Frey'd Not II

It's funny how short everyone's attention span is these days.

Last week the media and blogosphere were afire with talk of James Frey and his book, A Million Little Pieces. This week nada. And the weird thing is I thought I didn't really give a fiddler's, when in fact, I haven't been able to get it out of my head since my last blog on the matter.

Ragdoll posted a link to a great article she felt encapsulated her feelings on the matter. I have found mine, sort of. I had a knee jerk mental rejection of Scott Donaton's characterization of books as brands, because I certainly don't think of my work in this manner, at least not first and foremost.. But as I thought on it more, I realized that his point was that books, like brands make a promise in their own way. You can read the article in its entirety here, but you'll need to register to do so [it's free.] But for me, this was the section of Donaton's article that pretty much hit it out of the ballpark:

We could argue endlessly over Doubleday’s insistence that “the power of the overall reading experience is such that the book remains a deeply inspiring and redemptive story.” The power of the book, for me, emanated from its presentation as truth. Frey’s redemption was so moving precisely because these seemingly unbelievable things had all really happened to one human being, and yet he had found the strength to endure and triumph over them. If many of those things didn’t happen, or even some of them didn’t happen, that power is sapped.

I loved “A Million Little Pieces,” and while I may have read and enjoyed it if it were labeled a work of fiction, it wouldn’t have resonated in the same way. In any case, that’s beside the point -- that should have been my call to make, not the publisher’s.

As a writer, it's certainly how I feel overall about my work. I give my best. I give my truth. I may not give everything, but I don't present what isn't there and if I'm writing a factual how-to article, I sure as hell don't make it up and hope for the best. I think the whole "memoirs are embellishment" take is completely pretentious. Honestly. Am I to read Night by Elie Wiesel and at the same time be thinking "Ok. The Holocaust. Is it really as bad as he's saying it was?" At some point, the truth has to count.

I still stand by my remarks in my previous blog and I'm still glad that Frey wrote his book and that Oprah defended Frey's achievements as a recovered addict. It's still a remarkable story. But I must admit, my experience as a reader has been tarnished. And that's too bad.

But I'm probably one of the last bloggers standing on this. In a couple of days, we'll have all moved on to something else.