CNN International & Domestic

Don Lemon has been very humble tonight and says his new book will help to heal people and America.

So the first few minutes of his show and chat with Cuomo is selling his book.

He's mentioned more than once that unless you're writing a Harry Potter, there's no financial gain from writing a book!

So 10 minutes of product placement with Cuomo suggesting that it would be the perfect book for Oprah's Book Club! If interested, it's already available for preorder at 25 dollars on Amazon.com (and probably every other book outlet)

Wait 6 months and you'll pick it up in Barnes and Noble for 3.99.

"...and now the news at 10pm: My new book! and it's going to help heal America. "

Haha, they let him talk about it for a full 15 minutes. Even I'm a bit surprised.

Seems like a questionable use of his platform as a broadcaster going out to millions of viewers. Should CNN have allowed him to promote his book in this way?

To be fair, they've promoted books by other anchors, and they promoted the film The Outpost that was based on Jake Tapper's book. However, tonight took the biscuit, I doubt we've heard the last about the book either.

Well, they can of course do what they like and promotion is allowed. They frequently flash up the books being sold by commentators and contributors, even Dr. Sanjay Gupta gets a book plug before he talks about Covid these days.

Don framed this around racial injustice and it's obviously a talking point on Martin Luther King Day, so I guess people will be forgiving.

Makes a change from a monologue about Trump, I suppose.

(Something I felt less comfortable with recently was Jon Sopel mentioning his new book at the the end of the BBC Americast podcast last week, even in a jokey "we don't have time to talk about it" way, but they did and mentioned the title.)

It felt more like Don framed it around Don!

Yes, the passage he read didn't feel particularly profound to me, but I guess the whole exercise is primarily to feed the ego. I expect guest appearances on late night and talk shows are in the works.

CNNers are long known for promoting each other's books, but having now watched that show opener, I personally found it grotesque. He'd have been better off appearing on Cuomo's show, not opening his own show with a book promo. Ugh!

Camerota, Acosta, Scuitto, Steltar, Quest, Tapper have all written books over the years, and have all appeared on various shows if the news cycle permits. Keeping it classy is what promoting a book is about and there was nothing classy about what Lemon did last night.

A book I won't be reading. The next book I'll be reading is Brooke Baldwin's.

The days when Don was actually a pretty decent, straight-laced anchor on weekends about a decade or so back feel a long time ago.

He and Cuomo are absolutely the worst bits of CNNUS primetime and act like they not the news are the star.
They really should change the name of Don’s show - first of all because no show going out globally should be called ‘Tonight’ (as there’ll always be somewhere it’s not ‘tonight’) and also because the CNN Tonight name suggests a straight-laced newscast and Don’s show is anything but.

Problem we have is that Zucker is a big fan of Lemon, and so if Zucker sticks around, which he may well do, Lemon won't be going anywhere soon. For those of us that remember, CNN Tonight started out double headed with Lemon and Camerota until the position on New Day came up and CNN Tonight became his own.

It needs a name change as much as it needs an hour cut. It was outrageous when Cooper lost an hour of A360 to the benefit of Lemon.

Don's book seems to be doing alright today...

Last night @DonLemon announced the release date for "This Is the Fire" – this morning it is #1 on Amazon's best sellers list – the book comes out March 16https://t.co/t2tLYJA8Ng

— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) January 19, 2021