Liz Truss’s book about her 49-day stint as prime minister sold 2,228 copies in the UK during its first week on sale, after a wall-to-wall promotional media blitz.
Ten Years to Save the West: Lessons from the Only Conservative in the Room, combines an account of Truss’s time in office with a call to arms for the political right.
Nielsen sales data puts Truss’s effort in 70th place on last week’s bestsellers’ list, outsold by titles such as the Ultimate Air Fryer Cookbook and More Confessions of a Forty-something F**k Up.
By comparison, David Cameron managed to sell about 21,000 copies of his memoir in its first week, while Tony Blair’s autobiography sold 92,000 in the same timeframe.
Although Truss’s figures pale in comparison, she beat both on a copies-sold-per-day-in-Downing-Street basis.
Margaret Thatcher was estimated to have sold 500,000 copies of her memoir but other past occupants of No 10 have
mixed records when it comes to book sales. John Major’s memoir sold just 5,415 copies in its first week but went on to exceed 200,000 in total. Edward Heath’s The Course of My Life struggled to surpass 20,000 copies, while Gordon Brown’s My Life, Our Times sold about 30,000.
The Guardian’s reviewer
described Truss’s book as “one of the most shamelessly unrepentant, petulant, politically and economically jejune and cliche-ridden books I’ve read”.