July 13, 2020

"'The House,' she writes, capitalizing it like this throughout, giving it a special, sort of sinister air, 'seemed to grow colder as I got older.'"

"She takes us in, past the neglected cement slab of a porch, into the library with studio family photos on the shelves but no books, down into the basement with fluorescent lights and black-and-white tile, 'an old upright piano that stood largely ignored because it was so badly out of tune it wasn’t even worth playing,' and 'my grandfather’s life-sized wooden Indian chief statues that were lined up against the far wall like sarcophagi,' as she describes. 'Across from the stairs, a huge mahogany bar, fully stocked with barstools, dusty glasses, and a working sink but no alcohol, had been built in the corner—an anomaly in a house built by a man who didn’t drink. A large oil painting of a black singer with beautiful, full lips and generous, swaying hips hung on the wall behind it. Wearing a curve-hugging gold-and-yellow dress with ruffles, she stood at the microphone, mouth open, hand extended. A jazz band made up entirely of black men dressed in white dinner jackets and black bow ties played behind her. The brasses glowed, the woodwinds glistened. The clarinetist, a sparkle in his eyes, looked straight out at me. I would stand behind the bar, towel slung over my shoulder, whipping up drinks for my imaginary customers. Or I would sit on one of the barstools, the only patron, dreaming myself inside that painting.' It’s these types of keen peeks into private places that give this book its oomph. We’re in the House."

From "'He Is and Always Will Be a Terrified Little Boy'/Mary Trump has not indicted her uncle. She has indicted the whole family. And that might be even more valuable" (Politico)

"She" = Mary Trump, describing Trump's childhood home.

74 comments:

Marcus Bressler said...

Joining the ranks of Patti Reagan and others, this attention whore thinks she dishes and tells, but her NDA-non-compliant book is just another attempt at making money with "another Trump bombshell that will do him in this time" and is best used as an alternative during the toilet paper shortage that still seems to be going on.

THEOLDMAN

Orange Man Bad has now become "Orange Family Bad"

Owen said...

Based on that florid excerpt of her prose, she has indicted herself, her ghost writers and her editors, for capital offenses against good literary taste. I cannot wait to not read the rest of it.

Seriously: did she prepare for this act of creation with years of entries in the Worst Faulkner Imitation contest?

Kai Akker said...

From that one scene of description, it sounds pretty ordinary. Everyone had to have a bar in the basement, in the Rec Room.

MD Greene said...

So Politico prefers books that make Trump look bad? Who knew?

Kai Akker said...

Skimmed the article. Since most of the overly impassioned accusations we make include a healthy bit of projection, Mary Trump seems like a scared, unloved little girl grown older but never quite up.

wendybar said...

So Mary got nothing for an inheritance (and a drunk for a Dad) and is jealous of Ivanka. Jealousy is an ugly thing.

Amadeus 48 said...

That little girly has Daddy issues that she has projected on her more famous uncle. Sad or bad? Both?

It takes a special kind of crazy to expose yourself this way.

Amadeus 48 said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Howard said...

Another boring, impotent chapter in the get Trump saga. The best thing about it is watching you people foam at the mouth to defend every minor detail with some sort of Rube Goldberg style logic machine. Now That's Entertainment!

MayBee said...

Hahahahaha. Imagine buying and reading this book.

ps. I think Mary Trump read Ann Patchett's The Dutch House

Nichevo said...

"Mary Trump has not indicted her uncle. She has indicted the whole family. And that might be even more valuable" (Politico)


How does any human talk about any other human like that? I mean, in public, for public approbation? It's movie-villain talk.

stevew said...

Let's skip ahead to the sex parts, like when Sonny has sex with Lucy at the wedding in "The Godfather".

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

If you hate Trump - does this book appeal to you?

Who will buy this book?

Is this book for the media only? the real Trump hate shovelers?

Kai Akker said...

I did like this bit from the Politico writer:

"I was especially interested in the book because of a story I wrote in 2017.....Here’s how I started it:"

LOL. And was it about a pathological narcissist by any chance?

Joan said...

Why would a family of racists have a big painting of a black female jazz singer backed by an all-black band hanging in their rec room?

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Someone writes a book that trashed Trump.

Media uses is for their "news"

tim in vermont said...

“He is and will always be...” said the therapist about a man she has never treated.

