It takes a touch of scandal to grab the top spot on Amazon’s top book sales list. And while the S&M sex fantasy Fifty Shades of Grey certainly provided enough shocking transgressions to capture the imaginations—apparently quite vivid ones—of the book-buying public for the better part of the summer, a controversial new title has claimed the top spot: No Easy Day.
No Easy Day: The Firsthand Account of the Mission That Killed Osama bin Laden, isn’t even out yet, but brisk advance sales have landed it at the top of Amazon’s rankings for almost an entire week, enough to signal the end of Fifty Shades of Grey’s streak.
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Written under the pseudonym Mark Owen, No Easy Day has enough debate already that its publication has been moved up a week, from Sept. 11 to Sept. 4. The book has caused a stir not only because of its subject matter, but because its content hadn’t been vetted by the military or state department, which normally seek to have such books purged of any classified information. The U.S. government says it wasn’t even aware of the upcoming book before the rest of the public found out.
While publisher Dutton, an imprint of Penguin Books, planned to keep the author’s real identity under wraps, even reportedly planning to use disguises to cover his appearance and voice during interviews, Fox News and the Associated Press have identified him as a former Navy SEAL named Matt Bissonette.
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