Five things America, and California, might not know about Gavin Newsom

Though Gov. Gavin Newsom’s memoir isn’t available to the public yet, journalists at some national publications who were provided advanced copies published stories this week outlining the contents of the book, which is set to publish later this month. The Sacramento Bee did not receive an advanced copy of the book.

But the stories from the book, “Young Man in a Hurry,” described in other publications suggest Newsom focused on his personal history more than walking readers through key events during his tenure as mayor of San Francisco and governor of California, the decision-point moments that are the fodder of many political memoirs. Some of the episodes highlighted by reporters who read the book are well known to followers of California politics, but some will come as news, or as a blast from the past given the years that have passed since the moments were headlines themselves.

Dyslexia has dogged him throughout his career

Newsom hasn’t entirely hidden that he struggled with dyslexia throughout his career, and that it has made reading from a script challenging for a politician who is known as a skilled off-the-cuff speaker. At his final State of the State address earlier this year, he told lawmakers before his speech that the event was a challenge for him because of the need to stick to prepared remarks.

“When it comes to the written text, that has never served me well,” Newsom said that day. In the book, he is reportedly more candid. He describes being dogged by undiagnosed dyslexia that left him practically unable to read in his childhood, according to Politico.

His mother’s death was a searing event

Newsom’s mother died at age 55, in 2002, after a battle with cancer. Newsom went to her bedside after she chose to pursue an assisted suicide using morphine, according to accounts of the memoir. Newsom held his mother’s hand and cried while she died, The New York Times reported. Newsom at the time was serving on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. He was elected mayor two years later.

An embarrassing photograph was a lapse in judgment

In a 2004 article in the magazine Harper’s Bazaar, Newsom appeared in a photo shoot with his then-wife, Kimberly Guilfoyle, in a photo that became somewhat infamous in California political circles. In the photo, the couple lay entwined on a fancy carpet, wearing dinner attire, in a posh San Francisco home owned by the oil-rich Getty family. It may be hard for the modern reader to grasp that Newsom was once married to Guilfoyle, who went on to throw herself into the Mar-a-Lago world of the Trump family, date Donald Trump Jr., and today is the United States ambassador to Greece.

But that photograph remained on Newsom’s mind as he wrote the book. In the memoir, he describes it as a “gag shot” that backfired mightily, according to The New York Times account. He also says he later fielded grief for the photograph from his sister. Hilary Newsom told the then-mayor he had allowed himself to be influenced into an undesirable look for a government leader by his wife and Ann Getty, according to Politico.

Newsom had an affair with his campaign manager’s wife

Accounts of the memoir suggest Newsom may not treat the marriage kindly overall in the book. “I would go through all the motions until the motions led me right up to the altar,” Newsom writes of the relationship, according to the newspaper. The memoir also covers years after his divorce, when he was San Francisco’s bachelor mayor. It includes a recounting, perhaps to get ahead of opponents’ criticism if he runs for president in 2028, of an affair Newsom had with the wife of his former campaign manager. Newsom describes it as “the stupidest and also briefest of affairs,” in the book, according to Politico.

With Getty backing, Newsom built a successful wine and restaurant business

Newsom has long sought to temper the idea that his success as both a businessman and a politician came through his connections to the Getty family, who he grew up close to because of his father’s role as an adviser to Gordon Getty, an heir and family patriarch. Whether his telling will land with readers remains to be seen, but the memoir draws new attention to Newsom’s undeniable success in the wine and restaurant business. Before he entered San Francisco politics, Newsom opened a wine shop, PlumpJack Wines, with backing from Getty and others, according to previous Bee reporting.

He and his business partners went on to run Balboa Cafe, a highly successful restaurant in San Francisco, and then a high-end winery in Napa and a luxury hotel abutting the base of famed Tahoe ski resort Palisades Olympic Valley.

This story was originally published February 5, 2026 at 3:07 PM.