Books by Bill O’Reilly, including his latest best-seller “Old School,” at the Barnes and Noble bookstore on Fifth Avenue in New York.Credit Hilary Swift for The New York Times
The timing of Bill O’Reilly’s latest best-selling book could hardly be more awkward.
The book, “Old School,” is billed as a defense of traditional values, and includes advice on how men should treat women respectfully, not as sex objects. The book went on sale the same week The New York Times reported that Mr. O’Reilly, the Fox News host, had settled suits with five women who had accused him of sexual harassment or verbal abuse.
While Mr. O’Reilly’s critics have pounced on the appearance of hypocrisy — “Loved the part about how to treat women! This guy’s the worst!” one Amazon reviewer wrote — many of his die-hard fans might not care.
“Old School,” which came out on March 28 and was written with Bruce Feirstein, sold 67,500 copies in its first week, according to NPD BookScan, which tracks 85 percent of the print market. It will debut at No. 1 on the New York Times’s hardcover nonfiction best-seller list on April 16.
On Friday, it was among the top 15 books in sales on Amazon and was No. 1 on Barnes & Noble’s nonfiction best-seller list.
“Killing the Rising Sun” topped all adult nonfiction books last year, selling 1,104,389 copies, according to Publishers Weekly.
Patricia Eisemann, the director of publicity for Henry Holt, and Stephen Rubin, the company’s president and publisher, declined to comment when asked if the company would continue to publish Mr. O’Reilly’s books in the aftermath of the new revelations.
“I doubt very much that they would take a drastic action like cutting him loose,” said Mike Shatzkin, the chief executive of Idea Logical Company, a book industry consulting firm. “They’re not going to die if he’s not there, but they certainly would be scrambling to make up the revenue.”
His publishing contract [was canceled ](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/20/us/politics/cpac-milo-yiannopoulos.html) [in February](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/20/us/politics/cpac-milo-yiannopoulos.html) after a video clip resurfaced, in which he condoned sex between adults and teenage boys. By then, the publisher had suffered a public relations debacle
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