In an effort to make people pretend to care about books again, the publishing world is up in arms at the news that James Frey lied about pretty much everything in his book, A Million Little Pieces. This book, which was being listed in the non-fiction section of bookstores, suddenly finds itself as a bad novel relegated to the oft-ignored fiction section to join all the books pretending to be literature. But the flap just keeps going on, what with thousands of middle-aged women being told to read a book that turned out to be false.
The reasons for all this uproar are fairly obvious. After all, when a writer tells people that he assaulted cops, met a mafia boss in prison, and beat addictions to every major drug in existence on a whim, he'd better be telling the truth. After all, that's far too stupid for fiction, so it really better be true. Which is exactly the problem.
I'll admit, I never read any of A Million Little Pieces. I never wanted to read it, I never intended to read it, and I am not going to read it. In fact, the only reason I heard about this book is because people started noticing that it was all a bunch of lies.
The problem here is the simple fact that everyone (and when I mean everyone, I mean everyone who does what Oprah says) was talking about a book with absolutely no redeeming value, aside from the fact that it was supposed to be true.
This is not to say that the truth value of a book is not a merit on its own. This is, in fact, why I read encyclopedias, dictionaries, newspapers, and science textbooks. The information in them is true -- at least for now -- and I can pick up valuable information from them. However, the difference between these books and A Million Little Pieces is the fact that the latter is a narrative.
Narratives should have value outside of their actual truth value. I do not read Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy because it is true. I read it because it is interesting, funny, and I like the story. The value of truth simply does not come up.
Or let us take another example -- Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises. There is some truth is this book, as it is generally considered a roman a clef, or truth-based story that won't cause the author to get sued. As an example of some true things in The Sun Also Rises, I know there is a Spain and a France and you can go fishing, go to fiestas, and have your dick shot off. However, when I read The Sun Also Rises, I didn't care whether or not any of it was true. Rather, I thought it was an entertaining enough story and I could relate the people and events and the way the characters moved through the tale. It was simply a way to look in on places and people that may or may not have existed. And even if they never existed, it was fun to go along with them for the ride.
Now let us take a third example -- the movie Fargo. It is supposed to be based on a true story. However, the story itself is false. None of it really happened. But I can still watch Fargo and enjoy it. Its value is not contingent upon the factuality of the statement "Based on a true story."
Finally, let us say that the lessons of the book are still the same, whether the book is true or not. There is nothing particularly bad about that idea, it has been used before. The problem, of course, is that the lessons of the book are all based upon the factuality of the events in the book. The wisdom imparted is that of experience and, if the experience does not exist, then there is no wisdom to be gained. For instance, if I were to base a cancer therapy method upon an apocryphal story of someone surviving cancer by filling his ears with floor wax, I am not going to provide very effective treatment. Bad advice is even worse when it speaks from a position of fabricated authority.
Now then, since truth value is not a deciding factor in the quality of a piece of work, why is everyone so angry about A Million Little Pieces? How about the fact that I know -- without reading the book, mind you -- that the author can't write for shit.
On what do I base this bold statement? First, the author is American and, as I have said before, there are only a couple of American writers who have succeeded in reaching the lofty heights of "mediocre". Fact is, most American writers don't care one bit about the words they are using when they write. To use a comparison used by a friend of mine, this is like a musician not caring about the notes he is playing. After all, music eventually comes down to the notes and writing, at its base, is all about the words.
Secondly, the author felt the need to tell people that the events in the book actually happened. This indicates that Frey himself was aware that his book has no redeeming value. Thus, he may not be able to write worth a damn, but he knows an angle when he sees one. So, when he does what any enterprising writer would do: he tells publishers what they want to hear in order to get published.
Oh, and thirdly, every excerpt I read online was of the quality I would expect from a lazy 5th-grader.
Yes, I'm sure James Frey feels very bad about what he's done. He's had two books published, he is cashing enormous checks every month, he gets his picture taken in white, collared shirts with the top button open just like every other writer, and he has a choice between doing second-rate reality shows or becoming a bad actor in his next career. Or he could just sit on his ass, invest his dough, and not do anything for the rest of his life. Well, except go out on the lecture circuit to justify his actions to himself and comment on writing and popular culture whenever he wants a few dozen new cars. How can he live with himself? Just fine, thank you.
In fact, the problem here is only partially Frey. Sure, he's an asshole who leeches off of the misery of others, but he is an opportunistic asshole who is merely the first to break the unwritten rules. And don't think that publishers haven't seen the sales figures -- they are going to spoon out whatever it takes to move the merchandise even if it means duping the consumers. And the writers are also taking note, since there are a lot of untalented writers out there who will do anything to get their name in the Library of Congress... and they will be copying Frey's recipe for success like it was written on a box of Stove Top.
How do I know this? Because I probably would have done the same thing. I'm a lousy writer, but I lacked the foresight of Frey. And crappy writers are the ones who would break any rule or even any law in order to get their work out there -- especially when they are first starting out. It just so happened that Frey beat everyone else to the punch and served up what people want. People want true, heartwarming tales of survival in the face of personal struggle, addiction, violence, squalor, and even imprisonment? Might as well slide them a big, greasy helping of it. And he apparently even threw in a bonus with a molesting priest, since those are trendy right now.
Frey served up crap because that is what is expected of modern writers. Not talent or insight -- just implausible stories that can make rich idiots feel like they are suffering along with the writer and feel better about being rich. After all, the book version of Frey turns out pretty good, from everything I hear. Thus, the moral of the story is that rich people are rich because they aren't dumb enough to smoke crack and become alcoholics. Of course, the problem really only arrives when rich idiots laud this garbage to the heavens and subject everyone else to their fantasies of misery.
By the way, this topic was, in many ways, covered much more succinctly and skillfully in the song "Common People" by Pulp.
Does James Frey deserve to be lambasted? Hell yes! But he is just one more name in a long line of incompetent authors who have been placed on the pedestal. The cause itself is not being addressed. That cause is the overwhelming problem that nobody can tell the difference between a good writer and a bad one; especially the people who publish books. And if that is true, then publishing is not a matter of skill. Instead, it would probably just be an honor bestowed upon people who are either pandering to the rich idiots who run publishing houses, or it would be almost entirely random. In which case Writer's Market should change their slogan to, "You can't win if you don't play!"
So, in the future, publishers would to well to stop asking why people don't read anymore. Instead, they might help themselves and the literature they claim to love by asking themselves why they can't produce anything worth reading.