Melania Trump’s New Book Is Truly Bad, If Jam-Packed: A Review

“Throughout my life, I have witnessed many extraordinary events and have met incredible people,” Melania Trump writes in her Author’s Note to Melania, preparing her readers for the platitude-ridden tale to come. It’s a cliché in publishing to describe a reaction to a new book by how quickly one read it, how little one put it down, but it’s true that I read Melania in a few uninterrupted hours shortly after its release. This was purely for professional reasons, Skyhorse having declined to furnish VF with an advanced review copy. Unfortunately, I can’t recommend that anyone else do the same.

Over the following 256 pages (if you count the photo insert, broad in space and content), Trump details her life in words—too many, some might say, and not quite the right ones—though they coalesce around certain central themes: feuds, cheering and chanting, motherhood, her special ability to communicate with Donald Trump, weird stuff with world leaders, and limousines.

The book has much of what one would expect from a partner to Donald Trump. There are wobbly depictions of the 2020 election. (She points a finger at “the media, Big Tech, and the deep state,” and perpetuates unfounded claims of “suspicious voting activity.”) She throws some bones to the trad wife movement. (“It was my priority to safeguard his welfare, meticulously attending to every aspect of his life,” she writes of her early marriage and, later, “My career took a back seat to the most important role of all—being a devoted mother.”)

She dedicates much ink to recounting compliments that people have paid her. Following a QVC appearance, “Callers often complimented my style and jewelry: ‘It’s so nice to talk to you. I love your style; I love your jewelry.’” Elsewhere, she writes, “People frequently asked me about my regimen, marveling at the health of my skin.” She notes that she “was pleased to hear my name also being cheered, amid the clamor” after casting her vote for Donald Trump in the 2016 election. (There is so much cheering for the Trumps in this book—so much cheering and chanting and erupting in applause.)

Perhaps it’s also no surprise that Trump, granddaughter of a renowned Slovenian onion breeder and, by her own account, possessor of “a deep appreciation for the finer things in life,” is most comfortable dwelling in those shiny parts. Her origin story brims with childhood anecdotes designed to refute the “bleak and inaccurate picture of my upbringing” in her native Slovenia, from her father’s “exquisite vehicles”—Ford Mustangs, German BMWs, a Ford Cougar XR7, “prestigious Mercedes-Benzes,” a Citroén Maserati SM—to the “private nanny,” an alternative to kindergarten, who made elaborate cakes for her and her sister.

Of arriving in New York on a modeling contract, she writes that the limousine her new employers sent to the airport “exuded elegance. I felt an immediate sense of comfort and ease.” On the night she met Donald at a Kit Kat Club party, she arrived in a “sleek black limo.” She notes the two limousines that she and Trump and Michelle and Barack Obama rode on inauguration day and includes a photograph of herself in the Presidential limo, “The Beast.” Her excitement over the great city of New York is admittedly limited, extending “from the chic boutiques on Madison Avenue to the busy streets in the Financial District.” She lingers on descriptions of her wedding dress and her inauguration outfits. “In my couture gown, I danced with my husband to the timeless melody of Frank Sinatra’s iconic ‘My Way’ at the Liberty Ball and the Freedom Ball.”

Amid the glitter, though, the book is bad.

At times, Trump has the narrative instincts of a hound in a fish store, following her nose from one exciting scent to the next, beginning anecdotes only to abandon them. More than once, I found myself flipping back and forth between Kindle pages, wondering if a paragraph had gone missing. She begins one section with, “It was a Saturday in October, a seemingly normal weekend, when my memories of 9/11 came flooding back.” There have been no memories of 9/11 discussed thus far in the narrative, though she does mention seeing the Twin Towers standing “proudly against the horizon” upon her 1998 arrival to New York. The anecdote to follow moseys first through an explanation of the difference between weekends and weekdays in the White House, and then a scene in which her husband invited her to the situation room during a mission to kill the ISIS militant Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. (President Trump himself has seemed to conflate Hamza and Osama Bin Laden with al-Baghdadi.) It ends with Trump’s memory of giving a medal to the Belgian Malinois, Conan, but the 9/11 connection remains unexplored.

“It was not an easy process,” she writes of gaining US citizenship, declining to elucidate further. In a description of a trip to Japan she mentions that she doesn’t eat raw fish. Why not? I still don’t know. In a chapter detailing her experience of this July’s assassination attempt, she writes that “it had been a relatively quiet Saturday in Bedminster. Barron played sports outside. I was working on finishing my project.” Which project? Couldn’t say. Repetitions abound: “‘I think it’s very sexy for a woman to be pregnant,’ I told the readers of Vogue, making clear that I believe that a pregnant woman is very attractive.”

