Trump is reportedly looking for ways to block his niece Mary's tell-all memoir, including suing for NDA breaches

Having the U.S. Justice Department file a civil breach-of-contract lawsuit against former White House National Security Adviser John Bolton to delay the public release of a book that will embarrass the president, citing nondisclosure agreements Bolton evidently signed, is strange. But President Trump has also "begun discussing siccing his lawyers on his niece," The Daily Beast reported Tuesday night, citing two people familiar with the situation.

Trump was privately briefed Sunday on what he could expect from Mary Trump's noir family memoir, slated to hit shelves July 28, The Daily Beast says, and he has already told confidantes his lawyers will "explore what could be done in the way of legal retribution — or at least a threat — likely in the form of a cease and desist letter," mentioning an old NDA at one point.

Mary Trump, now 55, signed an NDA in 2001 as a part of a legal settlement over the estate of her grandfather Fred Trump, people familiar with the matter tell The Daily Beast, and it reportedly states she isn't allowed to publish anything about that litigation or her relationships with Donald Trump and two of his three his living siblings, Maryanne and Robert. Mary is the daughter of Fred Trump Jr., who died in 1981.

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Mary Trump is expecting the upcoming book to strain or sever some of her remaining family ties, and she's "prepared for whatever may come" from her volatile uncle, Vanity Fair's Joe Pompeo reports, citing one of Mary Trump's acquaintances. "I think she's been getting herself ready for this moment for a really long time," the source told Pompeo. Trump and her various legal and literary agents have been working on the book for a year and a half, Vanity Fair reports, so presumably they have already considered the legal ramifications.

As for President Trump, "based on my experience, if you're asking me which book the president would be more upset about, the Mary Trump one or the John Bolton one, it would be Mary Trump's," former Trump adviser Sam Nunberg told The Daily Beast. "It's about family, it's a personal betrayal. The president has dealt with disgruntled past employees saying things and criticizing him. But in all my research — and I'm very well read on the Trumps — I've never seen something like this."