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Pants On Fire

Posted on January 11, 2006 by Sarah Eaton.

I know, I know, everybody else is already talking about this, and you're probably sick of it, but I just cannot stop myself from commenting.

James Frey, of A Million Little Pieces-authoring fame, has been accused of exaggerating many of the exploits that he details in his memoir.  (See The Smoking Gun for a really long article about it.)

I haven't read it because two things prevent me from doing so: 1.  I believe books about drug/alcohol-fueled stupidity tend to be boring.  2.  I won't read an Oprah-book-club book.  (That's just plain book-snobbery, I know.  Go ahead and yell at me.) 

The issue at hand for me is this (and I feel like it can be applied to all kinds of writing, including marketing writing, writing for your newsletter, blogging, etc.): When you say something is true, it had just better be true.  That doesn't mean mostly true.  It has to be completely true for it to be true.

A while ago, I read The Fabulist by Stephen Glass (the disgraced journalist who was fired for making up articles), and discovered afterward that many of the scenes in the book turned out to be scenes that actually occurred in his life.  But this book was filed in the fiction section.  Stephen Glass (or one of his advisers, perhaps) had learned his lesson. 

But, here's the thing that makes me feel kinda ashamed: Now I want to read A Million Little Pieces.  Books about someone else's drunken stumblings might be boring, but books about liars?  Fascinating.

I wonder how many other people will feel the same way about this and rush to their nearest book store to see what all the fuss is about?  And, I wonder if this stage in Frey's life will be fodder for memoir number three.

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January 11, 2006 in award winning blog, award winning magazine, award winning newsletter, Award winning publications, Blogging Tools, Brand enhancement, Building B2B Relationships, Building Customer Intuition, bulk email marketing, business credibility, Business publications, CMO, company blog, company magazine, company newsletter, company newsletter sample, corporate magazine, Corporate newsletter, create a newsletter | Permalink

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