Hunter Biden , the son of President Joe Biden, announced on Thursday that his memoir will be released on April 6, as reported by the Associated Press . It will be titled Beautiful Things and focus on the youngest Biden son’s struggles with substance abuse. Biden’s personal issues became a target for Republicans during the 2020 presidential election, with former President Donald Trump also taking issue with his business dealings and the Justice Department investigating his finances.
Biden is the president’s oldest surviving child after his older brother Beau passed away from brain cancer in 2015. The title of Beautiful Things refers to a phrase he and Beau would say to each other following the diagnosis, a way to encourage them to remember the important things in life.
The memoir has already been read by several high-profile authors, including Stephen King, Dave Eggers and Anne Lamott, with King describing it as “heartbreaking and quite gorgeous.”
“In his harrowing and compulsively readable memoir, Hunter Biden proves again that anybody — even the son of a United States President — can take a ride on the pink horse down nightmare alley. Biden remembers it all and tells it all with a bravery that is both heartbreaking and quite gorgeous. He starts with a question: Where’s Hunter? The answer is he’s in this book, the good, the bad, and the beautiful,” King wrote.
In a snippet from the book, Biden describes his family as “forged by tragedies and bound by a remarkable, unbreakable love.” The president and first lady released a statement in which they wrote of their admiration for their son’s strength in speaking so openly about his addictions and hope that it will help those dealing with their own personal struggles.
President Biden regularly came to his son’s defense while on the campaign trail in 2020. During his debate against Trump, the former vice president brushed aside the attack and spoke about how proud he was of his son for overcoming addiction.
The younger Biden’s time as a lawyer and a lobbyist was connected to Trump’s first impeachment. In 2014, Biden joined the board of the Ukrainian gas company Burisma. During this period, his father was serving as vice president and playing a role in the Obama administration’s foreign policy in the region. Biden was accused by Trump and others of taking advantage of his father’s position and of corruption, allegations which were unsubstantiated. In 2019, Trump was impeached by the House after it was revealed that he had pressured the Ukrainian president to announce an investigation into the Biden family, but he was acquitted in the Senate.