'Hillbilly Elegy': JD Vance's rise to vice presidential candidate began with a bestselling memoir

NEW YORK (AP) — At the heart of JD Vance's swift journey from venture capitalist to vice presidential candidate is a memoir he first thought of in law school, “Hillbilly Elegy.”

Vance's bestseller about his roots in rural Kentucky and blue-collar Ohio made him a national celebrity soon after its publication in the summer of 2016, and became a cultural talking point after Donald Trump's stunning victory that November. The Ohio Republican has since been elected to the U.S. Senate and, as of Monday, chosen as Trump's running mate in the former president's quest for a return to the White House. He is 39, and would be the youngest vice president since Richard Nixon, who served two terms under Dwight Eisenhower, starting in 1953.