fruit.

My old colleague and friend Richard Kay—who was the reporter with by far the tightest relationship with the late Princess of Wales—has said publicly, “Aides are also looking into reports that Harry and Meghan may be tempted to return to the royal fold if their media careers turn out to be less enduring than they had hoped. Their deals with under-pressure streaming giant Netflix no longer seem quite so promising, while the arrangement with Spotify yet to materialize.”

So, keep looking at the photos of Megan while she’s over the pond. My guess is she’ll be consistently beaming, no matter how far she’s sat from the Cambridges and how many events the Sussexes don’t get invited to. There could be far bigger stakes at play.

That’s it for now, with more to come next week. Happy Weekend!