The hidden story is that she is proclaiming her profession a fraud, that change is not possible, and that we are all immutably prisoned by our childhood experiences.

Eleanor said...

One of the things that's most interesting about going to large family reunions is comparing the states of the cousins. One of their parents shares the same genetic pool as all of the others and was brought up in the same home. The aunts and uncles made different choices in life, one of which was to add different people to the pool. While there may be some sibling rivalry among the aunts and uncles, they had the tempering influence of growing up in the same household and if they were in a functional family, made some bonds to each other. The cousins, on the other hand, may have grown up living close by or maybe only see each other when there's a family reunion. If Mary had been Donald's child instead, would she be all that different? Is it the Trump genes that make Ivanka who she is, her mother's, or the different household?

Ann Althouse said...

Let me pick on one observation: “piano that stood largely ignored because it was so badly out of tune it wasn’t even worth playing.”

That’s plainly bad reasoning. I don’t trust this lady’s powers of inference.

First, not being worth playing isn’t something that happens when the piano is BADLY out of tune. If you care about playing the piano you object if it is out of tune at all.

Second, if anyone in the house wants to play the piano, you get the piano tuned. So if the piano is badly out of tune, it’s probably because no one in the house can play and wants to play.

So there’s nothing amiss in having a piano and not keeping it in tune! It’s very unlikely that there’s anyone in the house who could play and wants to play but is IGNORING the piano because it’s out of tune.

The writer is misinterpreting evidence and showing bias.

Kai Akker said...

"The writer is misinterpreting evidence and showing bias." [AA]

Noooo! Cannot be.

BamaBadgOR said...

My nieces and nephews know very little about me. Mary Trump doesn't know much about her uncle either.

Sebastian said...

"The writer is misinterpreting evidence and showing bias."

Now that's funny.

Next, you're gonna tell us about unrealizable narrators and bad faith.

I'm trying to think of what a 19-years-younger niece of mine could know about me and my upbringing.

gilbar said...

Hell hath no fury, like a lady denied her inheritance

Chris N said...

The doorknob was covered in greasy fingerprints. A cupboard door was ajar. It would probably never close.

Two little shakers stood watch. Their colored faces frozen in a smile. Their grotesque brown bodies promising salt and pepper service for eternity.

This was where little Trumpitler barked breakfast orders at his mother.

This was the kitchen.

-Scoops O’Hanrahan (Keeper Of The Flames Of Equity, Social Justice & Global Feelings)

gilbar said...

yes, but
“piano stood ignored, so it was badly out of tune"

doesn't sound as damning ( know LOTS of people's pianos like this)

gilbar said...

a huge mahogany bar, fully stocked with barstools, dusty glasses, and a working sink but no alcohol, had been built in the corner—an anomaly in a house built by a man who didn’t drink.

Let me guess. Mary is a 'social drinker', like her father; and Her Real HATRED of the family...
is that the rest of them don't drink (and, by "don't drink"; i mean aren't drunks like her)

Wince said...

She reminds me of Jack Nicholson in The Shining talking to the ghost/apparition bartender, Lloyd, in the mysteriously restored "Gold Room".

"Hi, Lloyd. A little slow tonight, isn't it?"

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Out of tune piano = Impeach!

Schitt has the goods... tonight on Maddow.

pacwest said...

So Trump grew up in the Bates Motel?

mikee said...

I, for one, recognize that family relations can be difficult, and that exposure of past family relations is an exercise in self abuse. Nobody else at the family dinner need participate when the talkative relative starts up again about who was supposed to inherit the armoire, or why grandmother liked one child more. Just go on with eating, and eventually, without attention paid, the instigator of fecal agitation will shut down.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

How many more TRUMP HATE BOOKS, for the media to discuss, will come out before the election?

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

"He Is and Always Will Be a Terrified Little Boy'/Mary Trump has not indicted her uncle. She has indicted the whole family. And that might be even more valuable" (Politico)"

Well, it would be if anyone outside of the frozen chosen noticed. When do they stop talking to themselves and try to convince, rather than anger, others?

Quayle said...

“ Second, if anyone in the house wants to play the piano, you get the piano tuned. So if the piano is badly out of tune, it’s probably because no one in the house can play and wants to play.“

Ann, you’re missing her point. The piano is, and always will be, out of tune.

