Bill O'Reilly spent a minute of the June 24 O'Reilly Factor complaining that Killing Reagan, a book he co-wrote with Martin Dugard that publishes in September, was not included in Publishers Weekly's Fall Adult Announcements Issue.
During his comments, he made several inaccurate statements—among them, that his publisher had contacted PW to ask why Killing Reagan wasn't included in the issue, and that PW "had no answer."
This is untrue.
On June 23, the publicity director of Holt, O'Reilly's publisher, emailed PW's reviews director, Louisa Ermelino, to ask why the book wasn't mentioned in the issue. Ermelino responded the afternoon of the 23rd, explaining why the book wasn't chosen.
(If you're not familiar with PW's announcements issues, they are twice-yearly previews—one done for spring and summer books, one done for fall and winter—which include curated lists of upcoming titles in 16 categories.)
Also, O'Reilly said that Killing Patton, the previous book he co-wrote with Dugard, was "the bestselling tome... in 2014" and that it had "outsold every other contemporary book by 50%, that's how big the margin of victory was."
In fact, according to Nielsen BookScan, Killing Patton was the fifth bestselling print book of 2014, behind The Fault in Our Stars by John Green, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul by Jeff Kinney, and Divergent and Insurgent by Veronica Roth.
(These figures don't include e-book sales, as there is no reliable source for e-book sales.)
O'Reilly concluded by saying that "PW, essentially run by liberal people, they don't like Ronald Reagan, they don't want you to know about Ronald Reagan."
For the record, we are fine with Ronald Reagan and also are happy to know that our readers are aware of his existence and presidency. We've reviewed many books about Reagan and the Reagan era, including six books since January 2014. You can read those reviews here:
Reagan: The Life by H.W. Brands
The Reagan Era: A History of the 1980s by Dough Rossinow
Landslide: LBJ and Ronald Reagan at the Dawn of a New America by Jonathan Darman
The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan by Rick Perlstein
Reagan at Reykjavik: The Weekend That Ended the Cold War by Ken Adelman
11 Principles of a Reagan Conservative by Paul Kengor