The biggest news story of 1997 was the death of Princess Di. I'm largely ambivalent towards the story. My opinion is the paparazzi involved in the accident should be shot while at the same time the story received way too much attention. The amount of coverage was semi-nauseating. Once someone's been dead for over a week it's pretty much not news at that point.

Fully-nauseating was the deluge of people looking to cash in on the story. Within a month of her death our shelves were plastered with hastily written biographies. I really can't recall how many different titles there were, it was a lot. They all sold regardless of quality, the non-fiction best sellers list had 3-5 of these books on it throughout the fall. It was quite lecherous, these overnight biographers weren't much better than the sleazes that chased her to her death. Both were looking to feed off the accomplishments, and suffering, of others.

Locally we experienced a similar phenomenon when Chicago Cardinal Bernadin passed away in late 1996. His book, "A Gift of Peace", sold in incredible quantities after his death.