MikeR said...

Same problem I have with Bolton memoir. The selling point here has to be, Orange Man Bad. Otherwise who wants to read it? So the author has a tendency, nay, a requirement, to make stuff up to make the book more interesting - if it isn't already interesting enough.
That means there is no way for me to tell if one word is true.

Michael K said...

The best thing about it is watching you people foam at the mouth to defend every minor detail with some sort of Rube Goldberg style logic machine

Writes the Biden voter.

Ray - SoCal said...

I am surprised this is in the article:
forged the personality of one of the most consequential presidents ever

Per the author, what is consequential about Trump's Presidency?

I thought Trump was a failure, and has done nothing positive as President, and everything positive that has happened was due to St. Obama?

Michael K said...

But she also holds a Ph.D. in psychological studies.

There it is again. "Studies." Does that mean the same as all the other "Studies" degrees? I've never heard of a degree like that. Psychology and Clinical Psychology but Psychology Studies ? What the hell is that ?

Ice Nine said...

Did she ever say anything (from what has been reported) that is especially damaging or scandalous about DJT? If she did, I missed it.

TexasDude said...

I guess Mary was forced to go to the White House and smile for pictures.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8502229/Donald-Trumps-niece-wrote-explosive-memoir-sits-Resolute-Desk-Oval-Office.html

DaveL said...

A lot of presidents have had monsters as mother or father. FDR's mother, JFK's father, for example. It may have pushed them into politics to prove they are worthy to their uncaring parent.

The lesson learned may be that we should never let Chelsea Clinton or any Kennedy near any position of power.

Darrell said...

The Bidens were into scat. For three generations.

wild chicken said...

"very unlikely that there’s anyone in the house who could play"

Used to be if you had a party there'd be at least one guest who could play. And you might even encourage him to play. Or several players; each one plays that song they still know.

Fred Trump either stopped having parties, or the guests couldn't play, or the other guests started saying oh not again. By then the tuning's shot anyway and someone spilt Seagram and Seven on the keys.

Lots of changes in the last 50 years.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

where are the tell-all Biden family books?

You know - the books about Joe's life of lies and money-whoring?

crickets.


wildswan said...

A book to match the year - the year 2020.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

I believe it was C.S. Lewis who said that God gave us families so that we could learn to get along with people we don't like.

Unknown said...


There is no ready audience for a salacious book about my relatives. But if there were, I’d like to think that I wouldn’t stoop to writing it.

Yancey Ward said...

I feel some pity for Mary Trump. It can't have been easy to grow up with an alcoholic father her first 16 years of life, and then have him die of it. I think the first instinct is to blame the father if the rest of the extended family isn't any better off, but if they are better off, it is far easier to transfer that blame to them. It is all too human.

Sam L. said...

l should care???? Not gonna do that.

Skeptical Voter said...

Ah a book that indicts the whole family! Outflipping standing! I'm waiting for something indictng the rumrunner and his descendants. You know the good old Irish of Boston and Hyannisport. I especially want to hear all of the "juicy" details re Marilyn Monroe and Chappaquidick.

It takes a village of ghostwriters to make these trasharoos marketable.

tommyesq said...

A large oil painting of a black singer with beautiful, full lips and generous, swaying hips hung on the wall behind it. Wearing a curve-hugging gold-and-yellow dress with ruffles, she stood at the microphone, mouth open, hand extended. A jazz band made up entirely of black men dressed in white dinner jackets and black bow ties played behind her.

Dog-whistle much?

Michael K said...


Blogger DaveL said...

A lot of presidents have had monsters as mother or father. FDR's mother, JFK's father, for example. It may have pushed them into politics to prove they are worthy to their uncaring parent.


That's a good point. Not just presidents. Read about Churchill's childhood.

As for Biden's family, read "Profiles in Corruption."

donald said...

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GrL1dMcDud8

A song about a piano.

~ Gordon Pasha said...

Looks like Eleanor Roosevelt made more of her (similar) family history than Mary Trump then. I'd rather study success.

hombre said...

Howard: “Another boring, impotent chapter in the get Trump saga. The best thing about it is watching you people foam at the mouth to defend every minor detail with some sort of Rube Goldberg style logic machine. Now That's Entertainment!”

