Controversial Author Clifford Irving Publishes 12 Rare Books on Kindle & Nook

ASPEN, Colo., March 28, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Best-selling author Clifford Irving, once the most newsworthy writer in America, announced that a dozen of his books, including the notorious Autobiography of Howard Hughes, and Jailing, his unpublished prison journal, are released through Amazon's Kindle and Barnes & Nobles's Nook book platforms.

Irving's books, long out of print, were transformed to digital format as a birthday present by his son who was 11 at the time of his father's jailing.

"This Kindle project," Irving said from his mountain home near Aspen, "was conceived and set up by my Atlanta-based, computer-savvy son, Josh. He told me it was time to share my books with a younger audience who haven't read them."

Irving's books appeal to art lovers, publishing industry observers, lawyers and readers of true crime novels, courtroom drama and western fiction.

Irving is the author of 20 published books, among them New York Times best-sellers Daddy's Girl, Fake!, Trial, and Final Argument.

Fake!, the book, was the basis for Orson Welles' "F For Fake," the film genius's final movie. Withdrawn from sale because of lawsuits by art market moguls, and rarely available now at less than $250 a hardback copy, Fake! continues to have a worldwide cult following. This 2012 edition includes a freshly updated 30 page Author's Postscript.

Irving is best known for a book that has not officially been published -- until now.

The Autobiography of Howard Hughes, the 1972 hoax that brought the eccentric billionaire storming out of seclusion to halt its publication, earned Irving 16 months of federal prison time. Tens of thousands of copies of the hardback were destroyed by publishers McGraw-Hill exactly 40 years ago, and since then, until now through Kindle, the book has never been published in the USA other than in a private edition.

The scandal was the basis for the 2007 Lasse Hallstrom film starring Richard Gere as Clifford Irving, and furthered a notoriety to the author's name that remains to this day.

Biographers of Hughes claim this book caused the downfall of Richard Nixon because Nixon's fear of the truth in the manuscript caused him to order the doomed burglary of Democratic Party headquarters at the Watergate.

Except for a private 1998 edition (selling for $350 and up when a copy surfaces), this is the first publication of the Hughes autobiography in the USA.

The L.A. Times called Clifford Irving "a master."

The new, digital editions include:

• I Remember Amnesia, a new novel about murder in East Hampton.

• Bloomberg Discovers America, the Depression-era adventures of a wandering Jew in the Deep South. A previously unpublished novella.

• Tom Mix and Pancho Villa, an updated version of the fact-based saga whose publication caused screenwriter Ernest Lehman to write that "Clifford Irving takes his place among the giants of contemporary literature."

• Best-selling courtroom thrillers Trial and The Spring (both made into movies).

• The Angel of Zin, the disturbing novel of a German homicide detective caught up in the Holocaust which Thomas Keneally (author of Schindler's List) lauded as "absolutely compelling, a totally engrossing thriller."

For more information go to http://www.cliffordirving.com or go to Amazon.

SOURCE Clifford Irving