She pinpoints the origin of the Be Best campaign to the internet bullying targeting her son Barron, which she called “not only cruel but invasive,” specifically a video of Barron that Rosie O’Donnell posted, in which she asked whether he was autistic. “There is nothing shameful about autism,” Melania writes, “but Barron is not autistic.”

It’s a sad account, but one that falls victim to Melania’s tendency to skate over useful information in favor of gassing up her husband. “I felt that she was attacking my son because she didn’t like my husband,” she writes of O’Donnell. “It all began when Donald extended a helping hand to Miss USA, offering her the support she desperately needed to overcome her addiction. His powerful act of kindness not only changed her life but also sent a powerful message: that with compassion and understanding, we can help others rise from their struggles.”

She ends a section on what she describes as the “cancel mob” with an ominous cliffhanger: “As we were soon to learn, cancel culture in America extends far beyond social media and the corporate sector.” However, rather than taking that natural segue into her account of the FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago, she instead takes a rapid detour into her much-discussed section on abortion, which begins with a line straight out of a corporate leadership memoir: “Living my life with a core set of principles provides me with a foundation that leads to consistent and rational decision-making.” Then we get Melania’s twelve paragraphs on abortion—her first public stance on the matter, following years of her husband bragging about overturning Roe v. Wade, and arriving in the final pages of her book—including what reads as a rebuke to Donald Trump’s often-repeated late-term abortion fear-mongering: “It is important to note that historically,” she writes, “most abortions conducted during the later stages of pregnancy were the result of severe fetal abnormalities…” Permission structure granted for any voters who might vote for Trump were it not for those pesky abortion bans, she pivots to explaining the personal indignity she felt when FBI agents looked through her belongings.

In at least one place, she has ripped language from previous interviews and statements without attribution: her description of her whereabouts on January 6 replicate, verbatim, an interview she gave to Fox News in 2022: “Several months in advance, I organized a qualified team of photographers, archivists, and designers to work with me in the White House to ensure perfect execution. As required, we scheduled January 6, 2021, to complete the work on behalf of our Nation.”

Whether these false starts and jerky transitions are the result of speedy writing or a hands-off editing approach is hard to say—in a 2020 call with VF, another Skyhorse author, Alan Dershowitz, described the publisher’s editorial process thusly: “I did my book on Defending the Constitution, the Trump defense; they had it out in three or four days after I finished it.” He described the published books as “first drafts.” (The memoir’s rollout has been unusual. When CNN requested an interview with Trump to coincide with the memoir’s release, a representative from Skyhorse requested a signed NDA and $250,000. CNN declined, and Skyhorse publisher Tony Lyons later called the request a result of “internal miscommunication.)

Trump strides easily through contradictions. “Despite Slovenia being part of communist Yugoslavia, the communism there was different from that of the Soviet Union. Growing up, I felt more connected to our neighbors in Italy or Austria than to other communist countries in Eastern Europe.” Later, she writes, “Growing up under a communist regime, the pervasive surveillance of the state shaped my childhood experience.” She takes aim at trans athletes before making the sweeping statement that, “as many of you may know, I fully support the LGBTQIA+ community.” Even her insistence on the “mess” of the 2020 election begins with a strange couching: “Going into November, I did not know if Donald Trump would win the election. In elections as close as this, it’s difficult to say,”

She has an anonymous tipster’s penchant for semi-blind items, particularly when writing about those who have wronged her—and in Melania, defeat and failure are always at the hands of a nefarious conspiracy or someone else’s incompetence. At a Slovenian modeling competition in the early 1990s, “I couldn’t ignore the buzz surrounding another contestant who seemed to have the right connections,” she writes. “My instincts were correct; the other model won first place.” (Her own success in modeling she attributes to “my professionalism and punctuality.”) The debacle around her 2016 RNC speech, which bore striking similarities to a 2008 speech by Michelle Obama, she blames on the campaign, describing her husband’s lack of awareness: “‘Why was the speech not vetted?’ I asked Donald in frustration. He expressed disappointment and was unable to provide me with an answer…Discovering the team’s failure to perform their duty filled me with a profound sense of betrayal.”

Her reluctance, in some instance, to use proper nouns renders various anecdotes strangely elliptical: “After lengthy negotiations, the CEO of a multinational investment bank decided to terminate discussions about a proposed ‘Melania Trump Technology’ Special Purpose Acquisition Company.” While writing about the Black Lives Matter protests, she doesn’t call George Floyd by name, instead describing him as “a Black Minneapolis resident.” Certain familiar figures, including former Vice President Mike and Karen Pence, are entirely absent.