Howard the troll spins the comments to pretend that they are about defending Trump in detail. Actually, they are about the sickness manifested by the single-mindedness of TDS in those of Howard’s ilk. They are about the elevation of this pathetic woman to further the takedown of Trump. They reflect the despair felt by normal Americans at the rewriting of our history, the rioting and looting on our streets in the name of some unprovable nonsense labeled “systemic racism”, the acceptance by our ignorant youth and their amoral accomplices in the media and the Democrat Party of the destruction of our culture in favor of the aims of cultural Marxism. The comments reflect disgust at the apparent willingness of Democrats to put the country in the hands of a demented, heretofore incompetent, old grifter in order to perpetuate the swamp and the RINOs who are their consorts.

No wonder the likes of Howie can’t understand. Cognitive dissonance looms large.

Dr Weevil said...

A home-owner who doesn't drink but has a fully-equipped basement bar isn't crazy. Whether it came with the house or not, it will likely increase the resale value of the house, so it's worth keeping. How much it would add depends on the market: what percentage of prospective buyers would expect a basement bar in a house of that size, style, and neighborhood in that era? A high percentage in those days, I think.

Similarly, I have an elderly uncle in western Illinois who hated air conditioning in cars. He much preferred opening the windows, even in the hottest weather. Nevertheless, he always bought his cars with air conditioning installed, because the extra purchase cost was far outweighed by the increase in trade-in value, since everyone else wanted a/c. He would turn it on twice a year just to make sure it worked. Made sense to me.

Gk1 said...

You would think the market for anti-trump porn would be over saturated by now. Think of all the dead trees these liberals are responsible for.

Amadeus 48 said...

In the immortal words of Wanda Gershwitz to Archie Leach, Mary Trump has “studied aspects of” your psychology system.

Readering said...

I guess AA has never lived in a home with a piano.

MadTownGuy said...

BleachBit-and-Hammers said...
"How many more TRUMP HATE BOOKS, for the media to discuss, will come out before the election?"

As many as the DNCC figures it will take. But I smell desperation on their part.

Howard said...

I can always tell when I've hit the target Center Mass when an old fool who has the temerity to call himself an hombre writes a detailed book report with twenty-seven 8 x 10 colored Glossy photographs with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of Each one explainin' what each one was, to be used as evidence against us

I feel like I'm a marionette that operates strings via electrons over the interwebs

Gospace said...

Unknown said...

There is no ready audience for a salacious book about my relatives. But if there were, I’d like to think that I wouldn’t stoop to writing it.


I was just going to read comments without adding until I saw this. I have one Trump hating liberal Facebook friend who did just that. Apparently he went to my HS. When he friend requested me I messaged another friend and asked “Who is this person?” Answer back was “He used to hang around with J, You met him.” Any such encounter is not in my 65 year old memory bank. Apparently all the abuse he suffered is the defining part of his life, and responsible for all his adult problems. I have not read his book.

His sister is on Facebook. I friend requested her and asked in messaging. Poppycock, he suffered no abuse was the basic gist of her response. She’s a conservative Trump supporter.

Could I write a tell all book about my family? Let’s see. Parents divorced when I was 10. Mom got custody. Within a year she was a complete alcoholic. All kinds of little vignettes could be told about that. Constant screaming matches between my older sister and her about the drinking until my sister finally ran off to live with another relative. After that there was calm in the home until I graduated HS. I learned early on from my reading (Thanks , Heinlein.) that I was responsible for my behavior and no one else’s. I’m anonymous here unless someone wants to dox me and researches me. I don’t think my closest HS friends ever figured it out. No one ever asked why I never suggested getting together at my place. Of course I was the only one living in an apartment and not a house. And they likely figured that was why,

My upbringing, as it was, is why I have zero sympathy for anyone blaming their childhood for their adult problems. You’re responsible for your behavior, not me, not your parents, and certainly not the government.

Doing family genealogy has convinced me even more of that. From the starting point of my sixth great-grandfather I have traced over 1700 descendants with his surname. Both white and black, and a few others that I guess in today’s world would be mixed race. Among the white descendants there are doctors,lawyers, missionaries and preachers, someone nominated for vice-president on the Prohibition Party platform along with prohibition era rumrunners (my grandfather), airmen, sailors, and soldiers, privates through colonels, no flag rank yet, and guests in some of our finer government institutions such as San Quentin. Among the black descendants? Exactly the same thing, but less prestigious institutions similar to San Quentin. And one of the airmen I’ll note was a Tuskegee Airman.

