TheBestseller
Observatory

Best Sellers

Hardcover Fiction

Week of December 13, 1959

FictionNonfiction
WeekMonth
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1
ADVISE AND CONSENT
Allen Drury
Cover of ADVISE AND CONSENT

ADVISE AND CONSENT

by Allen Drury · Doubleday

28 wks at #1 · 18 on list
3
1
EXODUS
Leon Uris
Cover of EXODUS

EXODUS

by Leon Uris · Doubleday

62 wks on list
5
2
THE UGLY AMERICAN
William J. Lederer and Eugene Burdick
Cover of THE UGLY AMERICAN

THE UGLY AMERICAN

by William J. Lederer and Eugene Burdick · W.W. Norton and Company

60 wks on list

The multi-million-copy bestseller that blends truth and fiction in a “devastating indictment of American policy” (New York Times Book Review). A piercing exposé of American incompetence and corruption in Southeast Asia, The Ugly American captivated the nation when it was first published in 1958. The book introduces readers to an unlikely hero in the titular “ugly American”—and to the ignorant politicians and arrogant ambassadors who ignore his empathetic and commonsense advice. In linked stories and vignettes set in the fictional nation of Sarkhan, William J. Lederer and Eugene Burdick draw an incisive portrait of American foreign policy gone dangerously wrong—and how it might be fixed. Eerily relevant sixty years after its initial publication, The Ugly American reminds us that “today, as the battle for hearts and minds has shifted to the Middle East, we still can’t speak Sarkhanese” (New York Times).

Historical bestseller data sourced from the New York Times Book Review, archived by Hawes Publications.