A Million Little Pieces Controversy

[RockRaines]

cool.

 

i'm just gonna sit here and stare at your avatar, if that's OK.

IM actually on the verge of changing it

[The Critic]

Since its fiction, you need to look at it as fiction.  His first book places him in rehab with Leonard.  That is where he meets him.  I dont care what actually happened, its still a good book, and a great story.

His book was turned down by multiple publishers when he offered it as a work of fiction.

It's only when that fiction became "memoirs" that it got published.

 

I am glad you like his books, I don't really have any interest in reading his works, more from his original endorsement by Oprah than the subsequent controversy.

[Texsox]

It is interesting that people who found inspiration in this guys story, when they believed it to be true, suddenly have lost that inspiration whe they learned it was fiction. I guess when someone publishes a book that becomes a "self help, here's how I saved myself", people want the guy to actually have suffered. How about a "that is great, you didn't spend all that time in jail".

[CanOfCorn]

It is interesting that people who found inspiration in this guys story, when they believed it to be true, suddenly have lost that inspiration whe they learned it was fiction. I guess when someone publishes a book that becomes a "self help, here's how I saved myself", people want the guy to actually have suffered. How about a "that is great, you didn't spend all that time in jail".

 

Because it's perspective. You can relate to a guy who went through the same thing. "This person suffered like I am and look at him now."

 

When it's all a lie, you don't have that ideal to look up to anymore. I'm not saying that this is always the case, because many people find it within themselves to get over whatever it is they are getting over. But sometimes it feels good to know that someone is saying what you are feeling and what they did to get over it.

[False Alarm]

It is interesting that people who found inspiration in this guys story, when they believed it to be true, suddenly have lost that inspiration whe they learned it was fiction. I guess when someone publishes a book that becomes a "self help, here's how I saved myself", people want the guy to actually have suffered. How about a "that is great, you didn't spend all that time in jail".

i think the jail thing is balanced out by the "hey, nice job exploiting those girls' deaths" thing.

 

i dunno, maybe my animosity toward him has nothing to do with his betraying his readers' trust or ignoring the ethics of writing nonfiction. i'm really a lot more upset that i lost two hours of my life eight years ago when my then girlfirend (now wife) made me go with her to see this:

 

Kissing a Fool.

Edited January 27, 2006 by False Alarm

[BigSqwert]

Does it bother you that what he presents as the truth, are actually lies? That most of that didn't happen?

Not really. It was a good read.

[Middle Buffalo]

There are errors in every auto-biography and biography that gets published. This is done either on purpose, or as an accidental error of ommision. I think that it's most likely done puposefully with the intent of making the subject look good.

 

I don't really get the uproar here. I know the guy presented the story as non-fiction and he embellished and flat out lied about some things, but that happens all the time. There are historical myths that have been perpetuated by scholars and teachers for years and years. The history that we learned in school is, in many ways, propaganda. So this guy changed some "facts" and flat out lied at times. He was trying to make some money. Big deal. Judge the book for the story, not for the truth.

[bmags]

There are errors in every auto-biography and biography that gets published.  This is done either on purpose, or as an accidental error of ommision.  I think that it's most likely done puposefully with the intent of making the subject look good.

 

I don't really get the uproar here.  I know the guy presented the story as non-fiction and he embellished and flat out lied about some things, but that happens all the time.  There are historical myths that have been perpetuated by scholars and teachers for years and years.  The history that we learned in school is, in many ways, propaganda.  So this guy changed some "facts" and flat out lied at times.  He was trying to make some money.  Big deal.  Judge the book for the story, not for the truth.

 

^^^does anyone think these are the first memoirs to be embellished???

[whitesoxfan101]

I'm just waiting for Oprah to secede from the Union and take 98% of America's women with her.

 

So true man. Most every girl I have ever known loves Oprah, it's really an amazing strangehold she has on the female population.

[False Alarm]

There are errors in every auto-biography and biography that gets published.  This is done either on purpose, or as an accidental error of ommision.  I think that it's most likely done puposefully with the intent of making the subject look good.

 

I don't really get the uproar here.  I know the guy presented the story as non-fiction and he embellished and flat out lied about some things, but that happens all the time.  There are historical myths that have been perpetuated by scholars and teachers for years and years.  The history that we learned in school is, in many ways, propaganda.  So this guy changed some "facts" and flat out lied at times.  He was trying to make some money.  Big deal.  Judge the book for the story, not for the truth.

sorry, the everyone-else-has-done-it defense is a joke. further, bringing biography and history into the discussion doesn't help your case. sure, there're invented s*** and mistakes and perpetuated myths in these genres, but it's kinda tough to deny that it's standard for authors to attempt to adhere to fact when describing events (thus the exhaustive bibliographies, reference lists, and citations when people do that kinda work). yeah yeah, history's written by the winners; that doesn't mean most peeps who are really interested in history don't try to determine what genuinely happened in the past.

 

as for judging the book for the story, how do you even do that with a memoir? i mean, the events are unalterable; they're what happened. so how do you evaluate the plot? how do you say, "oh, this sequence was implausible," or, "that was an ingenious twist," when it's not a plotted fiction but an account of a chronology of actual events?

 

this isn't really about frey. if it's not obvious, i haven't read MLP and don't intend to. it's about a s***ty and irresponsible genre (memoir) that's flooding the market, and frey's just emblematic of the problems in the genre. y'alls can pass it off as just-a-good-read this and truth-is-relative that and everyone else does it besides, but if no one cares about the fact that these are purportedly true stories, why's memoir outsell fiction by a rate of anywhere from 2:1 to 6:1, depending on your source? it's unlikely that all the writing talent in the language has suddenly and inexplicably flocked to memoir. seems much more likely to me that most readers actually care about and find themselves compelled by what they think is a truthful account.

[False Alarm]

^^^does anyone think these are the first memoirs to be embellished???

no one ever said or implied that.

[CanOfCorn]

I think part of the problem was that he continued to relay these stories as the truth. In fact, he bathed in them.

 

Three little words woulda saved his ass: "Based on fact."