It’s not where you start or what you start with, it’s what YOU do with what you got.

Donald John Trump has done pretty well. His brother Fred Trump Jr? Not so much.

Readering said...

Read the book, then your comments on it will hold my interest. The book reviews have been favorable.

Ann Althouse said...

"I guess AA has never lived in a home with a piano."

How do you figure that?

I have a beautiful antique piano, and I get it tuned when someone's going to be around who plays it, but I let it fall out of tune when nobody's playing it. My statement above is from experience. You have to call the tuner out to the house and have him work on the piano and you don't do it if there's no one around who wants to play. But if someone was around who wanted to play, I'd have the tuner out. I wouldn't have a dysfunctional situation whether there's someone who would play but is "ignoring" the piano because it's out of tune!

Michael K said...

I feel like I'm a marionette that operates strings via electrons over the interwebs

Howard, you remind me of a marionette but the strings lead to the same place Joe Biden's strings go.

Howard said...

Doc Quack provides the secondary explosions. Thanks! Some of the strings must work via the Higgs boson's mate

readering said...

I grew up with a piano. my mother played beautifully and her three children took lessons but had little talent. It got out of tune easily but my parents did not get a tuner in every time it got somewhat out of tune. It could still be played until badly out of tune. Admittedly folks as rich as the Trumps could have paid to have a tuner in regularly if they cared enough. In any event Mary Trump's description makes sense.

readering said...

TRO lifted in fairly scathing opinion.

Michael K said...

Some of the strings must work via the Higgs boson's mate

"The Higgs boson is an evanescent particle expiring after nanoseconds, while the Higgs ratchet seems to be a robust phenomenon, which has alternately been identified as “Governmentium” on the periodic table of the elements:

The heaviest chemical element yet known to science. Governmentium (Gv) has 1 neutron, 12 assistant neutrons, 75 deputy neutrons, and 224 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312.

These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons. Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert. However, it can be detected as it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact. A minute amount of Governmentium causes one reaction to take over four days to complete when it would normally take less than a second. Governmentium has a normal half-life of three years; it does not decay, but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutrons exchange places.

In fact, Governmentium mass will actually increase over time, since each reorganization will cause some morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes.

When catalyzed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium–an element which radiates just as much energy as Governmentium since it has half as many peons but twice as many morons."

You're welcome.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

Mary claims the piano was not tuned. But, do we know this to be the case? How? Cause she said so? She is a unreliable witness. As the good professor has stated, the piano might have been left untuned because there was no one who could play it. Or perhaps it was something much more sinister. I speculate that someone did want to play it, but that person was such a horrible pianist that the piano was left untuned in order to discourage that person from playing. And that person was Mary.

Paul Doty said...

I'd like to read some perspective on her weak, alcoholic father. Despite multiple efforts and interventions by his family, he apparently despised his daughter so much that he drank himself to death to escape her.

DavidD said...

"Valuable."

Meh. YMMV.

Tina Trent said...

Mary Trump and her brother did receive small fortunes from their grandfather's estate. Both got several hundred thousand in cash, more at his death, and also substantial real estate holdings. The lawsuits were over not getting the same amount as their aunts and uncles. They were settled by some arrangement that got them more money but cut them out of co-ownership of property, a reasonable arrangement. Mary's brother has disputed her accusations, saying his ill son is well cared-for by the family.

It's odd to be accusatory towards a newborn baby. She has a Ph.D. in clinical psychology but no license to practice. She advertises as a life coach, something like a cross between an astrologer and an interior designer. Less practical than piano-tuning.

Aggie said...

The whole thing reads like she's trying to channel into Citizen Kane

Joanne Jacobs said...

Using a basement bar for non-alcoholic drinks is not bizarre. Those of us who drink diet soda (there is a Fresca shortage!!!) like our beverages, ice, glasses, etc.

I'm always amused by the theory that Fred and Donald Trump are responsible for Mary's father's death from alcoholism, because they pressured him to join the family business instead of pursuing his dream of being a airline pilot. He would have done better as an alcoholic airline pilot?