Harry tell-all book ‘Spare’ sells record 1.4 m copies on day one

A bookseller displays copies of “Spare” by Britain's Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, at Daunt Books on Marylebone High Street in London. After months of anticipation and a blanket publicity blitz, Prince Harry's autobiography “Spare” went on sale in Britain as royal insiders hit back at his scorching revelations - AFP

LONDON, AFP: Prince Harry’s autobiography “Spare” sold 1.4 million English-language copies on its first day in the UK, United States and Canada, smashing Penguin Random House’s sales record, the publisher said on Thursday.

The figures come as the first opinion poll since the memoir’s publication showed Harry’s popularity in the UK continuing to nosedive.

The headline-grabbing book was published Tuesday, accompanied by four high-profile promotional interviews with the prince.

The sales outstrip Penguin Random House’s previous first-day non-fiction record for Barack Obama’s “A Promised Land”.

That sold 887,000 copies in the United States alone on its first day in 2020. In France, the French edition, launched with a print run of 210,000, is being reprinted with an additional 130,000 copies, publisher Fayard told AFP.

Demand from booksellers was about 20% higher than for Obama’s presidential memoirs, it added. Revelations in Harry’s blockbuster book have included claims Prince William physically attacked him in a row in 2019 and that the once-close brothers begged their father not to marry his wife, Queen Consort Camilla.

The 38-year-old former soldier also said he had killed 25 Taliban during his time in Afghanistan, sparking condemnation from military personnel and the Taliban.

Parts of the book were widely leaked but its contents have continued to fill airtime and newspaper and online pages.

Random House Group President and Publisher Gina Centrello, said in a statement that “Spare” was far more than a celebrity memoir.

The book is one of a number of lucrative contracts struck by Harry and his American wife Meghan cashing in on their royal connections. The couple dramatically quit royal life and moved to California in 2020 and have complained bitterly about their treatment in the UK.