Matt Hancock’s book sales FLOP as former health secretary tries to launch celebrity career

Book sales for Matt Hancock’s Pandemic Diaries: The Inside Story of Britain’s Battle Against Covid have plummeted following its launch before Christmas.

The book initially entered the Neilson book charts at number 191 earlier this month, but sales dropped so drastically it was knocked from the top 1,000.

Official sales of the I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here finalist’s book topped 3,304 copies during the first week but this sharply decreased to just 600 in the second.

Matt Hancock has been criticised for appearing on reality TV shows
House of Commons

One source told The Mirror: “There are just so many better things to spend £25 on.”

Other reviewers said the book was “self-justification” and “score settling” as one section claims that the successful vaccine rollout was single-handedly down to him.

The book, which was launched on December 6 claims the tragic handling of care home residents was someone else’s fault.

It also claims that the delayed restrictions were the fault of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies along with Public Health England who were to blame for the test and trace system.

One reviewer said simply “his ego got in the way” adding: “Most people I speak to hate him,” while another chimed in saying that his portrayal as an “undervalued genius” was “vanity”.

Other reviewers also mocked Hancock for not writing his own version of events by himself which misrepresents his “inside story” from his perspective.

Matt Hancock is to appear on C4's SAS: Who Dares Wins
Victoria Jones

Hancock is set to appear on Channel 4’s SAS: Who Dares Wins which he was widely criticised for ahead of any official investigation into the government’s handling of the pandemic.

There was uproar from Parliament’s anti-corruption watchdog who said he had broken Government rules by not consulting the body before appearing on reality TV shows.

Mr Hancock argued he did not believe he needed to ask the body’s permission for either show “as the guidelines state that one-off media appearances such as these do not count as an appointment or employment”.