Michelle Obama Announces New Memoir, Coming in November

We could all use a respite from the barrage of gaslighting, grifting, doltishness, and despair that has come to signify the past year in Trumplandia. The question is can we survive until November, when a new memoir by former first lady Michelle Obama will hit bookstores.

Obama’s memoir, called Becoming, is set to be released on Nov. 13, just after crucial midterm elections in the U.S., and will be accompanied by U.S. and international book tours, according to publisher Penguin Random House. She and her husband, President Barack Obama, reportedly reached a $30 million publishing deal, according to ABC News. Former President Obama is expected release his presidential memoir in 2019, according to People.

“As First Lady of the United States of America—the first African-American to serve in that role—she helped create the most welcoming and inclusive White House in history, while also establishing herself as a powerful advocate for women and girls in the U.S. and around the world, dramatically changing the ways that families pursue healthier and more active lives, and standing with her husband as he led America through some of its most harrowing moments,” a promo for the book states.

“In her memoir, a work of deep reflection and mesmerizing storytelling, Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her—from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to her years as an executive balancing the demands of motherhood and work, to her time spent at the world’s most famous address,” it adds.

The announcement comes two weeks after the Obamas’ Smithsonian presidential portraits were unveiled during a moving ceremony at the National Portrait Gallery in the nation’s capital. Martha Jones, a professor of history at Johns Hopkins University, described the former first lady’s portrait as “an unmistakable sign of black women’s political power at the start of the 21st century — a power centuries in the making.”

Memoirs follows a 2012 book by Michelle Obama called American Grown, about the White House garden and nutrition program she started.

Earlier this month, she spoke to a sold–out crowd in Indianapolis, IN, where she encouraged her audience to be “kind and open and generous and compassionate,” and to show “empathy for others,” according to The Ball State Daily News.

Hopefully, a few copies of her forthcoming book will be distributed among the current occupants of the White House.