Barnes & Noble a week ago said no way to selling copies of O.J.
Simpson's "If I did It" in its stores explaining the book was not expected to
sell well, and this week the answer is still the same despite the fact the book
is now ranked No. 48 on the superstore's online site.
"We still have no plans to stock it in our stores," spokeswoman Mary Ellen
Keating told The Associated Press on Sunday. The book, coming out this fall, can
be purchased through Barnes & Noble.com, or by special order at a Barnes
& Noble store.
Simpson's book was supposed to be published last November by ReganBooks, an
imprint of HarperCollins, with an announced printing of 400,000. But "If I Did
It" was dropped in response to widespread outrage, including from relatives of
murder victims Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman.
But last month, a federal bankruptcy judge awarded rights to the book to
Goldman's family to help satisfy a 38 million U.S. dollar wrongful death
judgment against Simpson. "If I Did It," is being reissued by Beaufort Books, a
small press based in New York. The Goldmans are calling the book a confession,
and extensive commentary will be added to the original manuscript.
Eric Kampmann, the owner and president of Beaufort Books, questioned Barnes
& Noble's reason for not stocking the book, telling the AP in a recent
interview that he suspects the superstore's executives were "making their
decision based on the HarperCollins experience, which was a totally different
situation."
A rival chain, Borders Group Inc., will stock the book, but, according to
spokeswoman Ann Binkley, "will not promote or market the book in any way."
Interest soared last week after TV host Oprah Winfrey announced that on Sept.
13 she would bring together Denise Brown, Nicole Brown Simpson's sister; and
Goldman's parents, Fred and Kim Goldman. Brown has accused the Goldmans of
hypocrisy for publishing a book that he had called "disgusting and despicable"
when Simpson first planned to publish it.