Book Groups and a Chat with Richard Nixon

So here is what I’ve been doing: talking to reading groups about Comeback Love. A couple of groups are considering reading it, and I’ve promised to show up for the discussion. Sounds fascinating, and any other groups interested please be in touch. One group even talks to authors over Skype.

I’ve also been working on my Web site. Over the years people have asked to listen to some of the interviews I’ve done with world leaders, and so now the interviews are up and easier to find.

Each interview has a story surrounding it, but I’ve never written about that, saving those tales for the memoir I’ll probably never write. But here’s one from the Nixon interview.

At the time—June of 1989—I’d heard that the former president did not allow his interviews to be taped—an understandable aversion given the Watergate scandal. Still, I wanted a record of our conversation and figured bringing my tape recorder was a worth a shot. So the door to his office opens, and I stand up, go in, shake his hand, and say hello, and as I’m asking if he’d mind my taping our talk, I dropped my tape recorder—one of those clunky cassette machines—on his foot. Smooth, right? I picked up the recorder, and he smiled at me and said taping would be fine. All in all, he gave me an hour, most of it recorded, but oddly enough, a couple of weeks after the interview, Nixon began to write to me. And that’s a story for another time.