She rehashes dull and years-old disputes, including a cosmetics distributor who flubbed a contract to put out the defunct skincare line, “Melania Caviar Complexe C6.” (For all her vague gesturing to “all we hoped to accomplish in a second term,” her most concrete goal described in the book: “I hope to have the opportunity to bring excellent skincare products to market in the future under more favorable circumstances.”) She quibbles with not being allowed to take measurements of the White House prior to moving in, and blames the “I really don’t care do u?” jacket incident on Stephanie Grisham, whom she refers to throughout only as “my press secretary.”

It’s Grisham who she blames for her lack of a response to the violence on January 6. “At 2:25pm, I received a text from my press secretary, who was not present in the White House; I don’t know if she was even in DC,” she writes. “I wasn’t aware of the events unfolding at the Capitol building…Had I been fully informed of all the details, naturally, I would have immediately denounced the violence that occurred at the Capitol Building.”

Her reluctance to name names doesn’t extend to celebrity name-dropping, from attendees at her wedding—Shaquille O’Neal, the Clintons, Gayle King, Simon Cowell—to foreign leaders. She still exchanges letters with King Charles, she writes. There’s a misunderstanding with the Pope. (“What do you give him to eat? Potica?,” the Pope asked her, which Melania misheard. “‘Yes, pizza,’” I replied, not fully hearing him. Then I realized he was inquiring about potica, the traditional Slovenian pastry. ‘Oh yes, potica.’”) “‘The media hate us,’ she recalls Sara Netanyahu telling her during a trip to Israel, ‘but the people love us.’” To which Melania replied, “We have that in common.”

There are glimpses of real emotion, most of which concern children, her own and others: she writes about meeting a child awaiting a heart transplant in Greece, and about learning of the surgery’s success. She describes a glossy account of her engagement with the Southern Border. (She didn’t know about the separations! She hadn’t been briefed!) “Can I explain how traumatic it is for a child to witness the attempted murder of his father?” she writes of Barron’s reaction to his father’s shooting in July.

But for the most part, rather than offering illuminating interiority or glimpses into private moments—family discussions about Donald’s decision to run for office, for instance—there are instead interminable tick-tocks of public events, as though she asked Chat GPT for stage directions to her husband’s presidency.

Recounting the day Trump announced his Presidential bid, she describes explaining to Barron, “We’d go together to Dad’s office, and then he would join the family in the lobby and wait for me and Dad to come down the escalator to the mezzanine. Dad would give a speech, and then it would be official.” For the reader’s clarity, she continues, “Although I hadn’t been involved in planning the announcement—those details were managed by Donald, his advisers, and his grown children—the idea was straightforward: Donald and I would descend the escalator, Ivanka would introduce her father, Donald would deliver a brief speech, and then we would all pose for photos onstage.” And, just in case anyone was left wondering about the means by which the couple made it from one floor of a building to another, “Just before 11:00, Donald and I took the elevator down to the mezzanine, where a large, wildly enthusiastic crowd had gathered to greet us…Donald approached the mezzanine railing and looked over the crowd below. He waved and gave two thumbs up before guiding me with his left hand to the escalator. I stepped on [sic] in front of him, and down we went…” Upon seeing the crowd, she quotes her husband: “Wow. Whoa. That is some group of people.”

Readers hoping for an intimate glimpse of the relationship between Mr. and Mrs. Trump, following the earliest moments of their relationship, will be disappointed—perhaps in part because Trump believes she possesses a secret understanding of her husband, fostered from the earliest days of their relationship, and not communicable to the outside world: “As I got to know him better, I realized the public only saw a part of Donald Trump. In private, he revealed himself as a gentleman, displaying tenderness and thoughtfulness,” she writes, going on to describe what reads, lacking further detail, as a potential HIPAA violation. “For example, Donald to this day calls my personal doctor to check on my health, to ensure that I am okay and that they are taking perfect care of me.”

She describes the time, during the aforementioned trip to Israel, when video of the Trumps and the Netanyahus walking together showed Melania swatting—there really is no other word for what she calls “a minor innocent gesture”—her husband’s hand away as he reaches to take hers. She says it’s because all of them couldn’t fit on the red carpet they were walking down, and that she was happy to walk behind them. “When he reached out to offer his hand, I declined, indicating that I was perfectly content walking on my own.” It is a relationship that maybe exists outside the bounds of regular spacial laws, since contrary to the account, the video shows her picking up the pace to walk, definitely, next to him.

If the Trumps ever have meaningful conversations, you won’t find them here, though Melania continues to translate what was left unsaid. Of the 2016 election night, “When we finally returned home on election night, the hour was so late and my exhaustion so profound that any deep discussions about the momentous events—or our suddenly transformed future—seemed beyond reach.” When they do finally have a “private moment,” she remembers telling him, “‘Congratulations,’ I said. ‘What an achievement. All those other people…and you won. You’re the president of the United States of America.” He replies, “And you’re the First Lady…Good luck,” which Melania translates for readers as “I know you’ll excel. Let’s get started.”