Huge surge in ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ sales after author JD Vance’s selection as veep candidate

Harper Collins is printing hundreds of thousands of copies to fill the demand

Vance holds a copy of his book ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ as he meets voters in his hometown after announcing his 2022 Senate run (AP Photo/Jeff Dean)

Donald Trump's selection of JD Vance as his running mate has led to a surge in sales for “Hillbilly Elegy,” his best-selling memoir that originally came out in 2016.

A spokesperson for Harper Collins told The Associated Press that more than 600,000 copies have been sold since Trump's announcement on July 15.

The total includes physical books, audio books and e-books.

“We are printing hundreds of thousands of copies to fill the demand at our retail partners,” the publisher announced on Thursday.

Vance's book already was a million seller before Trump chose him for the Republican ticket.

His journey from self-described hillbilly to Yale Law School student was documented in the memoir.

“I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve accomplished nothing great in my life, certainly nothing that could justify a complete stranger spending money to read about,” writes Vance in the introduction to the book which has now become a kind of prophecy.

“I am not a senator, a governor, or a cabinet secretary.”

Books Hillbilly Elegy

The adaptation “Hillbilly Elegy,” which Ron Howard adapted into a feature film released in 2020, tells of Vance's childhood in Ohio and his family's roots in rural Kentucky.

The drama stars Amy Adams as Vance’s mother Bev, and Glenn Close as his grandmother Mawmaw. Vance himself was an executive producer on the movie, and is portrayed by actor Gabriel Basso. The film was described by The Independent’s critic Clarisse Loughrey as “a sickeningly irresponsible parade of death and despair”. It was given a one star review.

Forbes’ writer Scott Mendelson wrote that the film “plays like ‘privileged’ Hollywood outsiders looking in with pity so as to assuage their white liberal guilt. By ignoring the very specific politics and personal observations that made the book allegedly valuable as a memoir, the film negates its very reason for existing.”

After Donald Trump's victory in 2016, the book was widely cited as essential reading for Trump opponents trying to understand his appeal to working class whites, even as some critics faulted at as a narrow and misleading portrait of Appalachia and of poverty in the United States.