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True Lies or That’s the Way I Imagined It
Oops, it happened again. Yet another author of a “memoir” has been exposed as a teller of fiction rather than fact.
Since these instances keep popping up, I’ve begun to think that the publishing industry may not care if the memoirs are, in fact, lies as long as the disclosure of the fakery draws plenty of attention. Remember that saying, “There’s no such thing as bad publicity.”
Case in point: the big brouhaha about James Frey. He was exposed as a liar, but his book is still on the shelves at Target and my branch library has two copies–of his new book.
Could it be that a faked memoir actually sells as well—possibly better than—real memoirs because of the publicity a fake generates?
I did a quick Amazon check during the week that the news about Margaret B. Jones broke. Love and Consequences was # 988. On the same day, James Frey’s, A Million Little Pieces was at # 1,438.
Now, I know that Amazon rankings can mean absolutely nothing when it comes to sales, but if nothing else, they show that people are interested in the books and looking at, if not buying, them.
There have been calls for publishers to fact check their authors, but it appears that as long as the books sell, publishers will keep publishing them. It’s like the debate about the tabloids. Most people agree they’re exploitive and trade in lies and rumors, yet people buy them. What are you gonna do? Besides, I think the whole argument misses the point entirely. Shouldn’t it be the authors who are held accountable for recounting the truth, not the publishers?
So, what do you think of the sudden rash of exposed memoir authors? Is it a symptom of our “I’ll do anything to get my 15 minutes of fame” society? Would you buy a memoir after you knew of the author’s duplicity? And, what’s your wildest memoir idea? Don’t forget, being raised by wolves has already been done.
