Kitty Kelley eyeing next biography subject

Politicians, beware. Kitty Kelley is on the prowl and looking for her next subject for a book. 

The author behind controversial tell-alls ranging from Oprah Winfrey to former President George W. Bush says, “I am looking for that engrossing biography and I have to choose carefully because they take me so long to do.”

But before she finds that special someone, Kelley has another task at hand: getting the word out about her latest tome, Capturing Camelot: Stanley Tretick’s Iconic Images of the Kennedys.

The book is a collection of photos — Kelley says at least 70 percent are never-before-seen — of the late president taken by Tretick, who bequeathed a collection of Kennedy mementos to his friend Kelley when he died in 1999.

The hardcover, the proceeds and royalties from which are all going to the D.C. Public Library, is a complete 180 for the 70-year-old author, who’s used to ruffling feathers with the release of her highly hyped biographies. While Kelley says it’s “kind of nice” not to “get beat up, to have the White House press secretary saying that you just wrote garbage, to have the head of the Republican National Committee go nuts,” she contends this isn’t the start of a kinder, softer version of herself.

“I still love biography,” she purred at a soiree celebrating the book’s publication held last week at the Washington home of Marina and Daniel Ein.

Before she began her career as an author, Kelley, a longtime D.C. resident, worked as a press secretary for former Sen. Eugene McCarthy (D-Minn.). The scribe says with a laugh, “I was a wonk. I read the Congressional Record.” She calls that time “absolutely fabulous,” saying, “There was not the divisiveness there is today. There was socializing with Democrats and Republicans.”

She fondly remembers the “mad crush” she had on a particular lawmaker, which started outside a senators-only elevator at the Capitol. Former “[Sen. Thomas Dodd (D-Conn.)] was standing there and the elevator came. I didn’t know who it was and I started to get on the elevator and the [attendant] said, ‘I’m sorry.’ ”

Kelley continues, “Sen. Dodd was so gracious and said, ‘Come on, come down with me.’ I don’t think that would happen today.” 

These days, the writer’s output seems as quick as her spitfire personality. She’s already working on another book using Tretick’s photographs to mark the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington.

But another bio is still on her brain. “Paula Broadwell could sit down with Gen. [David] Petraeus and write and write and write and then hand it to him and say, ‘Yes, sir. No, sir. Whatever you want in there, sir.’ But I don’t do that. So it has to be someone special, really special.”

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